Communication

The smart grid is opening the floodgates on customer data, just as consumers are getting comfortable with retail self-service and mobile apps. With dynamic rates, distributed generation and electric vehicles just around the corner, big changes are coming in the utility-customer relationship. Will IOUs let upstarts control the new energy market?

Those who don’t embrace new technologies will get left behind when the world changes around them. This is true across generations and across industries. At the same time, however, the telecom revolution offers a cautionary lesson about what motivates consumers and how it translates into business opportunities.

Regulatory policies are evolving to make demand response and smart-grid planning a reality across the country. Cooperation between federal and state lawmakers will allow local flexibility within a uniform national framework.

A rebuttal to conclusions made in three Fortnightly articles that service quality declined in Ontario because of a performance-based regulation plan implementation.

The concept of a wireless smart grid is gaining popularity. Some utilities are participating in pilots providing two-way secure radio frequency network coverage. They say the grid is well suited to wireless and the benefits only now are becoming known.

Information is power, and through smart technologies utility customers will gain access to that information. The challenge faced by utilities is to harness consumer benefits by boosting customer acceptance and participation in programs designed to lower system expenses.

Duke Energy named Lynn J. Good group executive and CFO, replacing David L. Hauser, who left Duke to become chairman and CEO of FairPoint Communications. Pepco Holdings named Anthony J. Kamerick as senior v.p. and CFO. And others...

The nuclear renaissance requires safety as its central focus. Industry vigilance at all levels is key to accident prevention, but only favorable public opinion will allow the industry to realize its enormous potential.

Unlike the majority of performance-based regulation plans, alternative design paradigms require less data, by instead allowing firms to reveal performance potential. In an asymmetric environment, regulators don’t have needed information, but that can be overcome with better models and incentives.

Sophocles once said, “Quick decisions are unsafe decisions.” Apparently Sophocles did not work in the utility industry. Utilities must make quick decisions every day to maintain a safe and reliable grid. As they have learned, the key to a quick and safe decision is making a well-informed decision. Yet utilities face challenges in providing enough information for their employees and automated systems to make these types of decisions.