Require electric utilities to provide consumers access to, and control of, their own digital energy information

Recommendation #142

FCC Chapter: 12.7

States should require electric utilities to provide consumers access to, and control of, their own digital energy information, including real-time information from smart meters and historical consumption, price and bill data over the Internet. If states fail to develop reasonable policies over the next 18 months, Congress should consider national legislation to cover consumer privacy and the accessibility of energy data.

Consumers, and their authorized third parties, must be able to get secure, non-discriminatory access to energy data in standardized, machine-readable formats.

Customers should have access to their data in the same granular form in which it is collected, and in as close to real-time as possible. Innovative companies -- from large service providers to small startups -- and utilities should be able to compete on a level playing field to provide a wide variety of home and building energy information and management services.

State public utility commissions (PUCs) should mandate data accessibility as a part of Smart Grid rate cases, especially smart meter deployments.

Consistent with the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA), these policies should mandate secure consumer accessibility to real-time energy consumption data, time-series consumption and billing data and dynamic price data.

Regulators should also require regulated utilities to adopt business processes that clearly articulate the methods by which consumers can authorize and de-authorize third-party access.

Regulators should also strongly consider requiring distribution utilities to provide consumers' generation mix and emissions data in as close to real time as possible.

States and utilities should not wait for full smart meter deployments to take these steps.

With reasonable privacy protections, the federal government should be granted limited access to utility bills from homes receiving federal energy efficiency funds to better evaluate the government's energy efficiency programs, such as weatherization.

States should consider how third parties might get access to anonymized datasets for research purposes, with strict privacy protections.

By the end of 2010, every state PUC should require its regulated investor-owned utilities to provide historical consumption, price and bill data over the Internet, in machine-readable, standardized formats.

By the end of 2011, every investor-owned utility should develop and implement this capability.

Congress should monitor the issue and should consider national legislation if states fail to act.