How electric companies are partnering with customers to advance the clean energy revolution
Electric companies around the nation continue rolling out customer-centric energy programs designed to balance customer climate goals with grid reliability and energy affordability, and they’ve determined that a critical component to success is engaging corporate and residential customers in their own energy decision making.
“Customers of all types are seeking new solutions from their electric companies and customer partnerships will only continue to grow faster” in the quest toward reaching a clean energy future, said Adam Cooper, executive director at the Institute for Electric Innovation (IEI), during the IEI 2022 Powering the People event held Oct. 18.
“A good partnership is one that works from both sides,” Cooper added.
The theme this year for IEI’s signature thought leadership event was Customer Partnerships Driving the Future of Energy. Two panel discussions were held that focused on 100-percent, carbon-free energy solutions for corporate customers, and using technology to engage residential customers and drive business and climate outcomes.
During the first panel, Lisa Wood, vice president of customer solutions at the Edison Electric Institute (EEI) and vice president of IEI’s Edison Foundation, pointed out that carbon-free energy solutions for corporate customers is an issue that has evolved fairly significantly during the last few years. “And we feel like this issue is going to be with us for quite a while,” said Wood.
That’s largely due to the fact that corporate clients are increasingly asking for carbon-free energy solutions to meet their sustainability goals, as are large federal customers like the U.S. Department of Defense, which also must meet aggressive, mandated carbon-reduction goals, Wood explained.
“So essentially, the entire base of what we think of as large customers is asking for these solutions,” she said.
That’s true for corporate giant Meta, formally known as Meta Platforms Inc., an American multinational technology conglomerate that owns Facebook.
Meta’s top-line goal is to reach net zero emissions by 2030, said Holly Lahd, Meta’s energy strategy manager, during the first panel discussion. Lahd works to ensure emissions accounting standards and quality data exist to drive the next generation of corporate decarbonization projects.
“We think our real value-add is working with utilities on brand-tariff style solutions wherever possible, and making sure those solutions aren’t just available to us but can scale to other customers,” Lahd said.
NV Energy, for instance, has pioneered several innovative tariffs, according to panelist Doug Cannon, president and CEO of the Las Vegas-based public utility that serves 1.4 million customers in Nevada.
NV Energy corporate customers “really want to have a different experience with their energy provider,” Cannon explained. “Just handing them the traditional tariff book… and saying ‘this is what you can choose from,’ it just doesn’t work for so many of these customers.”
At the same time, there are many factors motivating these customers, he said, with some seeking to achieve their ESG objectives or wanting to advance mandated sustainability goals. Others are motivated by cost and view the opportunity to have renewable energy and a fuel-free energy source as a hedge against volatile natural gas prices, for instance.
Because motivations can be diverse, Cannon said it’s NV Energy’s responsibility to help a corporate customer satisfy its objectives.
For example, the company’s NV GreenEnergy Rider program makes more than 230,000 megawatt hours of energy from renewable resources available to both residential and business customers. The offering is designed to help customers achieve their sustainability goals and drive the development of more clean energy in Nevada, said Cannon.
Under the program, eligible customers pay an additional fee to offset their electricity usage through one of two options: existing renewable resources or new renewable resources.
The option to use an existing renewable resource is available to all customer classes, with no minimum size requirement. The option to use a new renewable resource is open to large commercial customers that meet minimum usage requirements, and interested customers work with NV Energy to identify and assign a new resource to meet their load and execute a special contract with the utility that must be filed with the Nevada Public Utilities Commission for approval.
“Customers can subscribe to the program and essentially purchase Nevada-based renewable energy credits,” said Cannon. “Customers know these are resources that are based in Nevada… and are serving our grid. We can take those credits and apply them against an individual customer’s usage so that they can achieve 100-percent renewable energy based on the credit perspective.”
And it helps these customers have a more even budgeting process, Cannon added.
Residential customer support
The evolution of digital technologies continues to create new opportunities for households to get more engaged in managing their energy use, according to IEI, so electric companies are finding innovative ways to engage residential customers in decision making about their energy usage.
In fact, many energy companies offer myriad ways to help residential customers save money, such as through rebates and discounts on appliances, lighting, smart thermostats, and other home products; rate choices and payment options; personalized energy bundles; advice on numerous technologies, like solar and electric vehicles (EVs); and online customer apps for managing energy consumption, among others.
