Conference and exhibition on automation, information technology and T&D engineering for the Utility Industry, San Diego, CA, USA. The 19th DistribuTECH and Transtech Conference & Exhibition was held from February 03 to 05, 2009 at the Sand Diego Convention Center in San Diego (California, USA). It is a key event in North America. The event offered many opportunities to electric power system professionals to learn about the latest offerings in technology, share experience with existing solutions and exchange ideas about the challenging future of the power industry.

The event was well attended by vendors, utilities, system integrators and other experts. The number of exhibitors has grown since 2008.

The domains covered by the conference and exhibition comprise automation and control systems, information technology, transmission and distribution engineering, power delivery equipment and water utility technology. One crucial focus was on the many facets of the Smart Grids. Many of the three hundred exhibitors offered solutions for smarter or intelligent Grids. The new US government is expected to support alternative and renewable energy and to accelerate rebuilding the whole electric network and to make the power delivery system a Smart Grid. The event showed that many companies and groups are prepared (or waiting) to receive the "Obama Dollars" - to build the system of the future.

DictribuTECH was attended by about six thousand specialists from all over the world.

Some seventy product and service categories with some 4.000 products have been offered. Crucial categories were:

• AMR
• Meters & Meter Reading,
• SCADA
• Communications
• Distribution automation
• Systems integration

Some 180 presentations and discussions at the Conference and other sessions demonstrated the focus on the smart Grid, smart metering, communication and information technology.

Ten percent of the paper presentations discussed the use of IEC 61850 for different applications.

The Utility University offered tutorials on subjects of extreme importance to the industry:

• Using the IEC 61850 Standard for Communication Networks and Systems in Substations
• Substation Protection,Control, Communications and Data Integration in the New Century
• Substation Automation and Smart Grid: Design Issues, Alternative Approaches and Cyber Security Considerations
• From WAN to LAN and HAN: Communications Fundamentals for AMI and SmartGrid Applications

The implementation and use of IEC 61850 and IEC 61970 (CIM - Common Information Model) is accepted in the whole industry. All major vendors are already providing IEC 61850 conformant device and tools.

It seems that the technology focus shifts further away from distribution networks - the main focus of the DistribuTech years ago. Now it is smart metering and end-user devices, e.g., home energy management. There was much talk about building automation and even partnerships between utilities and cities for joint projects (e.g., "Smart Grid City", Boulder, Colorado).

The trend is for the smart grid - the intelligent utility. Utilities are leaving the isolation. Utilities are more and more forced to interact with other groups across the whole energy value chain and beyond it. That's where the biggest challenges are because it is not where utilities traditionally have had control: the environment, electrical energy efficiency and renewable energies.