Semantic Web Technologies for Power Grid Management

Utility companies worldwide are facing a multitude of new challenges, which can not be met with the historically grown, monolithic IT systems currently in use. Service oriented architectures are heavily used to integrate heterogeneous systems. One key aspect of this integration is the use of a common language, such as the Common Information Model (CIM). Important use cases are exchange of topologies and storage of topology histories. This paper describes the development and implementation of CIM Topology Store (CTS). CTS introduces new difference models for CIM/XML-serialized topologies. 1 Interoperability in the energy utilities domain Various reasons result in a growing need for energy distribution companies to exchange data between them. One reason is the close coupling and the physical interdependencies between networks operated by different companies. Other reasons are challenges posed by new developments like the legal unbundling laws passed in 1998 by the EU. These laws will force energy utility companies to dissemble their monopolistic functions like transport und distribution of electricity and reorganize them competitively. EMS systems often use proprietary data exchange formats and must be connected to other systems. Building specialized adaptors for interconnection between the systems is the most common and time-consuming task for IT-departments at utilities. The Common Information Model (CIM) [IEC03] establishes a common language and domain model for energy management systems and related data structures. Our solution adopted the CIM as a common language.