Transmission & Distribution World

New product offerings include Jumper Terminals, Full Tension Joints, Dead End Joints, and Repair Sleeves

MANCHESTER, N.H., June 4, 2009 — FCI-BURNDY® Products, a manufacturer and provider of connector and tooling solutions to the industrial, telecom, and energy industries, now offers products for Transmission Interconnect applications with the introduction of a range of IMPLO™ implosive connector products. These new product offerings include IMPLO Jumper Terminals, IMPLO Full Tension Joins, IMPLO Dead End Joints, and IMPLO Repair Sleeves.

The new implosive connector products accommodate a wide range of ACSR, ACSS, ACSS/TW, ASC, and ASC/TW conductors. They provide consistent, smooth, high quality installations, and require no tools or dies. FCI-BURNDY IMPLO Dead End Joints are available in various dead end configurations, tap pad angles, and eyebolt versions. Jumper Terminals and Dead End Joints come with a 15 degree tap pad standard.

The increasing acceptance of implosive technology as a means for the installation of transmission connectors for the utility marketplace is the result of intensive research and development coupled with successful testing and field installations. The result is a high-quality, long-lasting connection synonymous with that of the FCI-BURNDY Transmission portfolio of products.

FCI-BURNDY Products is committed to providing consistent excellence in quality, reliability, and service to the electrical utilities industry, in the safest possible manner, at the most competitive cost, and to the highest possible standards.

Press Contacts:

Amelia Decesare

617-367-0100, ext. 118

adecesare@gr2000.com

About FCI

With operations in 30 countries and sales of 1.25 billion euros in 2008, FCI is a manufacturer of connectors. Our 13,000 employees are committed to providing customers with high-quality, innovative products for a wide range of consumer and industrial applications. For more information: www.fci.comAbout FCI-BURNDY® Products

FCI-BURNDY® Products is a division of FCI, the fourth largest connector manufacturer in the world with operations in 30 countries. Headquartered in Manchester, New Hampshire, FCI-BURNDY® Products is the only manufacturer to have the BURNDY® Engineered System of coordinating dies, connectors and tools. The three elements have been specifically designed to work together and engineered to meet stringent, accepted quality standards -– allowing the user complete confidence in the integrity of the connection.

For additional information, contact us at 47 E. Industrial Park Drive, Manchester, New Hampshire, 03109, call Customer Service at 1-800-346-4175, or visit our Web site at www.BURNDY.com.

Carrollton, Georgia, May 28, 2009 — ASTM International recently published two new standards for high-strength steel transmission conductors: ASTM B957 – 08 and ASTM B958 – 08.*

These standards are an effort by the ASTM’s voluntary standards development organization to create a benchmark by which aluminum-conductor, steel-supported (ACSS) transmission conductors with ultra high strength (UHS) cores should be manufactured and installed. These standards ensure a high level of product quality, consistency, and performance throughout the utility industry.

Southwire’s Mark Lancaster, manager of overhead transmission engineering, is vice-chairman of the ASTM B01 committee that developed the new standards.

“Southwire has offered an ultra high strength steel core product – HS285 – for several years,” Lancaster says. “When the committee wanted to develop a standard for UHS ACSS conductors, we looked directly to HS285 as the model.”

Utilities today require transmission lines with higher capacity and lower line loss. Ultra high strength steel conductors like Southwire’s HS285 offer an advanced core technology that delivers just such benefits.

“Southwire’s HS285 delivers approximately the same strength and installation tensions as traditional ACSR, but with much less sag under high temperatures,” states Lancaster. “It also allows utilities to push the limits of their line design and deliver more capacity without the hefty price tag of the alternative conductors. It’s also a perfect fit for reconductoring projects where line design can’t be changed. And now, it’s even a standard-bearer for the ASTM.”

To learn more about Southwire’s HS285, visit www.southwire.com/hs285. To learn more about the ASTM standards, visit www.astm.org.

*ASTM B957 – 08 is titled ‘Standard Specification for Extra-High-Strength and Ultra-High-Strength Zinc-Coated (Galvanized) Steel Core Wire for Overhead Electrical Conductors’ and ASTM B958 – 08 is titled ‘Standard Specification for Extra-High-Strength and Ultra-High-Strength Class A Zinc–5% Aluminum-Mischmetal Alloy-Coated Steel Core Wire for Use in Overhead

Electrical Conductors.’

About Southwire:A technology leader for over 55 years, Southwire Company is the leading wire and cable producer in North America. Southwire manufactures utility cable products including overhead and underground transmission and distribution cable, building wire and cable, industrial power cable, copper and aluminum rod, and continuous-casting rod technology. For more information about Southwire products, services, and technical resources please visit www.southwire.com.

