Six Monthly Progress Report - Ofgem · Low Carbon Network Fund Six Monthly Progress Report 3 1. Executive Summary Project Falcon commenced officially on 3rd January 2012 with a kick

Low Carbon Network Fund Six Monthly Progress Report

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Project FALCON

Six Monthly Progress Report

Version 1.1

15th June 2012

Author: Sanna Atherton - Project Manager

Recommended By: Roger Hey – Future Networks Manager

Approved By: Paul Jewell – Policy Manager


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Contents

1. Executive Summary ......................................................................................................................... 3

2. Project Manager’s Report ............................................................................................................... 4

3. Business Case Update ..................................................................................................................... 6

4. Progress against plan ...................................................................................................................... 6

5. Progress against budget .................................................................................................................. 8

6. Bank Account ................................................................................................................................ 10

7. Successful Delivery Reward Criteria (SDRC) .................................................................................. 11

8. Learning Outcomes ....................................................................................................................... 14

9. Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) .................................................................................................. 15

10. Risk Management ..................................................................................................................... 15

11. Other ......................................................................................................................................... 16

12. Accuracy Assurance Statement................................................................................................. 16


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1. Executive Summary

Project Falcon commenced officially on 3rd January 2012 with a kick off meeting with the Project

Partners. This meeting was intended to set the vision for the Mobilisation phase and ensure that the

whole team were clear about the challenges ahead, not just for the Mobilisation Phase, but

throughout the project.

The project is progressing well and below we have summarised progress, lessons learnt and the

plans for the previous, current and next phase.

At a high level the plan for Falcon is over five phases. The first being Mobilisation and the second

Design. During this reporting period, we have moved from the former into the latter.

In September 2012 we will move into the build phase, which is where we will start building the SIM

and installing on site equipment. The results of this key design phase are therefore crucial to the

projects ultimate success.

Mobilisation

In this phase it was key to ensure that all partners were contracted with, and the building blocks put

in place to ensure that we transition effectively into design. This was a tight schedule, but it was

achieved. The only contract that was more difficult to resolve than we initially imagined was the

Data Access Agreement with Elexon. This is now agreed and the work to look at industry data can

commence.

The main lessons learnt from this first phase were around the academic parts of the project. In

particular resourcing, it takes a while for these resources to be recruited and therefore it made

progress in the first phase slower.

Design

All partners successfully moved into Design, starting to gather the requirements and drill down into

the detail. Workshops have been ongoing every week in order to facilitate the exploration of the

detailed solution design.

We have successfully started capturing the knowledge gained in the project and started the process

of collating it and sharing it via our website and WIKI. The collaboration aspects of the whole project

have been larger to plan and manage than first appeared to be the case- technology differences

between party organisations in part the main factor to consider. This has been a good learning point

and whilst small in the scheme of the project still worthy of capturing and disseminating none the

less.


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2. Project Manager’s Report

The Falcon project spans nearly four years and is divided into a series of phases. It encompasses

also a number of commercial and academic partners. The first task was to establish proper

project governance within WPD using a Project Review Group.

Whilst the project commenced on 1st December 2011, formal Project Kick off commenced on 3rd

January 2012 with a session with all project partners in Northampton.

2.1 Mobilisation

Mobilisation was from January to the end of March. It was intended as the phase that would

enable clarity of the roadmap, getting key contracts in place, setting the vision and moving

the project forward into design.

Key Achievements

All contracts agreed by the end of Mobilisation

Project office located in Milton Keynes

Key WPD staff brought into the project

Key Partner staff commenced work and embedded into the team

Work on Lowcarbonuk.com website commenced

Project Review Group (PRG) established and 1st gateway review (Mobilisation – Design

Phase) passed

Lessons Learnt

More work is required with academic partners up front, for example the recruitment

process for Research Fellows is dependent on Contracts being signed

Academic institutions have teaching and exam commitments during April and May,

which take priority. Understanding these constraints would have meant alternative

resources would have been secured to fill the gap and certain contracts would have

been structured differently.

