Independent System Operators (ISO)
Energy is a vital resource in today's economy, and corporations like Independent Systems Operators (ISO) play an enormous role in the operation of the electrical power system by monitoring, coordinating, and controlling electrical distribution throughout designated states.
These vital organizations must maintain compliance with both internal and regulatory requirements, such as the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), ensuring that all processes are streamlined and efficient. EtQ is able to provide a solution that can not only meet the compliance demands of ISO organizations, but exceed them through use of automated workflow, integrated systems, and collaboration across the ISO community. The ultimate goal is to identify and mitigate high-risk events, and prevent them using tools EtQ provides.
Below are some examples of how EtQ is able to provide a solution to help benefit ISO organizations:
- Set up and schedule Audits on a regular or ad-hoc basis
- Generate Corrective Actions and Change Management initiatives based on results of Audit findings
- Generate a comprehensive Audit Report, detailing all compliance data for NERC, FERC, and internal requirements
- Utilize enterprise reporting to foster global trending reports across departments and operational areas
- Identify Corrective Action reports to foster continuous improvement initiatives and global trends from all ISO areas
- Corrective Action workflow streamlines quality processes and sheds light on areas of improvement
- Total Quality and Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) Management Solution to streamline operations and better manage organizational resources.
EtQ has developed an EHS Software system for Independent System Operators to help maintain quality to NERC and FERC requirements, while providing a flexible workflow platform to adapt to changing business processes, without programming.
Challenges Facing the ISO Industry
Unified Quality Process
Too often, business processes are disconnected, with audits, SOPs and the like not connected to the next phase in the record's life cycle. EtQ's EHS Software allows the process to be linked automatically and intelligently. Audit findings are investigated and opened as a Corrective Action if needed. SOPs are linked to the Employee Training database, and assignment are sent. Risk Assessment tools assess the risk of records throughout the process. This unified process for handling Environmental Health and Safety issues results in an efficient system, where no time is lost and no problem overlooked.
Business System Integration
As more and more business systems are implemented in an organization, the ability to communicate between these systems becomes difficult. As a result, crucial processes are disjointed and often rely on manual "jumping" between systems, which can lead to inefficiencies in the process. EtQ's EHS Software features a robust integration layer that allows for information to be passed to and from external systems, widening the scope of the quality process to include other business systems.
Read More on Integration
Download Integration White Paper
EtQ's integration technology can not only integrate at the site level, but connect business systems from one ISO to another. Using Enterprise tools such as the Enterprise Configuration Center, Quality Process can be filtered by ISO, by location, by department or by process and shared from one operator to the next. This coordinated integration allows for increased collaboration and fosters continuous improvement from one ISO to the next.
Collaborative, Enterprise Environment
Using EtQ's integration technology, Independent System Operators have the ability to collaborate and improve quality through the sharing of data from one ISO to the next. EtQ's Web-based EHS Software allows limited access points for various locations to share specific data on Health and Safety initiatives, and foster preventive actions to improve operations across all ISOs.
Advanced Search and Reporting
Having a system store your documents and records is often not enough to ensure quality within a business. The ability to rapidly retrieve documents and generate report on the state of the quality operation is a key need within the industry. EtQ's EHS Software features advanced tools to search for documents, create custom views within the application, and generate template or ad-hoc reports.