Open Access Technology International recently announced the launch of what it says is the world’s first generative and agentic AI platform purpose-built for the energy industry through a pilot program with the California Independent System Operator.
CAISO, the balancing authority for 80% of the state of California and parts of Nevada and operator of the Western Energy Imbalance Market, and OATI are collaborating to understand the CAISO’s outage management system use cases, design the solution architecture, evaluate and select AI models, and deploy OATI Genie™ in an operations pilot.
Agentic AI is an AI system that can accomplish a specific goal with limited supervision, notes Cole Stryker, Editorial Lead for AI Systems at IBM, in a post on IBM's website. Agentic AI builds on generative AI techniques by using large language models to function in dynamic environments, he notes.
CAISO will evaluate the OATI Genie tool’s ability to analyze diverse datasets and operating procedures and streamline outage management procedures.
OATI Genie™ “was born from OATI’s legacy of robust research and development, designed to provide immediate impact for utilities, grid operators, power producers, and energy traders,” OATI said.
“We are excited to partner with OATI on this groundbreaking pilot program. This initiative fits in perfectly with our ongoing control center modernization program, which is designed to make sure our operators have the best tools available to them for maintaining system reliability,” said Dr. Khaled Abdul-Rahman, CAISO vice president and chief information and technology officer. “Improving situational awareness and freeing up time for other important tasks can make a real difference for our operators, who will have an opportunity to test this product later this year.”
CAISO’s pilot will determine the extent to which its outage management system, which includes structured tables, unstructured text and long review times for system operators, can be made more nimble and efficient using generative AI.
OATI Genie™ serves as a layer of intelligence to elevate and expand both existing and future OATI applications, including OATI webSmartEnergy® DERMS; GridMind® microgrid controller; webTrader™ energy trading; webTrans® transmission planning and scheduling, and more, “enabling more efficient and reliable decision making by power grid system planners and operators,” OATI said.
OATI Genie™ AI/ML models are hosted on OATI private data centers that voluntarily adhere to NERC CIP standards and audits, providing utilities and grid operators with an added layer of security over public clouds, OATI said.
OATI Genie™ brings the power of AI to the energy industry without mortgaging its tenants’ safety and security, it said.
Because public AI models and cloud infrastructure pose potential risks for utilities, OATI Genie™ models live exclusively on OATI’s data center servers.
After first analyzing an organization’s data, OATI Genie™ identifies procedures and patterns in order to streamline daily operations— by automating user-identified tasks and providing recommendations and insights into system conditions.
Other Grid Operators Pursuing AI Applications
Other grid operators in the U.S. have announced AI-related news in recent months.
The PJM Interconnection on April 10 announced a multiyear collaboration with Google and Tapestry to deploy artificial intelligence-enhanced tools to further streamline PJM’s planning process for connecting new generation resources to the nation’s largest electrical grid.
Hitachi and the Southwest Power Pool on June 5 announced a strategic partnership that they said will produce an integrated artificial intelligence-based solution that accelerates generator interconnection by reducing study analysis times by 80% while also informing faster, higher-quality decision-making by generator interconnection customers.
