CITY MANAGER AUTHORITY PROCUREMENT AWARDS
ACTION REQUESTED:
title
Approve the award of Cooperative Procurement 23-283, Cellular Service, to Cellco Partnership dba Verizon Wireless for an amount not to exceed $49,342.54 and for a one-year term (2024)
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DEPARTMENT: Electric Utility
SUBMITTED BY: Brian Groth, Director
BACKGROUND:
The Electric Utility (Utility) utilizes gatekeepers to aggregate meter reads from local neighborhoods and deliver them to the Automated Meter Infrastructure (AMI) headend located in its datacenters. The AMI system leverages both a 2.4Ghz/5Ghz Tropos network and a Verizon Private Cloud for its communication backhaul between the gatekeepers and the AMI headend. The AMI system currently has 35 gatekeepers utilizing the Tropos network and 39 gatekeepers utilizing the Verizon cellular network.
The Electric Utility also maintains a Distribution Automation (DA) system used to isolate and restore segments of the electric grid during a power outage, minimizing the impact seen by Naperville residents and businesses. The DA network uses a 900mhz radio network to allow each field device to communicate with each other and report telemetry data to SCADA.
DISCUSSION:
The Tropos network and the DA radios utilized by AMI and DA respectively have reached their end of life. Replacement parts for both products are no longer available and present a large financial and operational risk to the Utility if field devices were to fail. As a result, the Utility has two independent projects in its 2024 CIP to upgrade the legacy communication infrastructures to Verizon Cellular.
The Utility plans to expand the utilization of the Verizon cellular network to an additional 35 Gatekeepers as it depreciates the Tropos network in its AMI communication infrastructure. The Utility will also be deploying an additional 40 cellular devices in 2024 for its DA radio upgrade project.
The Verizon cellular charges for the existing AMI gatekeepers and both upgrade projects is $40,115.88. An estimated 23% has been added to the total line charges to account for the expected federal charges and fees. This 23% has been derived from historic Verizon bills and has been added to the total for the line charges.
The additional 75 cellular devices for the upgrade projects account for the 102% increase in Verizon charges when compared to 2023.The Utility has identified a cooperative contract, State of Illinois Contract CMS793372PA, for the procurement of this service.
The term of service is from January 1, 2024 through December 31, 2024.
FISCAL IMPACT:
CIP#: N/A
Cellular services to Verizon are budgeted and expensed to the below Internet account. While the 2024 budget is yet to be approved, the Electric Utility budgeted $71,256 for this service in 2024. The requested award is within proposed budget amount for this expense.
|
Account Number |
Fund Description |
Total Proposed Amount |
|
40331300- 542412 |
Electric Utility Fund |
$71,256 |