comet 2018comet 2018 - · pdf filemoderator: nicola gariboldi, qualitrol monetizing utility...

COMET 2018COMET 2018

2018 ProgramJanuary 30 – February 1, 2018

AT&T Executive Education Conference CenterHosted by: The University of Texas at Austin

COMET 2018 - Seminars

Tuesday, January 30: Level 1 – Classroom 105

Breakfast and Networking - Outside Classroom 105, Level 1

Seminar 1: High voltage circuit breaker: basic functionality and new SF6-free gassesPresented by: Nicola Gariboldi – Qualitrol Javier Mantilla – ABB Switzerland (remotely) Thomas Rak – PG&E (remotely)

8:30 AM – 9:30 PM

Lunch - Tejas Dining Area on Level 212:00 PM – 1:00 PM

9:30 AM – 12:00 PM

Seminar 2: Distributed Generation: Integrating Utility Scale Battery StoragePresented by: Lisa Martin – Austin Energy Josh Contreras – Austin Energy1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

COMET Social Event

Wine tasting and BBQ Participants should meet in the lobby near the AT&T valet area, directly outside theCarillon Restaurant; Tour Bus is scheduled to depart at 3:30pm.

3:30 PM – 8:00 PM

T&D Seminars

Condition based Online Monitoring of Electric Assets of 16


COMET 2018 - Conference Paper PresentationsWednesday, January 31: Level 1 – Classroom 105

Breakfast and Networking - Outside Classroom 105, Level 1

Remarks and WelcomeDr. Robert Hebner, Conference Chair, UT Austin

7:00 AM – 8:00 AM


KEYNOTE 1 - Kenneth M. Mercado8:10 AM -8:45 AM

8:00 AM – 8:10 AM

Paper Session 1: Return of Investment – The Bene�t of Condition MonitoringModerator: Nicola Gariboldi, Qualitrol

Monetizing Utility IoT Data with Cognitive Anomaly Detection & PredictionPresenter: Taj Darra, DataRPM

Implementing Transformer Fault Gas Monitoring for Operational and Financial Impact Presenter: Wesley Suplit, SDMyers

Data AnalyticsPresenter: Anjali Patel and Stuart Gillen, Sparkcognition

9:00 AM – 10:15 AM

Paper Session 2: New Challenges in the Network of the futureModerator: Joshua Contreras, Austin Energy

Protection Challenges and Solutions Enabling High DER Penetration inDistribution SystemsPresenter: Ning Kang, Argonne National Labs

Factors Motivating the Need to Strengthen the Interfaces Between Human Beingsand the Grid, and Suggestions on Best Practices Presenter: Dr. Michael E. Legatt, ResilientGrid, Inc.

Online Thermal Monitoring for Parallel Power TransformersPresenter: Allan Seamus, Dynamic Ratings

10:45 AM – 12:00 PM

Panel Session 1: Distributed Energy Resources (DER) – The new challengeModerator: Lisa Martin, Austin Energy

Panelists: Ning Kang, Argonne National Labs Allan Seamus, Dynamic Ratings Dr. Michael Legatt, ResilientGrid, Inc.

1:00 PM – 2:00 PM



COMET User Group MeetingBrady Johnson, American Electric Power (AEP)4:00 PM – 5:30 PM

KEYNOTE 2 – COMET CONFERENCE DINNER – Alan Ross, VP Reliability, SDMyers

CONFERENCE ROOM 3016:30 PM - 8:30 PM

Special Session - Grid Resilience and Disaster ManagementModerator: Alan Ross, SD Myers, Inc.

Presenter: Brian Ramatally, Carribean Analytical Services Group (CASL) Danny Ee, Austin Energy Dr. Michael Legatt, ResilientGrid, Inc Bill Beese, SDMyers

2:30 PM – 3:45 PM



Thursday, February 1: Level 1 – Classroom 105

Breakfast and Networking - Outside Classroom 105, Level 17:00 AM – 8:00 AM


KEYNOTE 3 - Bernie Cook8:10 AM -8:45 AM

Paper Session 3: Asset Monitoring Methods and ExamplesModerator: Tri Tran, Austin Energy

Upgrading a 400 Zone Gas Density Monitoring SystemPresenter: Emilio Morales, Qualitrol

Most Common Transformer Failures and Their PrinciplesPresenter: Dr. Michael E. Legatt, ResilientGrid, Inc.

