VASS Solutions is providing smart grid expertise and program management support to Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative (SMECO).  Mark Michaels provides SMECO with continuing smart grid technical and business consulting services.  Scott Stein is providing guidance on SMECO’s search for an asset management solution.

In 2009, Mark Michaels began advising SMECO, a customer-owned cooperative of nearly 160,000 electric customers, with the creation and refinement of its AMI business case. Mark led the joint SMECO and consulting team in architecting and writing multiple Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) regulatory filings and served in an advisory capacity in support of SMECO’s preparation, response and testimony at the PSC hearings – culminating in 2013 with PSC approval to proceed with AMI implementation. Mark continues to support SMECO today with the selection of an endpoint installation vendor to complete deployment of AMI across SMECO’s entire service territory.

Mark’s role and expertise include:

• Supporting SMECO’s strategic assessment of AMI and related technologies in support of operational goals and EmPOWER Maryland requirements.
• Assisting with the development and refinement of SMECO’s smart grid implementation roadmap – including prioritization of key capabilities required by the Maryland PSC as well as the benefits realization SMECO needed to achieve success.
• Identifying critical next steps/priorities and development of a cohesive strategy and roadmap for an Integrated Smart Grid Strategy that includes AMI, MDMS, DMS/SCADA, OCS and a Customer Web Portal for advanced usage information.
• Supporting efforts to define, develop, and issue AMI RFP requirements for a multi-phase AMI implementation that forms the groundwork for SMECO’s smart grid implementation.
• Successfully executing an AMI solution pilot that validated expected costs and demonstrated that the benefits achieved from the pilot would be representative of the benefits that SMECO could expect to achieve across a full system-wide deployment.
• Supporting the procurement of an Outage Communications System (OCS), SCADA replacement solution, Customer Data Presentment solution, and End Point Installation Vendor.
• Providing ongoing technical, program implementation and deployment management support.

In 2010-11, Scott Stein provided consulting services for procurement of SMECO’s MDMS and Systems Integration partners, all a part of SMECO’s Smart Grid implementation. Scott is currently providing consulting service and expertise to assist SMECO with the selection of an Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) System to complement existing operational systems such as work management (WMS), geographic information system (GIS), and mobile workforce management (MWM). 

Scott’s role and expertise include:

• Support for MDMS and systems integrator vendor solicitations, evaluations, and procurement.
• Affirmation and refinement of SMECO’s critical EAM requirements.
• Identification of potential EAM vendor partners.
• Development and issuance of asset management RFP.
• Facilitation of EAM procurement process including interviews and demonstration sessions and contract negotiation support.



VASS Solutions’ personnel have also helped SMECO define requirements, procure, and implement a Siemens/eMeter EnergyIP MDMS with their Sensus AMI operational landscape. This included development of an architectural context definition of their enterprise functional elements, and the overall integration planning efforts required for successful execution. VASS Solutions’ personnel also led the requirements definition and procurement of the Systems Integration and development vendor.