Newtown, PA - November 8, 2006 - Opvantek, Inc. announces the availability of two companion service offerings to help natural gas distribution utilities prepare for upcoming Distribution Integrity Management Regulations. After decades of experience helping customers with some of the oldest gas distribution infrastructure in the country to monitor threats and assess risk across their distribution network, we feel uniquely qualified to help with this new regulatory challenge.
First, our valuable Distribution Integrity Roadmap project will help an LDC to quickly inventory all current sources of knowledge about the piping infrastructure and the threats it faces. Then, we’ll work with the LDC to identify and prioritize gaps in their Distribution Integrity Management capability, and recommend a phased approach to address the highest priorities ahead of the impending regulations. We recently completed a DI Roadmap for a large combined gas & electric distribution company in the Midwest.
In addition, we’re offering to help operators draft their own written Distribution Integrity Management Plan. A written plan will almost certainly be a required element of any federal regulation. This is a natural follow-on activity to the DI Roadmap, or the two can be combined in a single, affordable project. As a deliverable to either of these projects, Opvantek will also be prepared to provide a proposal to implement our industry leading Distribution Integrity Management solution – Optimain™ DS.
Andy Benedict, Founder and Principal at Opvantek, is participating directly in the Gas Piping Technology Committee (GPTC) process to develop DIMP guidance materials for all operators. According to Andy, “These new offerings provide a way for us to bring our decades of industry experience to bear on a new regulatory challenge. We’re accustomed to using technology to integrate data from multiple sources, objectively measure risk and economic return on investment, and prioritize asset investments. That is exactly the type of solution we expect the new regulations and guidance material to suggest.”
About Optimain DS
Optimain DS is the company’s well-regarded pipe repair/replace decision support product for gas and water utilities. It also provides a powerful platform upon which to implement a distribution integrity management plan, in support of the anticipated natural gas distribution integrity regulations. Optimain DS can be installed as a standalone application or as a part of the Optimain product suite, which includes Optimain ACM (Asset & Compliance Management) and Optimain JPM (Jurisdictional Paving Manager). All of these products can be integrated seamlessly with key enterprise applications like work management, job design, and geographical information systems. Optimain DS is supported on client platforms running Microsoft Windows 2000 or Windows XP. Optimain DS relational data may be maintained in either a Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle repository. The Optimain GIS interface currently supports GE Energy’s Smallworld Core Spatial Technology™ and ESRI’s ArcGIS. Other enterprise GIS platforms will be supported upon request.
About Opvantek, Inc.
Opvantek, Inc. -- a leader in utility software solutions -- has long maintained that the key to operating a successful utility company in the face of an ever-evolving regulatory environment is in system-wide risk assessment & optimized asset management. Opvantek delivers best-in-class software solutions that significantly enhance distribution integrity, reliability, safety, and regulatory compliance management.
The company was originally founded in 1997 as Vantage Management Solutions, Inc. and is privately held. Opvantek, Inc. has since evolved into a talented team of utility industry and software development professionals, providing exceptional asset management software products, implementation and integration services, and focused business process consulting to the utility industry.
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Lauren Bowker
Opvantek, Inc.
215.968.7790
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