Online Partial Discharge Monitoring of Medium Voltage Metal Clad SwitchgearPresenter: William Higinbotham, Eaton Technology LLC

Online Detection of Markers for Cellulose Aging in Power Transformers Presenter: Kai Haemel, Gridinspect

Paper Session 4: Analytics for Asset Condition AssessmentModerator: Brady Johnson, American Electric Power (AEP)

Analytics for DGAPresenter: Randy Cox, General Electric

Asset Management Analytics for a Sustainable GridPresenter: Qasim Aziz and Gautam Sonde, CenterPoint Energy

Data Analytics and Upcoming TrendsPresenter: Jason Dennison, On Now Digital

10:30 AM – 12:05 PM

2:45 pm - 4:00 pm

Panel Session 3: Analytics – What to do with all that Data?Moderator: Danny Ee, Austin Energy

Panelists: Qasim Azis, CenterPoint Energy Randy Cox, General Electric Taj Darra, DataRPM

1:15 PM – 2:15 PM

Panel Session 2: Latest Trends in Asset MonitoringModerator: Dr. Robert Hebner, UT Austin

Panelists: William Higinbotham, Eaton Technology LLC Emilio Morales, Qualitrol Tony Picagli, Dynamic Ratings

9:00 AM – 10:00 AM



COMET 2018 – Program and Planning Committee

The committee expresses their profound gratitude to Austin Energy for theirunwavering support as sole sponsor for COMET 2018.

Dr. Robert Hebner, University of Texas at Austin Chair

Alan Ross, SDMyers Co-Chair

Brady Johnson, American Electric Power Member

Kayla Zellers, American Electric Power Member

Danny Ee, Austin Energy Member

Tri Tran, Austin Energy Member

Josh Srp, Lower Colorado River Authority Member

Shannon Strank, University of Texas at Austin Coordinator

Hayley Reed, Qualitrol LLC Media



AT&T Center – Floor Plans

Level 1



AT&T Center – Floor Plans

Level 3



AT&T Center – Street Access

Parking Garage Access from W. 20th Street



Keynote Speaker Biographies

Kenneth M. Mercado

Bernie Cook

Alan Ross


A more than 30-year veteran of CenterPoint Energy and predecessor companies, Kenny Merca-do has �nancial and operational responsibility of the company’s electric utility.

This consists of a 5,000 square-mile service territory and power delivery to more than 2.3 million homes and businesses in the Houston metropolitan area.

Bernie Cook is an Executive Consultant supporting power utilities with implementing new IIOT equipment reliability process and technology solutions to address today’s signi�cant power generation challenges.

He is a retired power utility professional from Duke Energy with over 36 years of experience implementing advanced technologies to support operations and maintenance improvements.

Alan Ross is the Vice President of Reliability at SD Myers, Inc. in Tallmadge, Ohio. He is responsible for developing and executing long-term reliability strategies and next generation leadership for all operating units, both domestically and internationally. He often presents at industry conferences and has authored several trade publication articles on transformer maintenance and reliability, including articles featured in Solutions and Uptime magazines and has written two books: Uncon-ditional Excellence and Beyond World Class. He completed his undergraduate work in Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology and MBA in Marketing from Georgia StateUniversity, graduating Magna Cum Laude.


Speaker Biographies

Stuart Gillen

Anjali Patel

Wesley Suplit


Stuart Gillen is the Director of Business Development at SparkCognition. In this role, he is responsible for driving business engagements, partner development, marketing activities, and go-to market strategy. His areas of specialty include IoT architectures, platforms, and technolo-gies. He also focuses on how advanced data analytics can be applied to Asset Performance Management to optimize e�ciency, maintenance and safety on critical infrastructure. He earned his bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering and MBA from Kansas State University.

Anjali Patel is a manager of Customer Success at SparkCognition. In this role, she handles project management of SparkCognition’s A.I. products for customers in the energy industry, as well as business development and partnerships. Previously, Anjali worked at Accenture as a strategy and technology consultant with a focus on digital implementations for large gas and electric utilities. Anjali has a BSE in industrial engineering from the University of Michigan and holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

Wesley is responsible for generating, cultivating and identifying product and service gaps as well as innovative ideas that grow market share, improve customer experience and drive growth. His speci�c focus is on online monitoring and transformer life extension.


Speaker Biographies

Michael Legatt

Qasim Aziz

Gautam Sonde


Dr. Michael E. Legatt is the CEO and founder of ResilientGrid, Inc., whose mission is to grow resilient infrastructures by optimizing the human side of the infrastructure management, including situational awareness, decision making support and collaboration tools in normal and emergency operations, and in fostering the kinds of organizational culture (high reliability, just culture) that empower humans to work more e�ciently and e�ectively, lowering human error rates. Dr. Legatt has been a programmer for over 20 years, and worked in the energy, �nancial, medical, neuroscience research and educational sectors. He has M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Clinical Health Psychology/Neuropsychology from the Ferkauf Graduate School of Psycholo-gy/Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and M.S.E. and Ph.D. degrees in Energy Systems Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, and is a Certi�ed Performance Technologist.