Press Contact:

Carol Godfrey, VP of Energy

770-832-4242

Southwire Company

One Southwire Drive

Carrollton, Georgia 30119

May 19, 2009 — Depending on where an electricity or gas customer lives in Europe, the price that customer has to pay for electricity can be around 300% that of another country. This is justone of the many findings of the monthly Household Electricity Price Index for Europe (HEPI), launched today by the Austrian Energy Regulator (E-Control) in collaboration with the VassaETT Global

Energy Think Tank. At 30.88 euro cents/kWh, Copenhagen power customers are paying 270% more than power customers in Athens. And at 13.71 euro cents/kWh, gas customers in Stockholm are paying 322% more than gas customers in London.

Based on the electricity and natural gas prices collected both for incumbents and competitor companies in capital cities of EU15 member states, E-Control GmbH and VaasaETT have compiled an overall index: The Household Energy Price Index, HEPI. The HEPI is a weighted end user price index that assesses the overall price

development.

The HEPI is Europe’s only independent comparative monthly index of electricity and gas prices across the _EU 15′ states. Nearly a year of research and development has gone into ensuring a methodology whereby prices are comparable between companies and between countries. Data is collected directly from utilities and authorities in the respective markets.

E-Control GmbH and VaasaETT will continue to monitor the overall price development. An update will be available in early June 2009.

KEY FINDINGS AS OF MAY 2009

European Energy Prices Falling

The figures for the HEPI reveal that both for electricity and gas, end-user prices for households have decreased constantly across EU15 member states since January 2009. The is mainly due to lower wholesale market prices for electricity and gas which has fed through (sometimes with a delay, as in the case of natural gas) to the end user.

Big Variations in Prices paid by European Energy Customers

* Electricity customers in Copenhagen currently pay by far the highest prices within the capital cities of the EU15, around a third higher than Berlin, the next most expensive city. This is due largely to much higher energy taxes in Denmark, which make up the majority of the energy price. Customers in Helsinki and Athens pay the least, in fact just over one third of the prices paid by the Danes.

* For gas, it is customers in Stockholm who pay by far the highest prices within the capital cities of the EU15, over 50% higher than in the next most expensive cities Copenhagen, Berlin and Rome.

* Gas customers in London, pay less than in any other capital city, with the closest cities Luxemburg, Paris and Lisbon around 25% more expensive

Slightly Different Picture when Taxes are Excluded

* The picture is slightly different when taxes are excluded, with Luxembourg, Dublin and Amsterdam respectively the most expensive for electricity. Paris becomes the cheapest city for electricity, followed closely by Stockholm, Helsinki, Athens, Berlin and London respectively.

* For gas Stockholm remains the most expensive when taxes are omitted, followed by Athens, Dublin and Berlin. London remains the cheapest, followed by Rome and Copenhagen.

Mixed Savings

For electricity customers switching from the standard incumbent tariff to the leading competitors typical tariff, the biggest current typical savings are available in Stockholm, followed by Vienna and Lisbon, with annual savings (given constant prices) of around 103 Euro to 56 Euro respectively. Interestingly, savings in London, Europe’s most active energy market, are modest in comparison.

In some countries, however, savings are effectively zero where prices are capped low (as in Paris) or where the capital city incumbent has a very competitive incumbent price (as in Helsinki). Savings are much larger when gas and electricity and gas savings are aggregated, with Berlin and Brussels leading the way with

savings of 164 and 144 Euro respectively. Savings in most cities are higher if customers switch to the cheapest competitor.

Contact:

Christophe Dromacque: Tel: +358449990138 /

Christophe.dromacque@vaasaett.com (English / French)

Dan Rieser, Tel: +43 664 621 0938 / dan.rieser@e-control.at

(English / German)

About the Authors

E-Control

E-Control GmbH was set up by the legislator on the basis of the new Energy Liberalisation Act and took up work on 1 March 2001. E-Control is headed by Mr Walter Boltz as the managing director and is entrusted with monitoring, supporting and, where necessary, regulating the implementation of the liberalisation of the Austrian electricity and natural gas markets. More at: www.e-control.at

VaasaETT Global Energy Think Tank

The VaasaETT Global Energy Think-Tank is a provider of collaborative expertise and solutions to the energy and utilities industry, through its network of thousands of senior executives, officials, researchers and other experts that are mostly

known and trusted personally. Value is provided to partners through the synergy of Interactive Forums (both real and virtual) and Collaborative Projects. The Think-Tank focuses broadly on strategic business, market, innovation and regulatory issues, and is world renowned for its expertise in fields such as Customer Psychology & Behaviour, Utilities Marketing, Smart Metering & Demand Response, and Market Efficiency. More at: www.vaasaett.com

May 20, 2009, UK — Protective relay installations that are based on IEC 61850, the new international communication standard for electricity substations, can now be tested easily and conveniently with Megger’s popular and versatile MPRT test set.

