Customer Preferences for Metering and Connectivity Metering Americas

Customer Preferences for Metering and Connectivity Metering Americas 2004 San Diego, CA March 24 -26, 2004 Lynn Fryer Stein Primen

Agenda } Study methodology } Participant characteristics } Notifications times and modes } Tools to encourage participation in DR } Conclusions 2

Quantitative Survey Method } Data collected between August 19 and September 10, 2004 } All interviews conducted via telephone } Respondents included facility manager, building manager, operations manager and chief engineer } Average survey length was 24 minutes } Survey focused on four utility programs – Energy information – Innovative pricing – Demand response – Outage notification 3

Respondent Distribution Size of company Type of company Estimated peak demand All results were weighted to reflect actual population and avoid being skewed by over-sampling across segmentation categories 4

The Main Job of Customers is Not Energy How often do you attend to energy? 5

How Much Time Do You Spend on Energy? Percent 6

Customers and Utilities Don’t Speak the Same Language 7

Familiarity with Energy Terms We asked how familiar with the following terms: } Demand response } Interval meters } Load shapes } Peak demand } Kilowatt hour Assigned score of 0 -5 8

Primary Energy Concerns Facing Customers % 9

When Do Customers Want to Communicate? } When they “need” their utility } The most pressing need is outage notification – Out of 25 questions related to value of helpfulness of communication programs only two were rated at a “ 10” by a majority of respondents Notification of when power is to be restored (52%) Ability to retrieve estimate of power restoration (54%) } Value of other programs – pricing, demand response, energy information – limited to niche markets and smaller groups of customers 10

Outage Communications – Phone Calls Preferred 11

Non-outage Issues – One-way Communications Preferred } 45% of customers prefer an e-mail, page or text message } Only 3% find such communication methods unacceptable } A utility employing a broadcast system that could send e-mail, page or text messages would meet the needs of 97% of the C&I population 12

Outages Are a Major Concern } 56% of customers state avoiding downtime due to power outages is a major concern } However, lengthy power outages are rare: – 58% experienced no more than two outages lasting < 5 minutes – 71% experienced no more than two outages lasting > 5 minutes – 28% experienced no power outages at all 13

Usefulness of Outage Notification Programs 14

Outage Notification – Additional Information 15

Little Interest in Demand Response Likelihood of participating in load curtailment Those who spend more time on energy are more likely to participate Percent of time spent on energy 16

What is Minimum Advance Notice You’d Need to Participate in Curtailment Program? 17

Preferred Communication Modes for Curtailment Notification 18

Tools to Aid Participation in DR Helpfulness of demand response tools There is less interest in post-event savings estimates (20% to 40%) among LES similar C&I states 19

Flexible Demand Response Communications Preferences for communication method by minimum advanced notice of curtailment period Minimum advance notice required for demand response by size 20

Automated Controls Need to Interface With Variety of Equipment With customer override, 30% of very large, 40% of large and 47% of mass market customers would allow utility to remotely control equipment 21

Exception Reporting and Benchmarking Valued 22

Preferences for Energy Consumption Data 23

The Frequency of Receiving Energy Information Impacts Technology Selection Customer preferences for method of receiving energy consumption data Preferred method of receiving information Preferred frequency for receiving data Mass (<150 k. W) Large (150 k. W - 1499 k. W) Very large ( 1500 k. W) Monthly With monthly bill - 54% Email - 24% Website - 10% Fax - 12% With monthly bill - 42% Email - 32% Website - 19% Fax - 8% With monthly bill - 19% Email - 45% Website - 28% Fax - 7% Daily With monthly bill - 25% Email - 27%| Website - 29% Fax - 20% With monthly bill - 12% Email - 46% Website - 32% Fax - 10% Email - 42% Website - 58% Every 15 -minutes N/A Website - 87% Email - 13% Note: This table shows customer preferences for the means of receiving energy consumption as a function of their preferences for how frequently to receive that information. Note that 25% of the mass market and 12% of the large segment indicate a preference with which no utility could comply — to receive information daily, but have it included with their monthly bill. 24

Larger Customers Can Tolerate Shorter Notice Time 25

Tools That Help with Pricing Customer communication preferences for innovative rates - services that would be helpful when participating in a variable pricing program % rating 8 - 10 26

Conclusions Customers really want to communicate with utility about outages } Energy information systems could share infrastructure with outage notification/management systems } Meter/machine to utility communications are transparent to customer Demand response and energy information are of interest to a small subset of customers } Controlling energy costs is a major concern } Most customers do not have tools to manage energy costs } Energy information and automated control would help customers participate in demand response programs 27

Discussion Lynn Fryer Stein lfryerstein@primen. com 303. 545. 0100 x 335 28