Ensuring partner’s legal teams understanding LCNF IPR provisions fully is key. A

contract template is being developed by our legal team to simplify/tailor the provisions

depending on the type of partner.

2.2 Design

Design is the current phase. It started on March 1st. The project partners have been running

a lot of workshops with key WPD staff.


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Milton Keynes Council has also been engaged, specifically around communication and

engagement in the local community. This is a key aspect of Falcon and we are actively

looking at ways in which to ensure the best and most practical ways of ensuring wider

visibility.

We have also commenced work on benefits management as well. We want to ensure that

the benefits we anticipated are real, and can be measured. Where they don’t materialise we

want to ensure we have an approach in place that will enable us to capture other benefits.

Documentation is being produced; designs are already nearing first draft stage. Falcon’s

Telecoms Requirements have been documented and are currently being reviewed by key

WPD stakeholders. Following sign off, Cisco and Surf telecoms will develop a high level

telecoms design. A separate worsktream has been established by Cisco to document WPD’s

future telecoms requirements.

The Intervention Techniques Learning Objectives (what we want to learn from the project)

and Use cases (how the trials are going to be implemented) were initially developed by

Aston and Birmingham Universities. Due to resource constraints, these have been further

developed by WPD and Logica and the draft versions are now complete. The first draft of

the SIM Use case has been developed by Cranfield University and WPD.

Key Achievements

Lowcarbonuk.com website live including team wiki, team calendar, blogs and file storage

established

First podcast in production with OU

Telecoms requirements fully documented

Tender process initiated for:

o Trials DMS

o Battery Storage

o Substation Monitoring

Tender process complete for Load Estimation workstream. Contracts awarded to Energy

Savings Trust and Logica

Locations for the Intervention techniques to be deployed across the network have been

identified.

Locations to install the telecoms equipment have been identified

The MoD are releasing the 1.4GHz spectrum and have allowed us to use this bandwidth

in the Falcon trials area. This frequency spectrum might be suitable for use as an

industry standard for utility applications.

Lessons Learnt

The procurement process has taken longer than anticipated for the Trials DMS. We have

a mitigation plan in place to reduce any impact further downstream.


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Embedding Knowledge capture processes across all the project participants has been

difficult, due to assumptions that it would be intuitively picked up. We have since found

ensuring the approach is adopted to the necessary level requires consistent attention

and reinforcement. It is not something that can be done remotely and would have

benefitted from being walked through in more detail during the Mobilisation Phase.

Drawing upon other DNOs experience in terms of procuring battery storage units has

proved invaluable to helping us initiate the tender process for Technique 4.

Having a phased approach to the project has helped focus the team on breaking the

complexity of the project into manageable sections.

2.3 Outlook

We currently believe that we will achieve all of the deliverables expected within the Design

Phase on time and subject to Progress Review Group gate way review approval move into

the Build Phase.

3. Business Case Update

We forecast there will be no significant direct benefits (either carbon or financial) during the course

of the project trials, as there is no change to the existing DR5 plan.

We have, however, developed an approach for capturing benefits for each technique to ensure

future benefits are captured.

4. Progress against plan

Overall the progress of the project against plan is on target. There have been some delays in getting

the Use Cases for Techniques 1-6 written due to availability of staff at Aston University and this has

impacted on Benefits Management and the SIM. We have mitigated the delay around Use Cases by

doing a number of the related work within WPD, with the support of Logica.

In addition there has been a small delay to the work around the Trials DMS, this is due to the

procurement process and requirements gathering taking about 3 weeks longer than we had

envisaged.

During the next month we are mitigating the risk on Trials DMS by writing detailed requirements

ahead of the appointment of a Supplier of the system. This will reduce the work required later in the

Build phase.

The requirements capture for the SIM continues and is on target. We have been holding a lot of

requirements capture sessions and Use Case sessions. The documentation is in progress and we are

confident that the deliverables relating to the SIM will be completed.

Benefits Management, as stated previously, has been impacted by the progress on the Uses Cases

and learning objectives for the engineering techniques. Planning to mitigate the risks to this has

been undertaken and this is progressing well overall.


