Piedmont Electric Leads Way
with ‘Smart Grid’ Technology
HILLSBOROUGH, N.C., July 1, 2009—Piedmont Electric Membership Corporation has become the first electric utility in North Carolina to provide options for all of its member-consumers through “smart grid” technology. The federal government and various U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) initiatives are promoting development of “smart grid” to help solve America’s energy crisis. The first step toward building a smarter grid involves installing a strong foundation of smart meters at homes and businesses that can talk back and forth to utilities about outages and electric use.
Piedmont Electric has been in the forefront in “smart grid” technology. In 2006 the Cooperative began installing the Advanced Meter Interface (AMI) system in its service area. More commonly referred to as automated meter reading, the AMI system has additional attributes. The most obvious is to save money by reducing meter reading costs, but there are many benefits to this smart grid technology. It helps Piedmont Electric effectively manage outages. For example, a smart meter can tell when the power is out instead of relying on consumers to call in outages. This will be a great benefit for major storm restorations.
The AMI system also records blinks and reports power outages without input from consumers. It may also be used in combination with additional equipment for load control. Once the smart meters were installed, Piedmont Electric took the technology to another level. Not only can the Cooperative read consumers’ meters without going to the actual location of the meter, but consumers are able to track their kilowatt-hour use on a daily basis—through midnight the previous day—through an Internet website, www.MyUsage.com.
It’s this technology that can help consumers make better energy choices when using appliances by allowing them to correlate high energy use from the previous day to certain activities around the home. On request, use-monitoring consumers can sign up to receive daily use emails or email alerts when their kWhs have exceeded a certain limit. Consumers may also sign themselves up for the program and change the level at which they receive alerts as their use changes.
“I like being able to see how changes made at home are reflected in real-time energy use information. I have always liked comparing my use in the current month to last month or even the same month last year. Now I can compare day to day to see how our living choices impact my energy bill...,” says Bryan Stachura of Durham.
Michael Marotta of Hillsborough says he is using the high use email from Piedmont Electric as a general indicator of the past days’ excessive use. “This information let’s me mentally guess if something is using too much electricity. I am very interested in a realtime monitoring suite that would allow me to measure the draw of appliances.
“My goal is to tune my household usage to as little electric load as possible while providing my family with a reasonable level of comfort. This is a great step in the energy usage innovation war this country needs,” he adds.
Using the MyUsage.com website is a simple step-by-step tool for keeping up with daily electricity consumption. Consumers just need to have their Piedmont Electric account number and meter number to log in to the website. Both are found on their monthly Piedmont Electric bill. They are then prompted to set up a password which is tied to their Internet address.
“After receiving emails that I had exceeded my projected daily usage number, I took steps to turn off/unplug various energy drains. This way I hope to be a partner in energy conservation,” says Dorothy Walker of Efland.
Other member-consumers of the Cooperative are also pleased with Piedmont Electric’s new service.
“I am a kilowatt freak. When the bill would be really high, I (would) walk outside and read the meter everyday... And now (there’s) a website I can check daily and it sends me alerts when I go over my specified number. I have gotten alerts and it makes me more mindful of what power I am using,” says Vivian S. Painter of Semora.
MyUsage.com is just one of the free tools Piedmont Electric offers its member-consumers to help them better manage their electricity purchases.
“At Piedmont Electric we’re committed to doing our part to build a smarter grid, making it faster, more efficient and smart enough to handle challenges thiscentury promises to bring,” says R.G. Brecheisen, CEO of the Cooperative.
“Smart Grid meters allow Piedmont Electric to empower and partner with our member-consumers by helping them save money and use electricity more wisely,” he adds.
In conjunction with the www.myusage.com website, the Cooperative’s member-consumers have the option of prepaid electricity, which allows them to buy electricity before they need it. Comparison studies show that prepaid consumers use approximately 12% less electricity.
An “In-Home Monitor” pilot program is planned for later this year which will allow participants to see real-time energy use on a special monitor. The size of this pilot program has not yet been determined, according to Richard Mabbott, Chief Operations Officer.
“(It’s) good to see our co-op is leading with some of these programs,” says Wes Shuttleworth of Durham.
Piedmont Electric, a Touchstone Energy Cooperative based in Hillsborough, is a nonprofit electric utility serving 31,000 consumers in parts of Alamance, Caswell, Durham, Granville, Orange and Person counties.
Photo Caption: Piedmont Electric Engineer Robin Blanton, center, discusses the “Smart Grid” technology with employees Jared Goodnite, left, and Ronnie Compton. The Cooperative is the first electric utility in North Carolina to offer this unique technology for all of its 31,000-plus consumers.
Contact:
Manager - Key Accounts and Public Relations
Piedmont Electric Membership Corporation
P.O. Drawer 1179, 2500 NC86S
Hillsborough, NC 27278
919.241.1176 (Office)
919.210.4961 (Cell)
Will we have the electricity we need in the future? Start a dialogue with your elected officials at: www.ourenergy.coop.
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