Black Hills Power started installing smart meters in customer homes in June 2010 under its AMI initiative.
Sixnet’s IndustrialPro routers provide cellular connectivity to remote locations and devices such as meters, sensors or RTUs in industrial environments.
The AMI collects data from smart meters at more than 69,000 customer sites over a 3G cellular network, allowing Black Hills Power to remotely monitor energy consumption and maximize power availability.
Black Hills Power communications engineer Rick Dobbe said the security, performance and reliability of Sixnet’s rugged cellular routers give the utility real-time access to data so that it can remotely monitor energy use, outage and restoration notifications and alarms.
