Posts filed under ‘Regulation’
Minnesota, California regulators watching out for consumer smart meter privacy
Protecting customer privacy is a top concern of policymakers as utilities roll out and utilize smart meters. This month Minnesota requested public input on smart meter privacy — joining a growing list of states and nations considering this matter.
Full post: Smart meter privacy: Minnesota, California regulators watching out for consumers
Demand response comes to California wholesale power market
The energy industry has long recognized effective demand response (a key smart grid application) as the equivalent as the equivalent of a power generation asset. Now, a new California Public Utility Commission decision allows demand response “aggregators” to provide their services to the California Independent System Operator, the state’s wholesale market operator. This approach contrasts with many other states and countries, where direct participation by aggregators in the wholesale market is not permitted.
Full post: California electric market operator welcomes demand response
New rules in Brazil support smart meter rollouts
This summer Brazil’s energy regulator ANEEL released its specifications for smart meter deployment. Contrary to expectations, ANEEL did not mandate a general smart meter rollout. Rather, the agency defined a set of rules and norms to achieve certain objectives — and smart meters are essential to achieve three key goals…
Full post, by Alicia Carrasco: Brazil: New rules will support smart meter rollouts
CPUC says California is meeting and exceeding renewables target
California often has been criticized as being overly aggressive in setting renewable energy targets. Yet this week, the California Public Utilities Commission reported that last year the state met its goal of getting 20% of its power from renewable resources. Also, California also is on track to “far surpass” that goal in 2012…
Smarter energy markets for the UK
It’s not just meters and power grids that are getting smarter. U.K. energy regulator Ofgem is advancing plans to make energy markets in that nation “smarter” — that is: more efficient and yielding better consumer outcomes. Smarter energy markets also would provide consumers with ready access to an abundance of easily digestible information about their energy use, plus time-varying pricing options and automation to help them actively engage as market players.
This week Ofgem published its Promoting Smarter Energy Markets work program. This follows the agency’s earlier consultation on this topic, which drew 34 responses — including a response from eMeter…
Full post, by Alicia Carrasco: UK moves to make energy markets smarter
EU: New energy efficiency, smart meter requirements coming
By September the European Union may have a new energy efficiency strategy in place. On June 14 negotiators struck a provisional deal on the proposed new EU energy efficiency directive (the “Third Energy Efficiency Directive”). Final approval is likely.
Full post: EU gets closer to new energy efficiency, smart meter requirements
Why do so few customers have time-of-user electricity prices?
According to a new report from the Edison Institute for Energy Efficiency, nearly one third of U.S. homes and businesses has a smart meter — 36 million so far.
Yet according to my esteemed colleague, economist Dr. Ahmad Faruqui, only about 1% of U.S. customers are charged for electricity according to dynamic or time-of-use (TOU) prices.
Why so few — especially since price signals are a key way to empower consumers to fully realize smart grid benefits?
Full post: Time-of-use electricity prices: Why do so few customers have them?
Interval billing needed to realize smart meter benefits
For any big project, details always matter, even if they look arcane. This is especially true for smart grid and smart meter rollouts. One issue that sounds obscure, but which actually is quite important, is whether to bill customers based on interval data from their energy use.
The U.K. is facing this issue right now as that nation continues to make good progress on rolling out smart meters. This includes addressing several important policy issues related to functional standards.
U.K. policymakers could choose to prohibit interval billing. However, that would be an expensive mistake — and it would significantly reduce the benefits that consumers would realize from smart meters.
Full post: Interval billing is crucial to realize smart meter benefits
UK making progress on electricity market reform
Recently SmartGridWatch noted that U.K. smart metering plans are moving full speed ahead for 2012. A key part of realizing these plans involves creating a new regulatory and commercial framework for the smart grid.
Toward that end, last week the U.K. Dept. of Energy and Climate Change announced new progress on electricity market reform…
Full post by Alicia Carrasco: UK: New progress on electricity market reform
How the smart grid can help us stop wasting precious renewable energy
Today the journal Electricity Policy is reporting a regulatory victory for wind power owners: the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has decided that the Bonneville Power Administration cannot force wind producers to curtail production in favor of hydroelectric plants.
The new FERC order emphasizes that BPA, which operates in the Pacific Northwest, cannot discriminate against wind energy.
As SmartGridWatch reported earlier, the sad thing is that is that every day, precious renewable energy resources are discarded. Wind turbines get shut down, or water gets spilled over dams without turning turbines — while gas- and coal-fired plants in BPA’s Northwest region continue to run.
Part of the solution is to build more transmission lines to deliver wind power — which is usually in remote locations — to cities where electricity is consumed.
But there’s another, easier part of the solution: Smart meters and the smart grid can enable demand response and energy storage. This can give the grid more flexibility to manage fluctuating generation capacity, thus reducing waste of renewables…
Full story: Stop wasting precious renewable energy! The smart grid can help
Smart Grid Watch 