Pilot Objectives:

• Determine the feasibility of delivering programs dependent upon customer data.
• Determine if virtual commissioning is support small to midsize customers find desirable and/or valuable.
• Determine if a virtual approach to serving customers can effectively and efficiently deliver energy savings.

Key Outcomes:

Focus on Energy partnered with Xcel Energy, Madison Gas and Electric, and WPPI Energy to deliver the VCx pilot. While it was initially planned to only target small to mid-size businesses, utility input resulted in this list expanding to include schools and government facilities. This decision was unique to each utility territory and was based on where they saw the greatest opportunity for customer engagement.

The pilot relied on utility provided customer data to deliver VCx services. This data included, but was not limited to, customer name, address, building type, and interval data. Customer data was run through proprietary software to analyze and identify which buildings had energy saving opportunities before customers were recruited to participate.

While the standard usage information was provided by every utility, some utilities opted to not disclose customer name and address until a customer agreed to participate. The data provided was a deciding factor in outreach efforts with each utility partner. For those where customer information was provided, Focus on Energy completed outreach via “cold calling.” Utilities who opted to limit customer data played a larger role in outreach efforts, often doing the initial introductory calls before offering a warm introduction to the Focus on Energy staff.

Once engaged, Focus on Energy gathered additional information from the customer about their building and provided guidance on energy-saving measures they could complete. VCx delivers energy savings through lighting and HVAC scheduling or temperature setpoint adjustments, changes most building operators can complete on their own. Once building changes were made, energy usage data covering three to six months after the change was reviewed to inform energy savings delivered by VCx. Only electric savings were reported through the pilot because the interval data for gas meters was unavailable and would have been necessary to accurately quantify savings via a modeled approach. This limitation was not exclusive to Focus on Energy and was a challenge faced in other areas implementing VCx programs at the time.

At the completion of the pilot, Focus on Energy’s utility partners provided data for over 1,150 sites, of which roughly 200 were identified as a good candidate for VCx (17% conversion rate). After outreach, 33 sites opted to participate in the pilot and completed building changes, delivering a savings of 17.4 million LC kWh. Additional details on the pilot can be found in the Focus on Energy CY2023 Evaluation Report.

Lessons Learned:

• Utility Partnership: Understanding the needs of the utility were critical in gaining their support to participate in the pilot. Being able to adjust the targeted customer groups and customize an outreach strategy helped make the pilot more impactful and valuable to the utility and their customers. Utility led outreach was most effective in recruiting customers than through “cold-calling;” however, the ability and timeframe for which a utility was able to complete the outreach was dependent upon their resources. In order to scale this pilot to a full program in the future, utility consumption data would need to be more readily accessible and provided in a uniform format.
  

• Customer Experience: On average, customers spent six hours engaging with Focus which was less time commitment than their initial expectations. Energy-saving recommendations were items customers said they had already identified but hadn’t done due to internal barriers or not understanding the impact changes could have on their building’s energy usage and costs. Customers commented the pilot was very influential in their decision to make programming changes because program staff walked them through what the new settings should be based on the operational requirements of their buildings.

• Energy Savings: Focus on Energy uses a five-year effective useful for VCx which is considered a short lifecycle for a measure. This combined with the limitation to electric savings resulted in the pilot’s cost of acquisition (i.e., the cost to achieve each MMBtu) being more than ten times the cost of other nonresidential programs.

Recommendations and Next Steps

The pilot was discontinued due to high acquisition costs and data access limitations.

Questions?
Please contact the Future Focus team with questions at futurefocus@focusonenergy.com.