To provide a comprehensive and dependable test solution for installations and relays that use this important new standard, Megger has introduced an IEC 61850 option for the MPRT, together with the new MGC (Megger Goose Configurator) software package.

The MGC software allows users to import parameters from configuration files in SCL (Substation Control Language) format, and use them to configure the MPRT test set to subscribe to pre-selected GOOSE (Generic Object Oriented Substation Event) messages. Data from the received messages is assigned to the binary inputs of the test set, so that the messages effectively take the place of hard-wired connections to the binary outputs of the relays.

This arrangement provides for both manual and automatic relay testing, using either the integral Touch View Interface (TVI) of the MPRT test set, or Megger’s AVTS software relay testing software.

The MGC software can also be used to assign the binary outputs of the MPRT to GOOSE messages to allow the simulation of circuit breaker status. In addition, the TVI can be used to perform high-speed trip and reclose timing tests, and fully automatic testing is supported using test files created in Megger’s AVTS relay testing software package.

Among the many other functions available with the IEC 61850-enabled MPRT test set are high speed trip and reclose timing testing via the AVTS Dynamic Control feature, and manual high-speed timing tests using the Touch View Interface, for which the MPRT fully satisfies the timing requirements of the IEC 61850-5 standard, Type 1A, Class P 2/3.

All existing Megger MPRT protective relay test sets can be upgraded to provide IEC 61850 support, while retaining their full functionality for testing conventional relay installations.

Contact:

Mark Johnson, Megger

Archcliffe Road, Dover, Kent, CT17 9EN

Tel: +44 (0) 1304 502100

Email: mark.johnson@megger.com

Web: www.megger.com

Media contact:

Amanda Price, Fresh Public Relations Ltd

Tel: +44 (0) 1562 68793

Fax: +44 (0) 1562 544202

Email: amanda@freshpublicrelations.co.uk

Web: www.freshpublicrelations.co.uk

ABB North America CEO Santacana seeks greater urgency in creating open standards at Smart Grid Leadership meeting in Washington, D.C.

Washington, DC, May 19, 2009 – ABB, a power and automation technology company, announced that Enrique Santacana, president and CEO of ABB in North America, participated with a select group of power executives at a special Smart Grid Leadership meeting called by U.S. Secretary of Energy Dr. Steven Chu and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, this week in Washington, D.C.

Santacana called for greater collaboration within the industry and with government leaders, as well as a greater sense of urgency among all stakeholders in creating new industry-wide open standards for smart grid development in the United States and elsewhere.

“We believe that development and adoption of open protocols and systems are necessary for the U.S. to properly develop the emerging Smart Grid,” said Santacana. “ABB’s extensive global experience, combined with innovative products, systems and technologies, can clearly help to provide direction and guide this effort. This challenge will require a greater collaboration and sense of urgency from all stakeholders, and we are certainly willing to play our part.”

The Smart Grid Leadership meeting was a kickoff to this week’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Interim Smart Grid Standards Interoperability Roadmap Summit. NIST has been charged with coordinating standards bodies for the Smart Grid. ABB participated in the first NIST workshop in April, and is sending seven global power experts to participate in this week’s roadmap-working sessions.

ABB’s History of Standards Leadership

ABB is active in technical standards’ committees with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA), helping to develop cross-border power industry technical standards. Santacana was instrumental in setting up a new NEMA Smart Grid Advisory Council made up of the major electric power components and systems manufacturers.

Santacana also sits on the U.S. Department of Energy’s prestigious Electric Advisory Council (EAC).

IEC 61850 Standards

ABB has been actively involved in the development and adoption of IEC 61850, the first international standard for electric power device communication interoperability. ABB established the first manufacturer’s IEC 61850 system verification center qualified by the UCA International User’s Group, which consists of 98 member companies from 29 countries.

All ABB transmission and distribution protection and control devices used in substation and distribution automation devices such as relays, communication gateways and substation controllers, go through a vigorous testing to ensure compliance to the IEC 61850 standard. ABB has the largest installed base of IEC 61850 devices globally, extending to more than 600 electric power systems in 57 countries.

As announced by DOE Secretary Chu and Commerce Secretary Locke on Monday, IEC 61850 will serve as the initial smart grid interoperability standard for substation automation and protection.

