Thailand: Performance improvement, cost reduction and a smart grid pilot project at EGAT

Thailand: Performance improvement, cost reduction and a smart grid pilot
project at EGAT

OpenGov speaks to Waiboon Chanchio, Assistant Governor / Chief Information
Officer at the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT). Mr.
Chanchio talks to us about the ten-year digital development plan. It
outlines four key strategies:

Strengthen Core Business
Achieve High Performance Through Analytics
Create Future Workforce
Establish ICT Foundation

EGAT is a state enterprise under the Ministry of Energy. It is responsible
for electric power generation and transmission for the whole country as well
as bulk electric energy sales. EGAT is the largest power producer in
Thailand, owning and operating power plants located in 45 sites across the
country, with a total installed capacity of 15,548 MW, as of December 2015.

Could you tell us about the ICT strategy at the EGAT?

We have just developed a new ten-year digital development plan for our
organisation. As you know our core business is power generation and
transmission, Thailand government currently focuses on the digital economy
which includes government's transformation to digital. Our company has to
transform to digital as well. We have cross-functional teams in EGAT to
drive the move to digital for delivering more information and services to
our customers and users through lean and digitize processes.

What is being done in terms of bringing digital to your core business?

We have certain important initiatives in the digital development plan. We
are trying to prioritize and decide which areas we need to tackle first.

There is an important project called the Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)
we have started working on. We estimate that it will take around 3 years to
completely implement. We try to maximise the potential and value of our
critical assets, which include power plants and transmission systems, along
their lifetime.

We will also use big data analytics, as part of the EAM project. In our
power plants, massive quantities of data are received from a large number of
sensors. It is as we call it "big data". We will use analytics tools on the
data for our predictive maintenance routine plan. It will help decrease
maintenance expenditures, extend the longevity of our assets and reduce
unplanned downtime. With this solution, we would be able to efficiently
monitor and manage the deployment, performance and maintenance of our
assets.

In the digital development plan, there is a mention of developing EGAT's ICT
professional workforce, to improve employee skills. What is being done in
that regard?

We increase budget for training our ICT staffs. They are required to be
well-prepared for supporting and driving EGAT's new business process through
IT/OT integration.

Are you currently using any cloud-based solutions?

At the present, we grow on a private cloud in our own virtualized
environment. We have no public cloud-based infrastructure.

Right now, are you in the planning stage for all these, or have you started
implementing some of the projects?

At the moment, we are in the planning stage. We have finished drafting the
digital development plan. We are going to start implementing the
initiatives.

Do you need to collaborate with other agencies?

Yes, we do. We continuously collaborate with the Electronic Transactions
Development Agency (ETDA) (Public Organization) to work on cybersecurity.

One of the initiatives in the digital development plan is to incorporate
security-by-design in our projects.

So how will the existing systems and infrastructure fit into the security by
design initiative?

We have to develop, review and test them thoroughly. People, process,
technology and now, security - we comply with the standards and laws of
Thailand with regard to cybersecurity.

Along with development, we have to review existing infrastructure, test it
deeply to find security vulnerabilities and fix them.

In terms of People, they are the most important element. They need to be
professionally trained and developed. Though you have the latest and best
new technologies, failure of systems can be occurred at any time if people
are not careful enough.

Is there anything being done by EGAT in the Smart Thailand Plan?

We have a Master Plan for Smart Grid (SG) Development (2015 - 2036). The
objectives are to enhance energy security, improve productivity and services
through ICT application and move towards a more sustainable, low carbon
economy, with greater use of renewable resources.

One of the pilot projects we would like to mention here is Smart Grid in the
Mae Hong Son Province. It comprises 4 components which are Smart energy,
Smart system, Smart city and Smart learning.

What is your vision about the use of ICT at EGAT?

By using the converged ICT solution, we can enhance EGAT's competitiveness
in terms of business performance, productivity and profitability.

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Link to Original Article:
http://www.opengovasia.com/articles/7264-exclusive---performance-improvement
-cost-reduction-and-a-smart-grid-pilot-project-at-egat

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John Diecker
APT Consulting Group Co., Ltd.

www.aptthailand.com