October 20
Duke Energy to Launch On-Bill Energy Efficiency Program
Top consumer smart energy news hand-selected and brought to you by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative.
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Beginning in 2024, Duke Energy will offer a “tariffed on-bill” energy efficiency program to customers in North Carolina that supporters say will be one of the first-of-its-kind for an investor-owned utility. The program will provide customers with access to upgraded heating and cooling appliances, home retrofits like insulation and air sealing, heat pump water heaters and HVAC duct repair or replacement.
Demand-side management (DSM) is one of several phrases that serve to broadly identify opportunities for energy flexibility within the electric grid. Demand-side management programs began in earnest in the late 1970s as an effort to minimize national dependence on foreign fossil fuels, prompted in large part by the global energy crises. In response to the energy crisis, President Jimmy Carter launched the Department of Energy to better manage the still-evolving energy landscape.
Customers throughout central Missouri will begin seeing crews in their neighborhoods as Ameren Missouri installs upgraded electric smart meters. The new meters will replace the current meter system, offering customers more options to tailor energy usage and potentially save money. Crews began working in the Jefferson City area on September 18, and the majority of installations in the area should be complete by spring 2024.
Through a cooperative effort on the part of ComEd and SunVest Solar, four new community solar projects entered service in northern Illinois last week. Community solar allows ComEd customers to subscribe to and gain the benefits of solar energy without needing to install solar panels of their own. Independent developers own the panels used in this case, but participants earn credits on their bills for their portion of the energy produced by such a project, which becomes part of the overall energy supply.
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Industry News
The Biden administration is making a historic investment in the core infrastructure of the energy transition – the country’s power grid. On Wednesday, the Department of Energy announced $3.5 billion in grants to expand capacity for wind and solar power, harden power lines against extreme weather, integrate batteries and electric vehicles, and build out microgrids that can keep the lights on during power outages.
With two-plus decades of retail experience, Rachel Brown well knew her internal fraud detector should be on high alert when weighing any offer touted as “free.” That’s why the retired quilt store owner paused – and did her homework – when a tempting overture for no-cost rooftop solar crossed the transom of her Augusta County home a year ago.
In 2009, the U.S. Department of Energy rolled out a $7.9 billion effort to invest in new smart grid technology. Most of those billions went into advanced metering infrastructure — two-way smart meter systems that could allow utilities to collect tons of data from the grid edge and promised a slew of benefits for the electricity system.
Very few U.S. utilities are taking the real-world action needed to combat the worst harms of climate change. And with the tens of billions of dollars in clean energy incentives created by last year’s Inflation Reduction Act, utilities have even less excuse for delay. These are the conclusions from the Sierra Club’s latest report tracking how “many utilities are unprepared” to comply with the Biden administration’s pledge to cut U.S. electricity-sector emissions by 80 percent by 2030 compared to a 2005 baseline.