About ABB

ABB (www.abb.com) is a leader in power and automation technologies that enable utility and industry customers to improve their performance while lowering environmental impact. The ABB Group of companies operates in around 100 countries and employs about 120,000 people. The company’s North American operations, headquartered in Cary, North Carolina, employ about 15,000 people in 20 manufacturing and other major facilities.

Contact:

ABB Media Relations

Bill Rose

Phone: 919-807-5743

Mobile: 919-244-4879

E-mail: bill.rose@us.abb.com

St. Paul, Minn., May 19, 2009 — Powel, Inc,, a vendor of utility software, recently awarded EnergyUnited their 2009 Innovation Award at the annual Powel User Group Meeting.

Brian Dacaret, construction manager for EnergyUnited, received the award. EnergyUnited, headquartered in Statesville, NC, is the 15th largest rural electric cooperative in the U.S., serving more than 120,000 members across 19 counties and more than 12,000 miles of line.

The award was given to EnergyUnited for their StakeOut (WorkStudio) design and work management implementation, which tracks all types of work orders, service orders and jobs from initiation through close out across four different systems. EnergyUnited is one of the first utilities to use StakeOut’s new ability to support multiple job types in a single implementation. EnergyUnited also developed customizations to allow access to StakeOut’s job information from their existing Cayenta CIS system.

EnergyUnited uses Cayenta CIS for service orders and SEDC Accounting for construction jobs, but they needed a better way to exchange information between the two systems and to increase visibility. For RUS reporting, EnergyUnited also needed to have their jobs in SEDC divided by 740c codes, so that no more than one code is used on each job.

In order to meet their unique work processing requirements, EnergyUnited defined eight different StakeOut work order types. Service orders are still initiated in Cayenta, while work orders are now initiated in StakeOut. In StakeOut, a work order that has overhead and underground units might be staked as a single work order, but for RUS reporting, it must be broken into multiple jobs. StakeOut handles this by allowing the user to design one single work order, and then before exporting it to SEDC, StakeOut runs an automation to break the work order into multiple smaller jobs with the units divided up based on the appropriate RUS categories. After jobs are built, as-built construction changes are recorded in StakeOut and results are integrated to the other systems, reducing data entry and error potential.

All completed work is also updated to EnergyUnited’s ArcFM GIS from Telvent. Before work orders are posted, StakeOut applies checks for accuracy and completeness, so that this interface not only reduces data entry and redrawing, but it also ensures data quality.

To improve work visibility, many utilities implement Powel’s InfoCenter web portal to view work orders from StakeOut, but EnergyUnited took their implementation a step further. They enhanced their existing Cayenta web-based system, so that it now displays work order information and comments directly from StakeOut’s database. Their office staff can see StakeOut’s information in the existing Cayenta system that they already use and are comfortable with. Any employee can not only determine a work order’s status, but can also see who owns the work order and who staked it, and can view the staking sheet and any associated comments.

EnergyUnited has also used the information created by StakeOut for productivity and work load analysis. They used the information from StakeOut to more efficiently meet their staffing needs by rebalancing work load throughout the territory.

According to Brian Dacaret, construction manager of EnergyUnited, “This award signifies the results of all the hard work and effort that was put into this implementation from both Powel and the EnergyUnited team. Their efforts truly pushed the limits of the software and our work practices in order to achieve a work order management solution that works best for EnergyUnited and its members.”

Scott Rogers, CEO of Powel, Inc, said, “We are delighted to give our Innovation Award to EnergyUnited this year. EnergyUnited took a detailed and thoughtful approach in how to best implement a design and work management system in their unique environment and worked with Powel as a partner throughout the process, applying the newest and most innovative technology. Their end result shows the outstanding efficiencies and work process insights that can be gained by such an approach.”

About Powel, Inc.

Powel, Inc., headquartered in St. Paul, MN, delivers software solutions that realize our mission of “Helping Utilities Work Smarter.” Powel WorkStudio is a Mobile Work Management platform with office-based analysis that helps utilities work smarter through the entire asset lifecycle, from design to construction to service, including right-of-way clearance, maintenance and storm assessment. WorkStudio incorporates Powel’s industry leading StakeOut field design application. Powel, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Powel ASA, a publicly held company serving customers worldwide.

About EnergyUnited

EnergyUnited, an innovative and dynamic energy services company, serves more than 120,000 electricity customers in 19 North Carolina counties, stretching from Virginia to northern Mecklenburg County and encompassing the fast-growing I-40, I-77, and I-85 corridors. Its service territory includes suburbs surrounding three of North Carolina’s largest cities - Charlotte, Winston-Salem, and Greensboro. EnergyUnited makes customer satisfaction its highest priority, and its electric customers enjoy one of the highest reliability rates in the industry. EnergyUnited also provides propane to more than 29,000 customers in 74 North and South Carolina counties and offers other specialized residential and commercial products and services.

