Senior Advisor's Note
Summer is coming to an end, and so is one large project. With this newsletter, we celebrate the successful conclusion of Standardized, Sustainable and Transparent EM&V-Integrating New Approaches. This has been a multi-year collaborative effort on the use of advanced data analytics and collection tools (advanced M&V, aka M&V2.0). It involved a statewide pilot to streamline evaluation, measurement, and verification practices that provide support for the development of energy efficiency policies and markets. Managed by CT DEEP, this project was co-funded by state energy partners (NYSERDA, RI, NH, and VT), Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL), CT utilities Eversource and United Illuminating, and NEEP. The utilities worked with software and analysts from LBNL and Recurve.
Like summer, the end of this project is bittersweet. There is satisfaction and relief from accomplishing an ambitious agenda and the knowledge that there is plenty more for the region and industry to learn and do to take further advantage of advanced M&V resources. In the spirit of celebration, we dedicate this newsletter to advanced M&V and thank the U.S. Department of Energy for its State Energy Partner (SEP) grant, our state partners, and the core project team, with shout outs to Virginia Castro (U.S. DOE), Michele Melley (CT DEEP), Eliot Crowe (LBNL), Miles Ingram (Eversource), and Dick Oswald (United Illuminating).
Take it Away: The Project and Lessons Learned
The Standardized, Sustainable and Transparent EM&V-Integrating New Approaches study included three major task areas: 1) Connecticut auto-M&V pilots; 2) Transfer of knowledge transfer; and 3) Building understanding of relevant protocols. CT DEEP launched the project 3.5 years ago out of an interest in seeing if energy efficiency program evaluation results could be delivered more rapidly and more cost-effectively than with the traditional impact evaluation approaches. CT utilities supplied AMI data from their commercial program to LBNL and billing data from their Home Energy Solutions (HES) residential retrofit programs to Recurve. The pilots were designed to be illustrative rather than a face-off between traditional program evaluation and the advanced M&V software applications. Results suggest the advanced M&V software results are comparable to traditional evaluation and also demonstrate some additional features. For example, preliminary results could be provided quarterly. Outlier information could be identified and filtered during the implementation stage of a program; and, results can be examined for each implementation contractor. Moreover, utility staff were able to use LBNL’s software and Recurve’s dashboard with relatively little effort, after receiving training. With advanced M&V, as with other methods, time & experience is still needed to make judgment calls in examining and understanding the data and results. One key takeaway from the pilot is Advanced M&V increases transparency in program performance, helping both implementation and evaluation. Another is that forthcoming national protocols on non-routine events can lead to further use and adoption of advanced M&V.See CT DEEP’s M&V2.0 Resource Page for a full compendium of project materials. Also for more information, see this fact sheet and paper on the commercial pilot and a recent blog referencing the residential pilot.
While the pilots were designed and data was collected and crunched, the project also tracked and shared industry developments relating to advanced M&V. NEEP organized annual workshops and webinars on the topic. See the NEEP website for links to the webinars, workshop presentations, and briefs. For more specifics on protocols, see Efficiency Valuation Organization (EVO) Advanced M&V Software Testing Portal, their Snapshot on Advanced M&V White Paper (January 2020) look for an IPMVP Application Guide from EVO forthcoming this fall.
We are currently challenged by COVID-19 and are in the midst of a pivot in energy efficiency thanks to the growth in DERs, the recognition of buildings as grid assets, and aggressive state decarbonization goals. Advanced M&V can help energy efficiency programs in this environment. For example, meter-based savings enable evaluations when fieldwork is restricted, such as by COVID-19. Advanced M&V works for individual buildings or whole populations of customers; some utilities are integrating demand response with energy efficiency, also enabled by advanced M&V. When it’s timely and actionable, information is power. We hope that this study helps encourage others to take advantage of the power of information that advanced M&V can unleash.
Opportunity Knocks: Advanced M&V and Strategic Energy Management
Strategic Energy Management is a commercial/industrial energy efficiency program that is focused on continuous improvement in whole facility energy impacts, and as such, can be a good opportunity to apply advanced M&V applications. This is likely to be an emerging topic of conversation which may lead to fresh approaches in evaluation of SEM. Over the last several years that NEEP has managed the Northeast SEM Collaborative, discussions consistently return to four topics:
- Maintaining SEM culture post implementation
- Exploring SEM synergies with other activities
- SEM messaging to customers (e.g. language, value proposition)
- Leveraging already-recognized SEM benefits and outcomes
The focus in the Northeast today is in offering more comprehensive and integrated energy solutions, which utilities believe can be more effective than programs with a single offering. Demand management programs, integrated demand side management programs, energy efficiency programs, and account management are all opportunities where SEM activities should be integrated. When asked how SEM should be integrated with these activities - M&V was at the top of the subcommittee’s list of answers. It is an important tool to SEM programs in that is can estimate performance, for example energy consumption which may be applied to individual measures or facilities.
M&V for SEM is already challenging. If program administrators can only claim savings for capital improvements, then the benefits of behavioral changes are undervalued. Advanced M&V can capture the whole building impacts. Every SEM program is unique and subject to different regulatory evaluation requirements which makes it difficult to encourage consistency in methods. While advanced M&V can’t answer every challenge, it is a flexible tool that can contribute to collaborative problem solving on matters of validation, scale of analysis, and capturing integrated whole facility impacts.
