T he Summer of my Sophomore year in college, some friends and I decided we wanted to take a road trip to go see Niagara Falls. I took charge of mapping out the route and planning our drive from South West Missouri to Toronto Canada. We had a simple plan: I'd sleep first, and my friends would handle the initial stretch. Then, I'd take over when they needed a break. All seemed well until we noticed a suspiciously large body of water to our West. Lake Michigan.
We had gone hours in the wrong direction. Instead of heading east, my friends had taken a series of wrong turns, completely derailing our trip. What should have been a straightforward drive turned into an unnecessary detour that added fuel costs, delays, and frustration—all because no one was tracking our route against the original plan. Including me.
That experience taught me a valuable lesson: A good plan isn't enough—you need visibility and course corrections to stay on track. This same principle applies to electrical utilities asset management, compliance, and scheduling.
Electrical Utilities operate under a complex web of regulations, asset management, and operational demands. Managing FAC-008 (Facility Ratings), MOD-033 (System Modeling), and Outage and Maintenance scheduling is a complex and arduous task at times. These requirements alone are often so intertwined that it takes not only a road map to manage but a well managed team with deliberate and efficient coordination. But too often, these processes operate in separate silos—leading to inefficiencies, compliance risks, and costly mistakes.
If this data is inaccurate or outdated, it creates compounding issues for modeling, operations, and maintenance planning. Teams waste time hunting for data, and mistakes result in unnecessary downtime.
If system models are built on incorrect or missing data, it can lead to unreliable power flow and contingency analysis—affecting real-world grid stability and future system plans.
If maintenance schedules aren't properly coordinated with operations, it can lead to conflicting outages, misaligned work orders, or system instability.
When these areas aren't aligned, utilities end up operating blindly, making decisions based on fragmented or outdated data—just like my friends, who thought they were following the right route but never checked their course against the original plan.
If we had real-time GPS tracking on our road trip, we would have caught our mistake before wasting hours on the wrong route. That's exactly what FPS's integrated asset management solution provides for utilities.
Unifies FAC-008, MOD-033, and Scheduling Operations in One Platform - No more disconnected spreadsheets or manual updates.
Provides Real-Time Visibility - Operators, compliance teams, and maintenance crews all have access to the same accurate, up-to-date data.
Compliance Readiness - Streamlines asset management and facility ratings, reducing regulatory risks.
With a centralized system, utilities can see the full picture, make data-driven decisions, and avoid unnecessary detours.
Managing FAC-008, MOD-033, operations scheduling, and maintenance is complex, but it doesn't have to be chaotic. Without a clear roadmap, utilities risk veering off course, leading to costly inefficiencies and compliance headaches.
FPS provides the GPS you need to navigate compliance and asset management with confidence—so you never end up on the wrong side of Michigan.
From point A to point B, we make compliance and asset management a direct route.
David Vernier III
Co-Founder and CPO at Ferro Power Solutions
David is an accomplished electrical engineer with extensive experience in the power transmission field. Over the course of their career, he has helped design, optimize, and manage high-voltage transmission systems, ensuring efficient and reliable delivery of electrical power across regions.