Erica Borggren, vice president of customer solutions at ComEd, leads the team that is helping ComEd’s customers save energy and take control of their energy use through energy efficiency, demand response, solar, and other customer solutions, she said during the second panel discussion.
ComEd is a unit of Chicago-based Exelon Corp., a Fortune 200 energy company with approximately 10 million electricity and natural gas customers. ComEd delivers energy to more than four million customers across northern Illinois, or 70 percent of the state’s population.
Borggren’s team is responsible for the company’s energy management solutions, the largest among them being ComEd’s Energy Efficiency Program. “We have one of the largest energy efficiency programs in the country, to the tune of $400 million a year in programs for low-income, residential and C&I customers across the board,” she said, adding that the company combined energy efficiency and energy management solutions to best help customers lean into a clean energy future that also helps the company better manage the grid.
One piece of ComEd’s Energy Efficiency Program, for example, is home energy assessments, which are designed to improve the energy efficiency of a home while lowering energy costs. Homeowners and renters may receive a free review of their home to identify areas for energy savings. An energy advisor collects information about a home’s energy features by looking at its lighting, heating and cooling systems, water heaters and appliances, and then provides personalized recommendations for saving energy and money.
During an inspection, an advisor may install free and discounted energy-saving products, including LEDs, a programmable or smart thermostat, WaterSense certified showerheads and faucet aerators, hot water pipe insulation, and advanced power strips.
Another ComEd program offers customers the ability to set up an online account that includes not just the recent electric bill, but also tools and detailed energy usage information. If a home has a smart meter, the online tools can track energy usage, compare usage trends, and show the results of energy-saving practices so that customers can more efficiently manage their energy usage.
The company also advises customers on all of their programs so that they are “able to encounter the right set of solutions in either the right bundle or in the right order, so that we’re over-answering whatever need it is they come to us with,” said Borggren. The big-picture information can help customers better understand what technologies might be the most helpful for them, a process Borggren called “a holistic energy management journey” for a customer.
Wood also noted that with advances in technology, bundling energy services with flat bills can be a triple win: participating customers get simplicity and predictability; non-participating customers get more affordable, clean, and reliable energy; and electric companies get access to new tools to manage the energy grid.
At Minneapolis, Minn.-based Xcel Energy Inc., helping residential customers find energy efficiencies are a top priority, according to Brett Carter, executive vice president and group president of utilities and chief customer officer at Xcel Energy, a public utility serving roughly four million electric customers and more than two million natural gas customers in Colorado, Texas, and New Mexico.
“In 2021, close to 52 percent of our energy was carbon free,” Carter said during the second panel discussion, “and we want our customers to be able to take full advantage of that energy and the sustainability that goes along with it, and the financial benefits that come along with that clean energy vision.”
Put another way, said Carter: Xcel Energy works to educate its customers on pursuing all the opportunities offered by the company that will help them “lighten their bills,” such as shifting them to off-peak pricing in Colorado, for example.
Similarly, Carter said that one of Xcel Energy’s best known programs is its EV charging program. He said the company knows that EVs are a key component of its comprehensive strategy to be a net-zero energy provider by 2050.
Through the company’s EV Accelerate At Home program, for instance, customers may save on charging by selecting a Level 2 charger that can either be rented or purchased from the utility. Xcel Energy then will install it within four weeks and maintain it.
The Level 2 charger will be programmed to charge only during off-peak hours, between midnight and 6 a.m. everyday. A customer’s EV will automatically charge during the lowest-cost time period, but there’s also the option to charge that to other times if it’s needed.
“If our customers want to save money on gasoline and have purchased an electric vehicle, they can use one of our automated programs to get a set price per month,” he said.
Getting customers to understand that Xcel Energy has programs “that are here to help them” is a massive endeavor, added Carter, echoing the sentiments of other speakers.
And it’s one that also extends to state regulators, said panelists, noting that it’s important to educate public utility commissioners on an electric company’s new technologies, offerings or other services. Springing the idea to them at the last minute is a sure-fire way to get a regulatory denial, they said.
“It’s a huge education for everybody,” Carter said.