Contact:

Mandy Bambenek, Marketing Director

Direct: 651.251.2958

Office: 651.251.3005

E-mail: mandy.bambenek@powel.com

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding to create 270 green jobs, protect human health and the environment

Kansas City, Kan., May 15, 2009 -– Federal, state and local officials will hold a formal groundbreaking ceremony Monday for the largest “green infrastructure” project in the State of Kansas to be funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009–a $16 million series of improvements to Johnson County’s Douglas L. Smith Middle Basin Treatment Plant.

According to estimates, the wastewater treatment plant improvement project is expected to create 270 new green jobs, result in almost $600,000 in annual cost savings for Johnson County wastewater utility rate payers, and reduce annual greenhouse gas emissions by more than 9,700 metric tons.

Components of the treatment plant improvements include the construction of a new anaerobic digester, a FOG (fats, oils and greases) station to more efficiently receive and treat used greases and oils from restaurants and industries, and a cogeneration system to produce virtually all of the plant’s annual operating energy from captured biogases.

News media representatives are welcome to join invited participants Kansas Department of Health and Environment Secretary Rod Bremby, Johnson County Board of Commissioners Chairwoman Annabeth Surbaugh, Johnson County Wastewater General Manager John O’Neil, and EPA Acting Regional Administrator William Rice at Monday’s ceremony.

WHAT: Groundbreaking for $16 million ‘Green Infrastructure’ project

WHERE: Douglas L. Smith Middle Basin Treatment Plant

10001 College Boulevard (Near College Boulevard and U.S. 69)

Overland Park, Kansas

WHEN: 10:30 a.m. Monday, May 18, 2009

President Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 on February 17, 2009, and has directed that the Recovery Act be implemented with unprecedented transparency and accountability. To that end, the American people can see how every dollar is being invested at www.recovery.gov. The Recovery Act seeks in part to spur technological advances in science and health and to invest in environmental protection and other infrastructure that will provide long-term economic benefits.

Contact:

David W. Bryan, APR

Public Affairs Specialist

Office of Public Affairs

EPA Region 7

901 N. 5th Street

Kansas City, KS 66101

Phone: 913-551-7433

Fax: 913-551-7066

bryan.david@epa.gov

Contact:

Chris Whitley

Phone: 913-551-7394

whitley.christopher@epa.gov

May 18, 2009, Copake, New York — High Voltage, Inc. serves the wind industry by providing portable VLF .1Hz Very Low Frequency AC hipots and AC HV Test equipment for proof testing the medium voltage collector cable circuits and switchgear commonly used on Wind Farms. The VLF .1Hz testing of Wind Farm power cable feeders and collector cable circuits per IEEE- 400.2 is a simple, cost effective, and conclusive quality assurance test method.

It definitively proves out the integrity of the workmanship, cable insulation and its associated accessories such as splices and joints. A VLF AC withstand test is an excellent test method for insuring the cable laying and workmanship of the new installation is good and will provide reliable, long term power distribution to the distribution grid the Wind Farm serves.

High Voltage, Inc. also can supplement VLF withstand testing with Tan delta testing diagnostics via a Tan delta bridge used in conjunction with a VLF AC Hipot. By monitoring the tan delta readings of a cable circuit over time, one can determine if a particular cable is beginning to show insulation degradation commonly caused by water trees possibly leading to a cable fault disrupting power delivery. By discovering a suspect cable before a catastrophic cable fault, plans can be made ahead of time to repair, rejuvenate or replace the cable and splices during a controlled repair outage minimizing power interruption and service failure. These two testing methods (VLF & Tan delta) are the easiest, most time proven, simple, and conclusive for Wind Farm managers and HV contractors to enhance and

continuously provide a reliable installation and reliable generation of power. High Voltage, inc. is very familiar with all cable testing technologies, and knows cables.

CONTACT:

High Voltage, Inc.

31 County Rt. 7A, Copake, NY 12516

Phone: 518-329-3275

Fax: 518-329-3271

E-Mail: sales@hvinc.com

Web site: www.hvinc.com

Agency Contact:

Walter Hearn Associates Inc.

Design for Marketing

1099 Deerfield Dr. NW

Blacksburg, VA 24060

Phone: 540-951-2853

Fax: 540-951-0591

E-Mail: whearn@whearn.com

Web: http://www.whearn.com