efficiency

Taking Digital to Scale

Eight key ‘plays’ to alter how work is managed and performed.

Adopting digital capabilities to transform operations and processes holds immense promise for utilities. Indeed, it’s the best path to growth.

Performance is What Counts

ISO New England’s capacity market proposal will bring reliability benefits to the region.

ISO New England CEO Gordon van Welie rebuts implications in a Fortnightly column about the ISO’s “Pay for Performance” capacity market proposal.

Cybersecurity and the PUC

Regulators and utilities should collaborate more to address cyber threats.

Public utility commissions face a growing need to understand cybersecurity issues, so they can address utility investments and processes. A collaborative approach will allow an effective response.

Energy Efficiency Unmasked

Regulatory formulas for rewarding efficiency investments.

Effective conservation incentives would send appropriate price signals to consumers. The more common approach, unfortunately, involves arbitrary standards that introduce market inefficiencies and ultimately harm consumers.

Putting a Price on Carbon

How EPA can establish a U.S. GHG Program for the Electricity Sector.

With the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards expected in June 2014, many states are considering their own approaches to provide flexibility in meeting compliance requirements. Experience in North America to date provides policy guidance.

The Innovator's Dilemma

Assessing the risks and rewards of distributed energy strategies.

To embrace change or fight it? The choice to either act or wait and see is fraught with complexity.

Smart Transition

Embracing a competitive and digital future for utilities.

A recent Accenture survey shows utility executives believe smart grid capabilities will transform the industry and bring competitive opportunities.

Turning Toward Customers

Utility transformation guided by improved customer insight.

Improved customer insight can help utilities transform their business models, to strengthen engagement with consumers and remain competitive as the energy sector evolves.

Energy Efficiency Unknowns

Making efficiency programs work requires understanding real-world behavior.

Efficiency programs often fall short because they don’t account for human behavior. Systematic studies with randomized trials can bring better results.

Game Changers

State regulators address transformative forces.

In Fortnightly’s Regulators’ Roundtable, commissioners from Idaho, Illinois, and Minnesota consider transformative forces and the regulatory response.