Return of experience regarding use of IEC CIM standard in distribution

This paper would like to give an overview of what has been accomplished by Electricite de France regarding IEC CIM and 61850 standards in Distribution field. EDF would like to automate its business processes. Accordingly, EDF R&D has started Cimergy project in 2004 in order to establish a methodology, tools, and standards for implementing a semantic-based integration infrastructure. Two approaches have been retained by EDF R&D to get a concrete feedback on CIM implementation. The first approach, is a top-down approach which explains how we can derive messages from an information model based on CIM. The methodology is based on the UN-CEFACT core component technical specification. This methodology has been retained in Europe by ETSO which has defined several message schemas. The key idea is that the CIM could play the role of the core component model of the electrical industry. The second one is a bottom-up approach based on field driven specific application, combined with participation to CIM interoperability tests. This paper highlights which CIM interfaces have been deployed by EDF Distribution, and which projects are under development. At the end we try to give an overview of the remaining challenges and new R&D project under development.