Millions of people in the US regularly respond to surveys asking where their energy comes from by responding “the socket” or “the plug.” The invisibility and omnipresence of electricity is, ironically, one of the challenges for the industry in trying to communicate its fundamental importance.

Making energy creation and consumption visible and relevant to people who are not engineers or experts, but are nonetheless reliant on energy for every aspect of their daily lives, is a challenge a number of firms in the sector have begun to embrace.

GE has access to one of the world’s most comprehensive data sets when it comes to energy creation, use and consumption. It prepared the 3D visual here to represent 713 of its gas turbines as they come on across the world, providing electricity to thousands of homes.

“The visualization also provides a brief look into GE’s remote monitoring operations,” the company says. “Through a 24/7 remote monitoring center in Atlanta, GE engineers overlook the entire fleet of power generation equipment, identifying potential problems and deploying solutions in real-time, helping prevent outages and saving customers money.”

“In 2011 alone, GE’s remote monitoring technicians captured upwards of 60 critical power generation issues, saving their customers more than $70 million,” the company said.