Welcome to Intelligent Energy Today

It has been a busy start to the year at Comverge and last week was no exception with the team in San Antonio for DistribuTECH 2012.

As one of the largest events in our industry, DistribuTECH brings together a broad range of stakeholders to discuss the latest and greatest in smart grid developments. For our part, we built on our recent customer announcements with PECO, Gulf Power and Ransome CAT by sharing details on our new IntelliSOURCE solutions that support innovative dynamic pricing programs and streamline energy management program execution.

We also participated in panels on customer engagement and international demand response programs, with the former bringing together executives from PPL Electric Utilities, Con Edison, TXU Energy and Tampa Electric to discuss best practices for engaging the customer. This is one of the most important issues facing the industry and an area where we are seeing excellent results, having just announced that we have enrolled one million customers in demand response programs.     

Taking a step back, it’s interesting to see some of the bigger trends that came out of the show. GigaOm’s Katie Fehrenbacher captured them well and I couldn’t agree more with her comment that “managing large streams of energy data is fundamental to the future of the grid”. In fact, that’s exactly why we have invested so much time in our IntelliSOURCE platform, which now manages huge amounts of data for 20 utilities across the nation. Other themes that caught my eye include the shift from hardware to software and the increasing importance being placed on smart thermostats. 

Among the other articles on the event, I was interested to read a story from Greentech Media’s Katherine Tweed. Tweed discusses what she saw as a “thread of uncertainty” that ran through this year’s show. Apart from that being the opposite to our experience at the event, the article is interesting as it contrasts the market from in-home displays – Tweed notes their absences from the trade floor – with the growth of distributed automation. As I have discussed before, this no surprise as from our experience with large-scale deployments, consumers actually want utilities to take some control of their energy use if it will mean substantial reductions to their bills.

I could go on as it was a great week with many fascinating conversations, but will leave it there for now. Hope everyone enjoyed DistribuTECH 2012 and as the year unfolds, I expect we will be hearing a lot more about managing big data, software platforms and the growth of distributed automation.

As our industry’s largest event gets underway, I thought it would be good to look back at the last year as it was an important time for Comverge and the industry as a whole. 

Comverge finished 2011 on a great note by signing a landmark new agreement with Eskom, Africa’s largest electric utility. This capped a pivotal year for the industry that saw demand response play a critical role in helping maintain grid reliability during extreme weather conditions and new rulings from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) that focus on leveling the playing field between energy conservation and power generation.

Looking at 2012, we are off to a great start. We have already announced significant new agreements with PECO and Gulf Power. On top of this forward momentum, we announced on Monday that we are the first demand response company to enroll one million customers in demand response programs.

At DTECH, we are building on that momentum with the launch of new IntelliSOURCE solutions that support innovative dynamic pricing programs and provide tools to streamline program execution. We will also be participating in two speaking engagements with Bud Vos and our customer TECO sharing real-world insights on distributed automation during a session on Wednesday morning and David Ellis joining Pike Research to discuss large-scale international demand response programs on the final day.

If you are at DTECH, call past the Comverge booth (booth 859) to meet the team, learn about our latest news and see our IntelliSOURCE platform in action. If not, you will be able to follow our activities on Twitter or come back here next week for our take on what I think will be an excellent event

As 2011 comes to a close and thoughts turn to family, presents, energy-smart food and decorations, and, let’s hope, some down time, we’re actually ramping up for something huge—and tremendously exciting—here at Comverge.

Don’t get me wrong: we’re all about the spirit of the season here! We just thought it would be best to go out with a bang, which is why I’m thrilled to announce our newly cemented partnership with Eskom, Africa’s largest electricity provider.

Comverge beat out some strong competition to work with Eskom as creator and co-manager of Africa’s first open market for demand response resources. Under the $27 million agreement, we’ll deploy our IntelliSOURCE 2.0 platform for Eskom, enabling the utility to register, dispatch, and manage a newly established demand response market, centered in South Africa. Under this initial 16-month pilot agreement, Comverge will aggregate 500 MWs of load under the IntelliSOURCE system. Beyond our role as aggregator, we will also bring at least 100 MWs of demand response services to the market, serving as the curtailment service provider for this portion of the total MWs allocated to the program.  

I feel honored to kick-off this international partnership. We have committed to expanding our international presence, as we strongly believe that investment in IT-based demand response solutions offers the best answer to the complex energy supply and demand challenges countries across the globe face today. With Eskom, we now have the opportunity to put our expertise into action, to streamline the efforts of the South African region’s C&I load providers, and to conduct the research-based studies necessary to assess how best to use demand response resources going forward.

I’m excited to get the ball rolling and to use our intelligent energy platform to build this new demand response market in South Africa. The ability to scale IntelliSOURCE across multiple customer classes – including South Africa’s mining, commercial, and agricultural industries – offers Eskom the flexibility to adjust to changing and expanding demand response needs as the project progresses. It’s a model I think we can replicate in other geographies, from Asia to Europe and beyond.

But more on that in 2012.

All the best for a happy, healthy new year!

If you live on the East Coast and Midwest you know it’s that time of year again when temperatures suddenly spike and you can’t walk around the block without needing a shower.

Along with excessive sweat, this heat-wave-prone season brings added strain to the power grid, threatening brownouts and even blackouts if we don’t intelligently manage our energy use.

But last week, a record breaking heat wave hit the Midwest and then moved east to New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. And this is no normal summer heat wave. In this month alone, more than 1000 records that have been set or tied and at its peak last week, approximately 132 million people were placed under a heat alert, according to the National Weather Service.

But with some ingenuity it’s completely possible to keep the lights and A/C units on, even when energy use reaches record highs.

Take last week for example. Our team worked tirelessly to quickly respond to the surge in demand that threatened grid reliability in 15 eastern states. Working with local utilities and grid operators, we executed 54 mandatory curtailment programs that delivered more than 1,250 megawatts (MW) of reduced electricity demand. The net result, we were able to help keep the lights on (and the cold air blowing) for more than 944,000 homes and 832 commercial and industrial sites.

While the results of last week’s efforts clearly speak for themselves, the role for intelligent energy management solutions goes far beyond helping out during heat waves. I’ve talked before about how extreme weather is becoming all too familiar these days, and as this past winter showed, we were on hand to help when snow and ice storms threatened power supplies to Texas homes and businesses.

So while the weather is as unpredictable as ever, the role for intelligent energy management solutions in our nation’s energy mix is becoming clearer and clearer.