Nobody has ever accused utilities of being good at marketing. This lack of sales sophistication continues to haunt the industry. As you will read below, utilities around the country are facing complaints that the consumer benefits of smart meters don’t justify the cost. That’s because utilities have foolishly focused only on bill savings, failing to connect smart meters to reliability. This is particularly ironic in Connecticut, where policymakers and the public alike are up in arms about outages. Yet the state’s largest utility is only now starting to talk about the reliability benefits from grid modernization.
Even though at least 25% of U.S. homes and businesses already have a smart meter, the concept continues to face resistance in other parts of the country, according to an Associated Press story. Privacy and health concerns are often part of consumers’ fears. But the most difficult hurdle, it turns out, is documenting consumer benefits. Keep reading →
Untangling The New Regulation: AOL Energy Week In Review
By Peter GardettHas the deregulation of the energy industry gone into reverse?
Energy deregulation was a central theme of the 1990s, a trend that swept the developed world as ways to liberate markets were sought out in the wake of seemingly-successful deregulation efforts elsewhere in the economy in the preceding decade. No longer would customers pay out regulated, regular rates to monopoly corporations with lengthy planning timelines and no incentive to cut costs or employees. Creative destruction was the name of the game, and politicians and power regulators got roughly half-way through rewriting the rules of power markets before the implosion of Enron put the brakes on efforts at further deregulation, which have been halting and piecemeal. Keep reading →