SCC31 Mission

One of Utilimetrics' primary missions is to develop standards that facilitate the use of AMR equipment. To introduce Utilimetrics members to the operation of the Standards Committee and encourage them to participate in the group's work, following is a survey of the committee's mission and the process by which standards are developed.

The Mission: Practical Standards for Utilities

The charter of SCC31 was approved by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) on Dec. 6, 1990, and reads as follows:

"This Standards Coordinating Committee is formed to promote the research and development of standards, guidelines and practices in the field of telemetry technology for meter reading, energy management, distribution and control. This field includes automatic meter reading and energy management through telemetry technologies (telephone, radio, power-line carrier, cable, etc.), primarily for electric, gas and water utilities."

While the committee's mission is to develop standards for AMR, the charge is to do so with an eye toward other utility operations, including energy management. Committee members must consider the needs of gas, water and electric utilities, and provide those utilities with the option of using various telemetry technologies.

The Process: Developing Consensus on Standards

Every standard goes through 13 steps of development:

1. Formation of a working group - The Standards Committee forms a group of people who believe there is a need to define a standard for a particular interface between two devices. These people discuss the general approach and suggest a possible charter and scope of work for the group. Each working group may develop only one standard.
   
   
2. Development of a Project Authorization Request (PAR) - The working group and SCC31 create a PAR, which IEEE must review before standard development can begin. The PAR specifies the exact nature of the proposed standard, expected time frame for development and the other standards groups with which the working group will coordinate its work. One PAR is required for each potential standard.
   
   
3. Approval of a PAR - The committee submits the PAR to IEEE for approval, which constitutes authorization to develop a new standard. Before the PAR is approved, IEEE reviews the work of other standards-setting bodies to check for overlapping work. If groups have similar standards in progress, IEEE instructs the entities to cooperate. The working group may begin developing the standard after IEEE accepts the request. The PAR will have an assigned number preceded by the letter "P," which indicates the project is in the preliminary-standard stage. This number ultimately will become the number of the finished standard.
   
   
4. Submission of contributions - The first step of real work on a standard is submission of one or more contributions, or formal written drafts of the possible standard. Utilimetrics assigns numbers to each submission and allows authors to modify their preliminary documents without a vote by the working group. Contributions should be consistent with the format of standards and the overall architecture of the SCC31 Topology and Reference Model and should use commonly accepted definitions of terms.
   
   
5. Voting to working document - When the working group agrees that a contribution has merit, the group votes to advance the contribution to the status of a working document. A working document may be changed only through a group vote. Group members who propose changes must do so in writing, indicating the reason for the proposed change and the language that will replace the existing working-document text. The reason for this rigidity is to ensure that carefully developed positions are not subject to changes that participants may not have fully evaluated. Typically, the working document, available to anyone who requests a copy, is a part of what ultimately becomes the final standard.
   
   
6. Approval by working group - When members of the working group agree that the standard is satisfactory, they vote to elevate the working document to the status of approved-draft standard. While the vote need not be unanimous, the working group makes every effort to resolve all differences of opinion to avoid difficulties later in the process.
   
   
7. Approval by subcommittee - Working group members then submit the draft standard to the SCC31 subcommittee to which they report. The subcommittee, which is responsible for several related standards, reviews the working group's submission to ensure it is consistent with standards being developed by other subcommittee working groups.
   
   
8. Approval by SCC31 - All members of SCC31 then review the draft standard and take a final vote before submitting the document to IEEE. During the review, the committee checks all procedural processes and tries to identify difficulties that could arise as the standard moves toward a formal ballot. A single negative vote sends the draft back to the working group for resolution. Beyond this point, approval does not need to be unanimous, but the working group must respond in writing to each negative comment. The response must explain the group's efforts to resolve the conflict and, if rejected, the reasons for not adopting the comment. To proceed, three-quarters of the committee members must vote on the draft, and three-quarters of those who vote must approve the standard.
   
   
9. Ballot by IEEE - Members of IEEE who are familiar with the technology that the standard addresses then vote on the document. Three-quarters of the committee members must vote on the draft, and three-quarters of those who vote must approve. Members must resolve all negative votes before the process can continue.
   
   
10. Final approval - Members then pass their recommendation to the IEEE board of trustees for final approval. Once approved, the document becomes a standard and no longer may be circulated to the public without charge.
    
    
11. Final editing - IEEE edits the document. Editors may not make technical changes, and anyone who wishes to circulate the document must pay a fee.
    
    
12. Publication - IEEE then publishes the standard. The organization usually charges a nominal fee for the document, and copies are available through ANSI or Measurement Canada.
    
    
13. Market acceptance - The final - and most important step - is acceptance of the standard in the market place. The voluntary-consensus standards developed by IEEE are not legally binding, and no organization can force industry participants to accept them. However, as users begin to incorporate the standard into purchase specifications and manufacturers begin to make products that interoperate with the products of other manufacturers, the standard becomes the true basis of product lines.