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5. Progress against budget

The following table show the items applicable to the Mobilisation and Design Phases of the project only i.e. Dec11- end Sept12. The design will dictate the

budget structure for the remaining phases; therefore a reforecast will be presented to Ofgem in September for review and approval.

Cost Category Total (£k)

Expected spend to end of May 12 (£k)

Actual Spend (£k)

Variance over period (£k)

Variance (%)

Comments

Labour

Project Management Costs (WPD) 813 76.2 77.1 0.9 1.2%

WPD Design Team 1468 204.4 28.4 -176.0 -86.1% There has been a delay in capturing costs incurred so far and transferring those costs to the relevant departments.

Equipment

Solution Design - Use Cases Review and finalise use cases

8 0 0 0 0.0%

Solution Design - Use Cases Detailed desktop network design

56 0 0 0 0.0%

Solution Design -Method infrastructure scenario investment model Design

8 0 0 0 0.0%

Contractors

Project Management Costs (Logica) 736 101.7 139.5 37.8 37.2% See below *

Solution Design - Use Cases Review and finalise use cases

240 60 0.0 -60.0 -100.0% See below**

Solution Design - Use Cases Detailed desktop network design

287 0.0 0 0 -100.0%

The contracts with all partners (except Logica and Alstom) are based on milestone payments. This specific cost will be release upon completion of the relevant work packages at the end of September.


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Solution Design -Method infrastructure scenario investment model Design

325 223.7 223.7 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination Market research with stakeholders

28 8.8 8.8 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination Electronic media

49 15.4 15.4 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination Workshops / seminars

302 95.0 95.0 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination FALCON Dissemination conferences

73 0.0 0.0 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination Academic dissemination

120 37.7 37.7 0 0.0%

IT

WPD IT Costs - Hardware and connection

72 6.75 0.5 -6.25 -92.6% There has been a delay in capturing costs incurred so far and transferring those costs to the relevant internal departments.

Learning dissemination - Market research with stakeholders

2 0.7 0.7 0 0.0%

IPR Costs 0

Travel & Expenses

Phase 1 - Solution Design 157 26.2 2.8 -89.3%

Contracts with most partners are on a milestone payment basis, therefore travel and expenses are included in those payments. Only Logica is on a Time & Materials basis. This figure will be addressed in the reforecast

Contingency 0

Decommissioning 0

Other

Phase 1 - Solution Design 421 0 0 0 0.0%

Learning dissemination 46 14.5 14.5 0 0.0%


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*We have utilised Logica more than anticipated during mobilisation and the Design Phase so far. Due to their detailed involvement in the proposed

solution during the bid phase, they have been invaluable in supporting the project transition into WPD. They are ensuring the elements of the technical

design remain true to the bid and are supporting the input and management of the other partners.

**Aston University has not been able to dedicate the resource required to the project due to teaching commitments. They have completed a small portion

of the work; however WPD and Logica have picked up the development and completion of the draft use cases and learning objectives. We are working with

Aston University to agree their scope for the remainder of the project.

6. Bank Account

Please refer to Appendix 1.


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7. Successful Delivery Reward Criteria (SDRC)

We have detailed below all of the key SDRC’s for the Mobilisation and Design Phases and highlighted

progress and challenges that we have made and faced.

SDRC Progress Challenges

Commercial agreements in place with Logica, Cranfield University, University of Bath, Alstom, Cisco and Aston University.

This has been completed. Timescales were in hindsight challenging. Made more challenging by the integration of CN and WPD, but the support from the partners and the WPD team was valuable in helping us get the contracts in place.

Documented SIM design blueprint

This is being developed as part of the design phase and we anticipate no issues with this being delivered.

No specific challenges have been experienced so far.

Prototype visualisation available for viewing



A customer data privacy strategy developed and documented

This is being developed as part of the Data Resilience and Back Up work.

Time constraints and availability of people may be a constraint for this deliverable, but we are confident that it will be achieved at the end of design.

Data resilience and back up methods developed and documented

This has not been started yet, but discussions are in hand with WPD IT to further determine the best way to provide this document.

