Powering forward. Together.

Looking Ahead: The Customer Engagement Platform Jennifer Potter Sacramento Municipal Utility District

September 18, 2013

• About SMUD • Overview of Pilots • Efficiency data and customer devices • Customer feedback and lessons learned • What’s next for the customer platform?

Agenda

U.S. Department of Energy Disclaimer • Acknowledgement: “This material is based upon work supported

by the Department of Energy under Award Number OE000214.” • Disclaimer: “This report was prepared as an account of work

sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.” Page 3

General Information • Service Area Population: 1.4 million • Service Area: 900 Square miles • Number of Customers: 604,053 (2012 year-end)

• Retail Revenue – Residential: $569 million – Commercial & Other: $695 million – Total Retail Revenues: $1,264 million

• Energy Sales: 10,454,769 MWh • Net System Peak Demand: 2,954 MW (2012)

• Record Peak Demand: 3,299 MW (Jul 24, 2006)

• Employees: 2,028 (2012 year-end)

• Smart Meters are fully deployed

Sources: 5-year summary of operating statistics published in 2012 annual report.

A few of our pilots…

SmartPricing Options

• Behavior based pricing pilot

• EnergyAware In-Home Display offered to half of customers

• Total customers enrolled: ~11,000

• CPP, CPP/TOU, and TOU

• Day ahead CPP event notification

PowerStat

• Demand Response program with limited time based pricing

• Energate thermostats

• Total customers enrolled: ~850

• CPP/TOU rate • Day ahead CPP

event notification

HAN Check-out program

• Customers can “check-out” a In-home Display for two months

• EnergyAware IHD • Return device to

SMUD and is sent to another customer

• Sign up online • Over 1,000

customers to date • Pricing information

displayed on device

Types of information that we provide

In-home Display

• Data is pushed from the CIS to the meter via HAN Communication Manager (HCM)-

• Current Usage • Current Price • Cumulative costs • Cumulative usage • Messages: energy saving

tips, conservation day notifications

• Flashing lights- red for peak and PP, green for off-peak base usage, yellow for off-peak Tier 2

Other Data

• On-line portal for hourly usage and costs

• Day ahead notification of CPP events via email, SMS, and phone

• Online tips, games, social media, informational videos

• Cost-to-run charts for on and off peak periods

• Bill estimator- for CSR use only

Customer Feedback

What have we learned about the IHDs?

• Opt-in customers were more likely to accept the IHD offer but less likely to activate it than default customers

• Does the offer of a free IHD: – Increase participation rates in time-varying rates? (No) – Impact the type of customers who opt-in to time-varying rates?

(Personal demographics: No. Housing characteristics: TBD) – Increase the conservation effect? (Interim results indicate: Not SS

for most groups, range 1%-4% reduction) – Increase peak load impacts? (Interim results indicate TOU: Yes;

CPP: No)

What kind of data are we working with (internally)? • HAN connectivity reports • Call volumes for pricing pilot (HAN calls, bill inquiries, CPP event questions, etc.) • Customer Satisfaction Survey data, completed once a year • HAN troubleshooting support issues • Enrollment reports for exceptions, attrition, other programs • Load Profile data- hourly interval data • Customer contact information (email, phone and SMS) for CPP events and information

tips • Contact logs for customer messaging (determine success rates) • Weather data for Conservation days • Billing data for all customers (estimating bill impacts) • Pilot rate calculator • Demographic data (housing type, income, HH size, sqft, education, age of inhabitants) • Residential Appliance Saturation Survey (conducted in 2013) • Budget data for pilot (to assess cost effectiveness for each pilot) • Google analytics for websites and web portals • Facebook and Pinterest data

Education Campaign Print ad

Web ad

Savewithsmud.org

What’s next for customer engagement platforms? • Customers are getting use to this level of engagement

– Expectation is set for EE tools, pricing plans, and more data

• Customers have told SMUD they want: – Time-based pricing- 59% have stated preference – Current bill total on display – Reset on every new billing cycle – Average/weekly average/monthly average – History of past cycles – Disaggregation of household load – Information on mobile device – Reminders/alerts for pricing – Cumulative cost-to-run data – Community impacts- “how much energy did we all save by being on

this program?”

Final thoughts…

• This stuff is not easy. – Each touch point to the customer offers new obstacles and

opportunities. – New technologies and data analytics have us scrambling to find

them a home in the utility • Even when customers say they want it, they are unlikely to

use it. • 60% of SMUD SmartPricing Options customers never even turned on

their IHD • Currently, only 25% of the customers with IHDs are connected to the

network • My Account enrollment is 40%, but participation increases with time-

based pricing • Facebook groups and Pinterest are at 3%-4%

• Customers that are engaged with the utility are happier with the utility.

Questions? Contact me…

Jennifer Potter Project Manager II Resource Planning and Pricing Sacramento Municipal Utility District Jennifer.potter@smud.org