LBNL AM&V Tools Under Development to Predict Peak Load
One of the benefits of advanced M&V is that it enables sophisticated analysis of electric or gas loads at the whole building level. Given our industry’s growing interest in understanding building performance and how buildings interact with the grid, we expect that advanced M&V software will increasingly be put to use for these purposes. Some of LBNL’s research on building energy modeling points in that direction, making use of advanced M&V models. LBNL is testing various models to understand how accurately they can predict peak load. This question is relevant to stakeholders who are interested in designing or assessing programs intended to shed load, such as demand response programs or grid interactive programs. This is significant research given its implications for management of building decarbonization and grid reliability.
Recently, LBNL convened a webinar for a small group, to share progress to date on its project to predict peak load, using advanced M&V models. All of the models underestimated the peak loads. There was a lot of overlap (consistency) in the values of the metrics measuring the accuracy of the predictions. The webinar posed a variety of hypotheses for the puzzling results and more research is happening to increase the accuracy of predictions. Other models – weather data, definitions of peak events, and model adjustments – are among the topics for continued research. At a higher level, it invites thinking about how to establish what is important in a model. If a model does a good job of identifying the extremes (peaks) and is consistent across all buildings in underestimating the load, is that more important than hitting an actual peak value prediction? These kinds of questions illustrate why research to model building performance is important. Development of protocols that establish best practices and consistent methods is an important part of our business. For more information about this research effort, contact LBNL's Jessica Granderson.
What States Can Do to Get More Experience with Advanced M&V
As noted, we hope that our recent research on advanced M&V helps encourage others to take advantage of the power of information that advanced M&V can unleash. Here are examples of several ways that state partners in the region are experimenting with advanced M&V for energy efficiency programs.
States Can Issue Regulatory Directives and Evaluation Guidance on Advanced M&V. A New York directive to program administrators (NYSERDA CE-O5, EM&V Guidance 2016-11-01) provides a good example of explicitly encouraging use of advanced M&V.
“This EM&V Guidance recognizes new methodologies being employed to help inform and improve program offerings that produce more continuous and actionable results, than were possible under traditional evaluation….“Program administrators and evaluators are encouraged to use advanced M&V techniques when appropriate and cost effective, to collect, aggregate and analyze data.”
Program Administrators Can Offer Programs Focused on Continuous Improvement and Whole-building Impacts. Advanced M&V is especially well suited to support such programs. Eversource CT has adopted Recurve’s data platform and OpenEE meter software for use with its Home Energy Solutions program. In New York for example, Con Ed offers the pay-for-performance program design. Moreover, ConEd is in the process of rolling out advanced metering infrastructure, which generates the more granular energy consumption data that advanced M&V software is capable of analyzing efficiently. New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Washington D.C. also offer pay-for-performance programs. NYSERDA has a Real Time Energy Management (RTEM) program, focused on efficient commercial building energy management. Also, NYSERDA and VEIC offer strategic energy management and deep retrofit programs that focus on continuous improvement at the whole building level.
States and Program Administrators Can Design More Pilots and Research. Pilots leverage resources, reduce risk, and motivate innovation. The industry has a long history of using pilots to help inform future decision making about electric utility rates, customer technology adoption and integration, and even changes to the utility’s business models. Connecticut was a pioneer in designing a pilot that tested advanced M&V as an evaluation strategy. One of the unique features of that pilot was the collaborative effort that pooled resources and brought together expertise from multiple stakeholders. More recently, Vermont has issued an RFP for a pilot to assess use of advanced M&V for hourly impacts from efficiency programs. Ongoing research investigations at NYSERDA relating to advanced M&V include how to address savings uncertainty and how to incorporate non-routine event adjustments into evaluation practice.
For utilities and stakeholders interested in pilots, here is a brand new resource from LBNL: A Handbook for Designing, Implementing, and Evaluating Successful Electric Utility Pilots (September 2020). This report provides a step-by-step process that regulators, policymakers, and utilities can follow to help promote more successful pilots. While this report is not focused on advanced M&V and is not intended to serve as a technical resource, it is an excellent starting point and is filled with references for those wishing to delve deeper into the technical details.
For states that are just starting out, A Guide to Adoption of M&V2.0 is a roadmap that helps stakeholders navigate the decision-making process of what to use advanced M&V for and what options to consider.
New Resources
- National Efficiency Screening Project report: National Standard Practice Manual for Benefit-Cost Analysis of Distributed Energy Resources (NSPM for DERs)
Mark Your Calendar
Upcoming NEEP and industry webinars and meetings of potential interest
- ASHP and VRF Market Transformation, October 21-22, 2020, NEEP virtual workshop
- Call for Abstracts! IEPEC Evaluation Conference 2021: Energy Optimization: Evaluation for a Clean and Equitable Future. Due October 30.
- Northeast Strategic Energy Management Collaborative, November 17, 2020, NEEP virtual workshop
- IEPEC Webinar – November 17, 2020
- EM&V for Decarbonization, December 1, 2020, NEEP virtual workshop