Qasim Aziz is a Consultant in the Asset Management department at CenterPoint Energy. He has around eighteen years’ experience in the electric power industry in various �elds including engineering, protection, operation & maintenance, planning and project management in electric power generation, transmission and distribution �elds. His current job responsibilities include development of asset life cycle analytics for CenterPoint Energy’s assets.

Gautam Sonde is a Solution Architect for the Operational & Corporate Analytics team at Center-Point Energy with a combined experience of over twenty years in Information Technology. He has been charged with the delivery of innovative solutions in several areas such as �nance, asset management and smart meter analytics. He has led his team through architecture development to implementation of business solutions which includes the delivery of data models, reconcilia-tions, and value added self-service solutions using various state-of-the-art technologies.


Speaker Biographies

Taj Darra

Dr Ning Kang

Emilio Morales


Experienced Data Scientist with a demonstrated history of working in both large-scale enter-prises and smaller startups. Skilled in Machine Learning, Statistical Data Analysis, Statistical Modelling, Data Science, and Java. Strong engineering professional with a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) focused in Mathematical Sciences from The University of British Columbia / UBC. Robust deployment capabilities ranging from customer-facing situations to solely product deploy-ment settings to research environments.

Dr. Ning Kang is a Distribution Engineer in the Energy Systems Division at Argonne National Laboratory. She received her PhD degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Kentucky, Lexington, in 2010. She obtained her BSc in Electrical Engineering from Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China, in 2004. Prior to joining Argonne, she was a Senior R&D Engineer at ABB U.S. Corporate Research Center in Raleigh, NC, from 2010 to 2016. Her research interests include power system automation, protection, optimization, advanced distribution management system, microgrids, and renewable energy integration. Dr. Kang holds 6 U.S. patent applications. She is also a registered Professional Engineer in North Carolina.

Emilio Morales is a Technical Application Specialist in Transformer applications at Qualitrol Company LLC. His main focus is to support solutions in comprehensive monitoring for Trans-former applications Emilio attended Nuevo Leon State University in Mexico, receiving his Bach-elor of Science degree in Electro Mechanical Engineering in 1980. Emilio has spent his entire career in the power transformer manufacturing industry. His has over 30 years of experience in design which includes transformers up to 500 MVA and 500 kV as well as furnace and recti�er transformers and di�erent type of reactors. He is member of the IEEE/PES Transformer Commit-tee, IEC and CIGRE and actively participating in di�erent task forces. Emilio joined Qualitrol in June 2012 and previously worked with GE-Prolec , Ohio Transformer, Sunbelt Transformer and Efacec Power Transformers.


Speaker Biographies

William Higinbotham

Jason C. Dennison

Thomas Rak P.E.


Mr. Higinbotham is the president of EA Technology LLC in Denville NJ USA. Since founding the US subsidiary of EA Technology Ltd in 2013, Mr. Higinbotham has been responsible for all operations in North and South America. He has authored and presented many papers on partial discharge testing and condition based asset management to bodies like IEEE, CEATI, and EPRI. Prior to EA, Mr. Higinbotham was Vice President of RFL Electronics Inc. Research and Devel-opment Engineering group. He joined RFL in 1988 as a senior design engineer. In this role, he architected and lead the development of numerous RFL products in the areas of utility commu-nications and system protection. Bill is a senior member of the IEEE and has been active in the IEEE Power Systems Relaying and Power Systems Communications Committees. There he co-authored several IEEE standards. Bill received his BSEE from Rutgers University in 1984. He holds one patent in EHV teleprotection.

Engineering and Creative professional with 13 years of technical leadership and project management experience across multiple industries. Currently focused on creating engaging user software and web experiences for electrical asset owners, and leading Internet of Things (IoT) and analytics initiatives to help transform data into wisdom. Extensive experience in new product development across software development, transformer maintenance, oil and gas transmission, metal machining, and rubber and plastics manufacturing. Six Sigma Black Belt, co-author of DGA Monitoring Technology Study (2015), and Adjunct Instructor for Transformer Maintenance Principles.

A graduate of New Jersey Institute of Technology with a BSEE (power concentration) and Portland State University MSE. Tom has over 20 years of experience in the electric utility indus-try managing electrical distribution design, substation design and generation design. Tom is presently the management sponsor for the implementation of a Substation Asset Condition Monitoring system at PG&E.


Speaker Biographies

Josh Contreras

Lisa Martin

Seamus Allan


Josh Contreras is a Power System Engineer Senior at Austin Energy (AE), the City of Austin’s municipally owned utility. Josh currently works in the System Engineering workgroup that supports integrating Distributed Generation into the AE system, and previously worked in Transmission Relay for seven years. Josh is a registered Professional Engineer in the State of Texas.

