'A priority is updating computer systems that control power-plant operations'
From the Columbus Dispatch, Ohio
dispatch.com
'Will new century shut off utilities?
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Companies busy updating systems to prevent a glitch
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By David Lore
Dispatch Science Reporter
Jan. 12, 1998
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"Let's face it -- this is not something we've ever had to deal with before."
Craig Glazer, chairman of PUCO, said agency officials are being briefed this month by state computer experts on the situation. Meetings with utility executives probably will follow by spring.
"We certainly are interested in what they're doing and want to know what they're doing," Glazer said.
"But we regulate the companies, we don't manage them. It's their job first and foremost to fix the problem."
Joseph Valentine, vice president and Project 2000 director at American Electric Power, said PUCO hasn't imposed any reporting requirements in the past "but that may happen."
Valentine is one of about 50 AEP employees working full time on his company's Year 2000 project, which has its own office in Hilliard.
That number could grow to 100 employees this year, Valentine said.
A priority is updating computer systems that control power-plant operations (especially nuclear plants), customer billings, emergency response, environmental monitoring, power grids and coal deliveries, he said.
"We'll try and get it all done by the end of 1998, although there might still be some things to do during the first quarter of 1999," he said.
Ameritech, which provides local telephone service in Ohio and four other states, has about 300 employees working on the millennium bug, spokeswoman Anne Bloomberg said.
Ameritech's goal is to get all systems compatible with 2000 by the end of 1998 so that 1999 can be used for testing.
Despite such encouraging forecasts, some analysts expect breakdowns to occur, especially at smaller utilities that can't commit much money or manpower to the fix.
A national survey of 72 electric companies in November found that 17 percent, or one in six, had not yet begun a correction program, said Rick Cowles, Year 2000 program manager for Digital Equipment in Penns Grove, N.J.
In his online column last month, Cowles said he doesn't expect utility services to collapse on New Year's Day 2000.
More likely, he said, is a "gradual system degradation over a period of time, rather than an immediate big bang."
Charles Gray, general counsel for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners in Washington, said state commissions so far have assumed that utilities would make necessary fixes.
The 2000 problem "does, however, go right to the heart of a utility's obligation to serve," Gray said.
"My guess is that six months from now, this will be at more of a rolling boil." ' |
