Noteworthy AI, a provider of artificial intelligence-enabled distribution grid intelligence solutions, on Oct. 15 announced that each of the 32 member utilities of the Florida Municipal Power Agency will have access to Noteworthy AI’s Inspect platform.
The program follows FMPA’s competitive request for proposals for an AI Utility Infrastructure Data Collection System, through which Noteworthy AI was selected as an awarded provider.
Participating members gain standardized terms, negotiated group-buyer pricing and flexible deployment options suited to different priorities, budgets, staffing levels and project timelines.
FMPA is a Joint Action Agency that serves over 2.5 million Florida residents from the Panhandle to Key West, approximately 11% of the state’s population.
FMPA’s Joint Purchasing Program enables negotiated program pricing that can be up to 80% lower than conventional field collection and data analysis methods, depending on project scope and deployment model, Noteworthy AI said. "This gives smaller and resource-constrained utilities access to capabilities and economies of scale that may otherwise be difficult to achieve independently," the company said.
Members can purchase camera systems for continuous use on existing fleet vehicles, collecting data passively during routine operations; rent cameras for targeted projects, baseline patrols or storm assessments; or engage Noteworthy AI for turnkey collection services, including vehicles and drivers, for accelerated coverage.
Noteworthy AI’s Inspect platform uses AI-enabled, vehicle-mounted cameras to automatically geolocate distribution poles and capture high-resolution, timestamped imagery as vehicles travel through a utility’s service territory.
Near-real-time, cloud-based analysis supports asset inventory and GIS development, pole and equipment condition analysis, joint-use attachment inventories, outdoor lighting audits, vegetation detection and post-storm damage assessment, all from the same field collection and without separate, redundant truck rolls, it said.
Results are available in Noteworthy AI’s Inspect Cloud application and can be delivered into existing systems of record, including Esri ArcGIS Online.
The AI program builds on successful deployments with municipal members and other investor-owned, cooperative and municipal utilities across Florida, Noteworthy AI said.
At the City of Starke, for example, about eight hours of collection inventoried and inspected roughly 2,300 poles, and a third-party attachment audit identified revenue opportunities from previously uncounted pole-attachments, helping offset the project’s cost.
“Florida’s municipal utilities are cornerstones of their communities, and we’re excited to make advanced grid intelligence more accessible to FMPA’s member utilities,” said Chris Ricciuti, CEO of Noteworthy AI. “Whether a member purchases, rents or fully outsources collection, the program offers a practical, scalable path from GIS baselines to faster storm response.”
“We had no mapping system and were operating on tribal knowledge. There was no way to know how many poles, transformers, streetlights or joint-use attachments were out there, so we were working blind,” said David Sparks, Utility Director and Assistant City Manager for the City of Starke. “In just a few hours, Noteworthy AI gave us data that would have taken us years to collect. We don’t just see points on the map, we have a whole encyclopedia of knowledge of what’s at each point.”
Noteworthy AI said that routine collection builds a continually refreshed baseline of asset locations and conditions.
After hurricanes and other severe weather, the same technology accelerates damage-assessment patrols, expanding capacity when mutual-aid resources are constrained or focused on larger utilities affected by the same event, and giving operations teams earlier visibility for crew deployment, materials planning and restoration estimates.
"And while FEMA makes eligibility and reimbursement determinations independently, a current, timestamped visual record of pre- and post-event conditions gives utilities verifiable documentation to support eligible disaster-assistance claims and reduce the risk of qualifying costs going unreimbursed," Noteworthy AI said.
Noteworthy AI in April announced a new program that enables American Municipal Power to offer its more than 130 municipal electric utility members with a program that provides streamlined access to Noteworthy AI's Inspection platform through standardized terms and group-buy pricing.
In a recent episode of APPA's Public Power Now podcast, Branndon Kelley, Executive Vice President of Strategy and Innovation and Chief Strategy Officer at AMP, detailed how AMP members will benefit from the Noteworthy AI program.
AMP's membership spans nine states -- Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, and Delaware. AMP is a nonprofit wholesale power supplier and services provider and provides Members with power supply, transmission, and a broad suite of operational and technical services.