Lisa Martin is a Program Manager of Advanced Technologies at Austin Energy(AE), the City of Austin’s municipally owned utility and one of the largest publicly owned utilities in the nation serving more than 450,000 customers. Lisa is currently the project manager for Austin SHINES, a project funded in part by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). Austin SHINES establishes an open standards-based Distributed Energy Resources (DER) management platform to integrate and optimize DER at several levels along the utility value chain. Prior to working at AE, Lisa worked for Southern California Edison (SCE) in the �eld of energy markets and power and gas origination. Lisa has a BS in Electrical Engineering and an MBA in Operations Management. Lisa is a registered Professional Engineer in the State of Texas.

Seamus is the Product Portfolio Manager for Dynamic Ratings and is based in Dynamic Ratings’ headquarters, in Sussex, Wisconsin. Seamus has recognised subject matter expertise in many areas including transformer and electrical apparatus monitoring and control technologies for Dynamic Ratings. He has worked for Dynamic Ratings since 2008, moving through various roles including software development, on-site commissioning and product development. Seamus graduated with an honours degree in electrical and electronic engineering from the University of Canterbury, New Zealand in 2007. Seamus’ experience includes his working in several coun-tries, where he held a variety of positions ranging from software development to the site management of transformer assembly, providing both ‘under the hood’ and on-site application views of electrical asset monitoring and control with a global viewpoint.


Speaker Biographies

Kai Haemel

Tony Picagli, PE

Randy Cox


Professional with 15 years of experience in development and application engineering of protection devices, sensors and monitoring systems for high voltage equipment. Worked 10 years for MR/Messko as head of R&D department with responsibility for new and running prod-ucts, test department and technical sales support. Together with Joerg Preusel founder of GRIDINSPECT GmbH in 2013. Main focus on application engineering of sensors and monitoring solutions for high voltage equipment including installation, commissioning and data evalua-tion. Inventor of several patents for protection devices and sensors for high voltage equipment. Member of standardization committee for EN 60076 (part transformer accessories).

Tony Picagli is a Principal Engineer for Circuit Breakers at Dynamic Ratings, Inc, Sussex WI. Tony joined Dynamic Ratings after 37 years of electric utility experience at United Illuminating, Orange, CT. He is past chairman of both the Doble Circuit Breaker Client Committee and the Doble Timing and Motion Committee. He has been involved with EPRI, equipment manufactur-ers and testing/maintenance companies as a subject matter expert for both circuit breakers and stationary battery systems. He has been an IEEE member for over 40 years and is active partici-pant in the IEEE Standards Association. He is a Registered Professional Engineer in the State of Connecticut and possesses both a BSEE and MBA from The University of New Haven in addition to completing the Power Technology Extended Program at Power Technologies Institute (PTI) now Siemens Power Academy TD – North America.

Randy Cox is the Domain Expertise Manager for GE Grid Solutions, M&D. His current duties include interfacing with the industry, committee work and education of customers on the technical advantages of GE M&D technology, products, software and solutions.


Speaker Biographies

Javier Mantilla

Nicola Gariboldi

Brian Ramatally


Holds an M.Sc. in Mechatronics and an M.Sc. in Power Engineering from the RWTH Aachen University Ten years’ experience in high voltage circuit breaker R&D with ABB Switzerland. Main focus on environmentally friendly technologies. Expert in CIGRE WG A3.26 and WG A3.32 Senior Member of IEEE.

Since July 2017 in Qualitrol as Technical Application Specialist 23 years in ABB • 3 years Surge Arrester development • 12 years High Voltage Circuit breaker development • 5 years in GIS and Circuit breaker testing • 3 years in Short Circuit Laboratory

Member of CIGRE, IEC, IEEE

Brian Ramatally is the President of CASL’s group of companies with locations in Trinidad, Surina-me, Jamaica and South Florida. He holds a BSc. in Chemical Engineering from Queen’s Universi-ty, Canada, and a Masters in Business Management from Anglia Ruskin University, England. Brian has over 25 years of experience in the industry. He has presented at Reliability Plant Conferences in contamination control, particle counting technologies and on lubrication management. As a Franchise Partner for Noria Corporation since 2002, Brian has delivered lubrication training, consultancy and management program development to the steel, cement, power generation, LNG, re�neries, mining, and oil and gas companies within the Caribbean region.

Brian is the past Chairman and current board director of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, Trinidad and Tobago Section and was the recipient of the Hermit Waldron Award in 2017. He supported the development of the Society of Tribology & Lubrication Engineers, Trinidad section, in 2002. He served on several international subcommittees inclusive of the Internation-al Council for Machine Lubrication for ASTM International Standards Development, American Chamber of Trinidad & Tobago, and the Association of American Chambers of Latin American. He is a Past President of the Rotary Club of San Fernando South and an active Rotarian since 1994. Brian has served in many humanitarian projects within the Caribbean region.

comet 2018comet 2018 - · pdf filemoderator: nicola gariboldi, qualitrol monetizing utility...

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