Thursday's power outage because of the fire at the substation near the Southwest Freeway no doubt was a more the electrical disruption for thousands who work and live in the area. For them power control is the last thing on their minds.

Power control is what's on the mind of CenterPoint Energy crews trying to reroute around the trouble spot.

"The objective is to control the damages to the most minimal amounts,” said CenterPoint Vice President Kenny Mercado.

Earlier this year CenterPoint unveiled a test project called the Intelligent Grid.

All elements of the system from the substation to the meter at home able to send information and be controlled from a remote location ideal in a situation exactly like the one Thursday.

"So remotely you can take the magnitude of the problem down to a more finite area,” said Mercado.

And put manual crews to work exactly where the are needed to get power back on faster.