Bahrain EWA Signs $28.7M Contract with GE Digital for Grid Software Solutions

GE Digital today announced that the Bahrain Electricity & Water Authority (EWA) had signed a contract worth $28.7M for software and services to modernize the Kingdom of Bahrain’s electricity and water networks. A variety of GE Digital’s industry-leading Grid Software will be installed in a state-of-the-art control center that will digitize operations for increased efficiency and operations redundancy.

This remarkable end-to-end software solution spans the breadth of operations from transmission to  distribution across the company’s essential electricity and water services. Its implementation will be integral to the country’s economic vision and strategy for the future.

“We at the Electricity & Water Authority are keen to provide electricity and water services at the highest level of quality and reliability to ensure sustainable development in the Kingdom of Bahrain, and to become a leading model for providing electricity and water services,” said H.E. Shaikh Nawaf Bin Ebrahim Al-Khalifa, Chief Executive Officer of the Bahrain Electricity & Water Authority. “This project will facilitate our goals to optimize asset and network utilization and minimize outages in the networks for reliability of supply.”

“EWA’s solution is unique in the region and the industry and we are proud to be a part of it,” said Talal Eskandar, Vice President for GE Digital’s commercial operations in the Middle East region. “As the authority serves 430,000 electricity and 310,000 water customers, digital solutions will assist in optimizing their customer service and asset management goals.”

Grid Software to be utilized in this solution include:

• Distribution Management: GE Digital’s industry-leading Advanced Distribution Management Solutions (ADMS) provide for the safe and secure management of the electric grid. The software provides EWA with next-generation control and optimization capabilities that will help them with outage restoration and overall performance of the grid.
• Transmission Management: The Advanced Energy Management System (AEMS) provides a better framework for the authority to optimize the energy and electric transmission in a more innovative way with improved efficiency by integrating multiple monitoring, control, and analytics systems into a modular solution.
• Grid Resilience: AEMS Wide Area Management (WAMS) can monitor and locate system oscillations in real-time reducing the risk of unnecessary power disruptions and accelerate system restoration in case of an outage.
• Water Transmission and Water Distribution Management: The GE Digital team will be integrating EWA’s existing geospatial asset management system with the distribution network to model and manage the water operation.

“GE Digital is happy to work with the Bahrain Electricity & Water Authority to help modernize their networks and increase resiliency with our solution,” said Jim Walsh, General Manager of GE Digital’s Grid Software business.

“This is a good example of how our customers are being called on to transform their businesses to take advantage of digital capabilities that can help them to achieve their goals of increased grid capacity and reduced outages.”