Metering utility plant’s power

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Southern California Edison (SCE) serves more than 13 million customers in 11 central, coastal, and southern California counties. In the southern half of SCE’s service territory lies the Inland Empire, which is an area of 27,298 sq miles of commercial, industrial, and residential zones. The rapid growth of the area presented a critical need for electrical power in the wake of frequent deregulation blackouts and brownouts during the early part of the decade. In early 2006, the area’s need for additional power was met by the completion of the Mountainview generation facility in Redlands, Calif. The Mountainview facility, which was the state’s first new utility-developed power plant in 15 years, provided 1,054 MW of additional capacity to the grid.

Once operational, the utility launched a series of measures to improve service efficiency, while increasing responsiveness to regional power emergencies. As part of the process, SCE will construct 10 new customer service centers throughout its 50,000 sq-mile-service territory. In 2009 SCE opened its first service center in Wildomar, Calif. The new 97,553-sq-ft Wildomar facility features two multi-level main buildings and a single-story structure in the service yard.

Designed by Elements Architecture of San Juan Capistrano , the $38 million plant features solar panels installed over the service yard to generate electricity for the fuel dock, overhead lights, and other circuits. The plant uses energy-efficient lighting that automatically adjusts based on natural light levels during daylight hours. The energy-efficient measures helped the building receive a LEED-Gold certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

In order to meet the LEED requirements for measurement and verification of a facility’s energy envelope, the Wildomar facility selected D-Mon electric submeters from E-Mon LLC , Langhorne, Penn. Sunwest Electric, based in Anaheim, Calif., specified 277/480 V, 3-phase/4-wire E-Mon D-Mons to monitor electrical consumption (kWh) and demand (kW). Sunwest placed two meters on the 200 A circuits, one on the 1,600 A circuits, and one on the 3,200 A circuits in the three main buildings and the main switch board.

The submeters communicate raw energy data every 15 min. to the energy manager’s PC via the facility’s Ethernet local area network. “The E-Mon D-Mons were installed to see how much power is being consumed in each building and to compare this usage to similar non-green buildings,” said Sunwest Electric project foreman John Richards. “Benchmarking the energy-efficiency measures that were implemented in this facility will serve as a prototype for other service centers in the near future.”

The submeters allow commissioning agents to use the energy intelligence software to identify functionality and performance of electric, water, and gas systems. For new construction, like the Wildomar facility, the submeters provide a baseline facility energy performance to compare with that of other buildings of similar size and type. The D-Mon submeters helped the Wildomar facility collect LEED points in Commercial Interiors, Core & Shell, and Energy and Atmosphere sections.

AT A GLANCE

At the new Mountainview customer service in Wildomar, Calif., the use of electric submeters to measure the facility’s power usage helped contribute to its LEED-gold certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

Sunwest Electric specified 277/480 V, 3-phase/4-wire E-Mon D-Mons to monitor electrical consumption (kWh) and demand (kW). Two meters were placed on the 200 A circuits, one meter was placed on the 1,600 A circuits, and one meter was placed on the 3,200 A circuits.

The submeters help the building’s energy manager monitor the building’s energy use by communicating raw energy data to a PC via the facility’s Ethernet local area network.

The submeters helped the Wildomar facility collect LEED points in Commercial Interiors, Core & Shell, and Energy and Atmosphere sections.

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