On May 20, over 200 members attended the EDA Awards Gala to celebrate LDC excellence in the sector. Thank you to EDA Board Chair Chris White, President and CEO of ERTH Corporation, for hosting the event, and to our corporate and event sponsors for their generous contributions. Hat offs to our LDC members for all the amazing work you do in the communities you serve. That’s why, this year, every LDC member will be recognized as a winner of the Public Electrical Safety Excellence Award, sponsored by the Electrical Safety Authority (ESA). Congratulations to this year’s award winners in the following categories for all your hard work and well-deserved recognition: The LDC Performance Excellence Award recognizes outstanding performance in occupational health and safety, operations, finance, conservation, and contributions to the community. This year it was awarded to Entegrus Powerlines for accomplishments that included a comprehensive health and safety management system worthy of IHSA CORTM 2 ...

The latest breach to the Colonial Pipeline highlights the importance of cybersecurity in critical infrastructure. Following the ransomware infection, Colonial had to shut down its pipeline control system—which is responsible for approximately 45 per cent of the fuel for the East Coast of the US. This comes as the municipal water facility for Oldsmar, FL is recovering from a breach where an attacker attempted to raise sodium hydroxide levels in the water being treated to levels that could harm its residents. Although the Colonial breach details are not fully known, the Oldsmar breach occurred due to weak access controls and the use of insecure remote access software. Key takeaways: The Oldsmar breach was thwarted because a water utility technician noticed irregularities in changes to the sodium hydroxide level in the utility’s control system. The question is: how well are utilities proactively monitoring their OT environments for cybersecurity events? Luck should not be a factor in identif ...

The following statement from Minister Greg Rickford, Minister of Energy, Northern Development and Mines was presented at the 2021 EDA Award Gala on May 20:   Statement by Minister Greg Rickford, Minister of Energy, Northern Development and Mines Electricity Distributors Association Virtual Awards Event    On behalf of the Ontario government, I want to extend our congratulations to today’s award winners. Recognition of your service to Ontarians is well deserved.  I’d like to thank the Electricity Distributors Association and its members for your commitment, dedication and remarkable flexibility during the COVID-19 pandemic.  This has been an extraordinary year for Ontario’s electricity sector. The EDA’s members have remained nimble, resilient and committed to managing this evolving and complex environment. As the closest point of contact for Ontario’s electricity customers, your efforts helped to ensure that supply continued unin ...

Utilismart Corporation is hosting a webinar on Thursday, May 20, where they will unpack what the future for utilities looks like beyond meter-to-cash. Experts from Utilismart will take a deep dive into some of the challenges, opportunities, and steps utilities in Ontario can take to leverage advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) for efficient grid monitoring to improve grid visibility while looking at ways to reduce operational costs. Utilities will be able to gain greater insights into their distribution grid by understanding how they can leverage data analytic solutions that will allow them to engage and serve their base better.  This session will demonstrate how advanced utility analytics can enable utilities to journey towards a data-driven, digital utility. Specific topics include: Engineering analysis Asset performance (transformer and voltage monitoring) Grid visualization Outage management Interoperability Innovation Data confidentiality and security Utilities of today ...