Dive Brief:
- Smart grid plans filed by North Carolina utilities provide inadequate information on how customers can access their energy consumption data, cost-benefit analysis and adequate technology descriptions, say two environmental groups.
- The N.C. Sustainable Energy Association and the Environmental Defense Fund asked regulators to reject the proposals and pressed for a separate proceeding to consider updating rules for accessing customer information.
- Duke Energy issued a response letter saying it values the privacy of all its customers and that regulatory requirements commonly prohibit it from sharing customer information, Smart Grid News reports.
Dive Insight:
Smart grid proposals filed last year by Duke Energy Carolinas, Duke Energy Progress, and Dominion North Carolina Power have a range of deficiencies, lack sufficient analysis and should be rejected, the two groups told state regulators.
"The utilities filed plans fail to provide sufficient detail," NCSEA said in a statement on its web site. The proposed plans do not sufficiently show how the utilities will transfer information between it and the customer while maintaining the security of that information.
The smart grid technology plans filed by the utilities "fail to provide enough information to inform the commission as to whether the utilities are taking the steps necessary to enable customers to reap the benefits that smart grid technologies are capable of providing," according to the group's comments.
NCSEA and EDF requested regulators reject the plans until supplemental information is provided by the utilities and require such information be included in all future smart grid technology plans. The groups also requested the commission initiate a rulemaking to address data access.