A draft operations manual developed



A comprehensive communications plan detailing knowledge dissemination roles and responsibilities and activities will be complete.

This is nearing completion. The aspects outstanding are those pertaining to customers. It has been shared with the business, partners, Milton Keynes Council.

No specific challenges have been experienced so far and the next step is to submit it to Ofgem for their review.

A specific workshop will be held with other DNOs and LCNF project partners to share the output of the final trials design.

This is being arranged for July 17th.


A FALCON website, e-newsletter and podcast

Website is up and running, first podcast is in production with



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established the Open University. Further podcast content is under discussion. The e-newsletter is currently being developed.

Data access agreements will be in place with required processes approved for use by ELEXON by 31st March 2012.

This deadline was missed; there have been specific challenges which have now been resolved.

It has been more challenging to agree the contract with Elexon that originally envisaged. The main reason for the delay is the fact we went out to tender for the Load Estimation workstream. Until the contract(s) were awarded, the Elexon licence agreement had to be put on hold as the sub-licensee was not yet in place. The process has taken a lot longer than we originally estimated. However, agreement is now in place. There is no specific learning other than starting the supplier tender process earlier. We started dialogue with Elexon in January.

New customer groups will be defined and estimated demand profile curves developed

Work is progressing by the Energy Savings Trust, with input from UCL, to develop their energy model. New customer types are being defined for industrial and commercial customers, whereas the existing domestic customer archetypes will be aggregated into a manageable number of groups.

Some data quality issues are emerging which may present challenges to this work. It may be that improving data quality to allow data sources to be cross referenced will be time consuming

A dataset from the LV Network Templates Project data will be chosen, (based on the new customer groups) to validate the estimated demand profile curves.

A data store has been developed by WPD to hold the LV Templates data and it is starting to be populated.

The LV Templates project has been delayed in gathering data; however, in terms of project Falcon, we are still on track to obtaining the relevant data to provide an input into the hot spot map.

An interim report containing analysis results i.e. the applicability of calculated data vs. measured data, including analysis of error margins and model data validity across network types and time variations

Work is nearly complete to define the metrics and characteristics to be used in the analysis. Comparator data is available at the feeder level and work is in progress to cleanse this data. This is being developed as part

The interim report will be able to reference results from comparison at feeder level. However, substation level comparison will be dependent on the availability of LV Network template data.


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of the design phase and we anticipate no issues with this being delivered.

In October 2012,a specific workshop will be held with other DNOs and LCNF project partners to share the initial identified 11kV ‘hotspots’ from the data obtained from the LV Network Templates project.

The hotspot map is being developed by WPD and the Energy Savings Trust. Due to the challenges faced, there is a risk that this will not be available for dissemination in October.

There has been a change of approach in terms of how the hot spot map will be created. The original concept was that existing analysis tools would be run repeatedly with a manual process to change the input data. We now believe that it would be better to amend the analysis tools to allow for a less labour intensive execution.


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8. Learning Outcomes

The following shows the high level learning we have obtained in the Mobilisation Phase and in the

Design Phase.

Mobilisation Phase

More work is required with academic partners up front, for example the recruitment

process for Research Fellows is dependent on Contracts being signed

Academic institutions have teaching and exam commitments during April and May,

which take priority. Understanding these constraints would have meant alternative

resources would have been secured to fill the gap and certain contracts would have

been structured differently.

Ensuring partner’s legal teams understanding LCNF IPR provisions fully is key. A

contract template is being developed by our legal team to simplify/tailor the provisions

depending on the type of partner.

Design Phase

The procurement process has taken longer than anticipated for the Trials DMS. We have

a mitigation plan in place to reduce any impact further downstream.

Embedding Knowledge capture processes across all the project participants has been

difficult, due to assumptions that it would be intuitively picked up. We have since found

ensuring the approach is adopted to the necessary level requires consistent attention

and reinforcement. It is not something that can be done remotely and would have

benefitted from being walked through in more detail during the Mobilisation Phase.

