El Paso Electric Implements FASTapps™ From Efacec ACS as First Phase in Smart Grid Program

ATLANTA, June 10 /PRNewswire/ -- With the testing and commissioning phase successfully completed, El Paso Electric (EE) has added automated fault detection, isolation, and restoration capabilities to feeders in its Santa Teresa, NM service territory using the FASTapps™ feeder automation platform from Efacec Advanced Control Systems.

El Paso Electric joins a growing number of utilities choosing Efacec ACS' award winning FASTapps technology. FASTapps (Feeder Automation and Substation Technology applications) is a flexible, powerful substation-based solution for improving network performance, reliability and efficiency through self-healing feeders.

FASTapps offers a number of advantages over other feeder automation schemes:

• FASTapps easily adapts to any abnormal network configuration in real–time – no pre-defined scripts or programming is required.
• Works with existing switches, controllers and protection schemes - leveraging existing infrastructure.
• Expands easily to a large number of feeders or devices.
• Slashes restoration times to less than 20 seconds, dramatically improving key performance indices.

“This is an exciting project for us and we are pleased to continue a key partnership with El Paso Electric”, said Efacec ACS CEO Jose Barbosa. “EE is a progressive utility that is focused on providing improved reliability and delivery efficiency for their customers using Smart Grid technologies such as FASTapps.”

El Paso Electric has embarked on a key Smart Grid project to implement distribution automation, funded partially through a smart grid stimulus grant agreement signed with the DOE in April of this year. The second phase of the project, slated for 2011, will include a Distribution Management System with feeder automation for the Van Horn region in EE’s Texas service territory.

“El Paso Electric is committed to delivering the full benefit of distribution automation to our customers, improving reliability and enabling us to respond more quickly and efficiently during emergency conditions,” said Richard Turner, Director of Corporate Development for EE. “FASTapps and advanced distribution applications from Efacec ACS are a key component of our current Smart Grid initiatives.”

El Paso Electric is a regional electric utility providing generation, transmission and distribution service to retail and wholesale customers in a 10,000 square mile area of the Rio Grande valley in west Texas and southern New Mexico. El Paso Electric's common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol EE.

About Efacec Advanced Control Systems

Efacec Advanced Control Systems is a provider of smart grid solutions to the global electric power industry. The Efacec ACS software suite provides integrated distribution and outage management, simulation, optimization, and enterprise business intelligence. Efacec ACS automation product lines include a wide range of flexible and cost-effective substation, distribution, and feeder automation solutions. Efacec ACS is powering the utility of the future -- today. For more information, visit www.efacec-acs.com.

SOURCE Efacec Advanced Control Systems