March 22
Xcel Energy Deploys Two Million Itron Smart Meters
Top consumer smart energy news hand-selected and brought to you by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative.
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Itron announced that its customer, U.S. electric and natural gas company Xcel Energy, has deployed two million Gen5 Riva distributed intelligence (DI)-enabled electric smart meters. The meters are a component of Itron’s end-to-end Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) and industrial IoT (IIoT) network solution. Itron’s solution, including the DI-enabled smart meters, aims to streamline field operations and reduce truck rolls.
Duke Energy leader Lynn Good is passing her president’s title to a 28-year company veteran as part of a group of management changes that includes longtime executive Steve Young preparing to retire. Good, 64, has been board chair, president and CEO of Charlotte-based Duke since the beginning of 2016. On April 1, 53-year-old Harry Sideris will become president and assume responsibility for the operations and customer service of Duke’s electric and gas utilities across the Southeast.
Since taking office, the Biden administration has committed to mitigating the effects of climate change, while positioning these challenges as a source of economic opportunity. These were the motivations that drove the Inflation Reduction Act, as well as mandates to increase electric vehicle production to 50 percent of all vehicles manufactured in the United States by 2030.
Opinion Dynamics is pleased to welcome Dr. Jim Stewart as their Senior Director of Data Analytics. As an energy economist, Jim has leveraged his expertise in applied economics, econometrics and statistics, and consumer behavior to evaluate demand-side management, energy efficiency and decarbonization programs and policies for utility and regulatory clients for nearly two decades.
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Industry News
In his quest for a net-zero emissions house, Tim Leroux has already achieved gold status. But he’s not content to rest on those energy-efficiency laurels. The Albemarle County homeowner is itching to reach platinum. And he believes a heat pump upgrade will eventually punch that ticket. For guidance, the healthcare risk manager will turn to a free online calculator recently unveiled by Charlottesville-based Pearl Certification.
The California Energy Commission (CEC) has awarded BorgWarner and project partners Fermata Energy and Lion Electric a $3 million grant for a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) project meant to bring V2G solutions to California school districts. The project aims to enable electric school bus batteries to support the grid with additional power during emergency events and generate revenue through participation in demand response programs.
In early 2023, things were moving along as planned for a rate restructuring plan at Holy Cross Energy, a rural electric co-op in Colorado. The board of directors had approved the plan, which would separate the cost of energy from the cost of delivering that energy to the customer. The change meant rooftop solar customers could continue to sell their excess electricity back to Holy Cross, just at a much lower rate that would slow their return on investment.
Myths run rampant about whether electric vehicles are actually better for the climate than fossil-fueled cars. Electric vehicles run on batteries, which are made from mined minerals and then charged with electricity; those steps involve some amount of carbon emissions. But electric cars still emit far less carbon than comparable gas cars would over their useful lives, a new study from BloombergNEF found.