Drawing upon other DNOs experience in terms of procuring battery storage units has

proved invaluable to helping us initiate the tender process for Technique 4.

Having a phased approach to the project has helped focus the team on breaking the

complexity of the project into manageable sections.

In addition a lot of planning has started for our first industry conference and this will take place on

17th July at the University of Bath. There will be a variety of industry and partner personnel invited

and it will be constructed to ensure that lessons learnt can be openly discussed with interaction

positively encouraged. We have also started, with the OU, filming the first podcast. This podcast will

provide an overview of the project and how it fits with WPD’s innovation strategy.

Gallomanor have also been engaged with Bath University around specific school collateral which will

take the Falcon project to schools, making them aware of what we’re doing, why and what it means

to them.


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9. Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)

No Intellectual Property Rights have been generated or registered during this period. It is not

anticipated that any further IPR will be generated in the next reporting period.

10. Risk Management

The project has a RAID log that is managed by Project Support and reviewed with the project team

and the PRG. The original RAID log was revisited early on in the Mobilisation Phase and has been

regularly updated since.

Partners report on their progress every two weeks and this informs the RAID log and its supporting

process.

We have detailed below the key risks and issues that we have and the actions that are being taken to

address them. Careful management of these forms a key part of our fortnightly Project team

meetings.

Risk Description Mitigating Actions

The hotspot map will not be available for dissemination in October.

There has been a change of approach in terms of how the hot spot map will be created. The original concept was that existing analysis tools would be run repeatedly with a manual process to change the input data.

Several meetings are being held with Energy Savings Trust to develop an approach to ensure the October date will be achieved. We now believe that it would be better to amend the analysis tools to allow for a less labour intensive execution.

Aston and Birmingham cannot deliver, whether through other priorities, lack of resource or lack of understanding

There is a risk that Aston cannot deliver their remaining parts of the project and we have seen evidence that other priorities have meant that deliverables have been later than planned, or not of the required standard.

WPD and Logica have picked up some of the early deliverables. We are currently working with Aston to restructure their scope over the remainder of the project. An engineering assurance has been appointed from University of Bath to help derisk the remainder of Aston/Birmingham’s work.

Cranfield can't deliver the SIM It was always recognised that

there was a risk that Cranfield

would not be able to deliver the

SIM.

Payments are based on

milestones achieved. Cranfield

are being closely managed by

the SIM lead and Technical

Solution Architect and have

successfully achieved some

early deliverables.

University of Bath don't have As their Knowledge Contract contains payment


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the quality within their team

to deliver parts of their

commitments

Dissemination scope becomes

clearer it has highlighted the

overall complexity and

deliverability of their relevant

aspects.

milestones linked to

deliverables; They have a

robust plan, provide regular

reports against the plan and are

being closely managed. The

Research Fellow will be in place

in July and will take on the

management of this

workstream.

The technology doesn't work as a whole

As the equipment is installed it

may not deliver what we expect

or it fails during testing

We are developing detailed

functional designs, descriptions

and testing plans. The Technical

Design Authority owns the

whole design and it’s

‘deliverability’. There is also,

close liaison between suppliers,

partners and WPD to develop a

deliverable solution.

Little or no customer take up for Techniques 5/6

Internal resource constraints

means the SIM development is

taking priority over techniques

5 & 6.

Other organisations with which

we have existing relationships

are being approached to

provide support. Customer

relationships will be leveraged

via Milton Keynes Council. The

customer communications plan

will be shortly submitted to

Ofgem for approval.

Logica and EST cannot deliver the load data work

There is a risk that this work cannot be delivered and therefore this may miss some key new knowledge for the industry.

The contracts with each party have been robustly discussed with plans forming part of the commercial arrangements.

11. Other

This section has been intentionally left blank.

12. Accuracy Assurance Statement

This report has been recommended by Roger Hey, Future Networks Manager and approved by Paul

Jewell, Policy Manager.

Documents

Six Monthly Progress Report - Ofgem · Low Carbon Network Fund Six Monthly Progress Report 3 1. Executive Summary Project Falcon commenced officially on 3rd January 2012 with a kick