DER Task Force October Newsletter

October 2021 Edition 👻

Oct 27, 2021

Earlier this month, the DER Task Force Leadership team made our way to upstate New York to St. Regis Falls to visit Azure Mountain Power, a hydropower facility run by 3 generations of the Smith family. Not only were Everett, Emmett, Ethan and the rest of the family generous enough to host us at the family lake cabin, they also shared the incredible history of the hydropower facility, its roots in the local community, and the challenges they face as a clean, local power producer. You can learn more about Azure Mountain Power in this presentation they gave to DER Task Force back in June and via James’s Tweet thread on the site. And keep your eyes out for some awesome new video content from the trip coming soon!
Our next meetup is scheduled for 11/3 at 6:30pm ET, with Local Solar for All - you can register for the event here. Karl Rabago, a Local Solar for All consultant and former Texas public utility commissioner, will discuss recent modelling from Vibrant Clean Energy showing the value of DERs to the grid and the role they play in achieving a decarbonized grid at the lowest possible cost.
In case you missed it, Canary Media’s Mike Munsell featured the DER Task Force in his Friday Social Newsletter on October 8th. His piece really captured the grassroots, intellectually curious, and open nature of this epic group and it was a good reminder of why we’re all here in the first place.

From the community

Content

DER Task Force member, meetup guest, and economist Lynne Kiesling joined Canary Media’s Editor-in-Chief Jeff St. John to discuss transactive energy earlier this month. Professor Kiesling, who heads up the Institute for Regulatory Law and Economics at the University of Colorado Denver, previously shared her thoughts on transactive energy and end-users’ participation in energy markets with the Task Force during a May 2021 Meetup (meetup recording coming soon!) In the meantime, keep an eye out for her latest on the Canary website.

Energy memes never quite get old, and thankfully DER Task Force’s resident memelord Pamela Wildstein keeps a steady stream of them coming in the #ministry_of_der_propaganda Slack channel. Her latest masterpiece is this TikTok, showcasing the hysterical chaos that ensues when kidnappers meet energy nerds. Check out the channel for more nerdy but funny energy content 🤓

Thread of the Month

Two cool threads to highlight this month!

First, a thread that captures the power of the network that is the DER Task Force. Nick Dreves was asking around for stats on demand-side resources and received a handful of responses, including a study done by Portland General Electric. Incredibly enough, the person responsible for the analysis in the PGE study, Josh Keeling, surfaced on the thread to offer to answer any questions about the study.

That is a testament to the tightness and collaborative spirit of this network and demonstrates how helpful and intellectually rigorous DER TFers are. Love to see these kinds of connections happen!

Second, we return to the controversial topic of settling to the meter. Troy Hodges courageously broached the subject in the #policy channel:

Key takeaways from the thread:

Despite widespread deployment of smart meters over the last few years, which should in theory allow utilities to collect, share, and use granular energy usage data in ways that benefit customers, this is not happening in any meaningful way.
Instead, utilities use estimated load profile of a customer, rather than the customer’s actual observable usage, to bill retail energy providers for the energy component of the electricity bill.
To make matters worse, utilities often claim they are doing this because the regulatory bodies require them to use estimated load profiles rather than customer data from smart meters. However, this claim is easily refuted by referencing smart meter case filings, which show utilities arguing against having to use the granular data due to computation costs and, absurdly, on the grounds that customers don’t actually want their data to be used to provide a superior service.

Check out the #policy channel for more great conversations with fellow DERTFers!

What we’re reading

Microgrid Knowledge picked up coverage of Footprint Project’s amazing work in Louisiana following Hurricane Ida, along with the fundraiser DER Task Force put together and the ensuing institutional fund spearheaded alongside Spring Lane Capital.
In preparation for our meetup on 11/3 with Local Solar for All, check out this summary report from the group walking through the conclusions of Chris Clack’s Vibrant Clean Energy study and why they are relevant for DER deployment - specifically solar and storage.

Want to read more? Join the #news channel in the Slack. Did we miss a piece? Let us know about it here.

Jobs

Bellawatt is looking for a Product Manager to help build products for a wide range of energy clients. Reach out to Eugene Granovsky to learn more and check out the application here.
Fluence Energy is hiring for a Director of Engineering to guide architecture and design decisions across the company’s platform. Reach out to Alan Cordova with questions and apply here.
ClearTrace is looking for individuals passionate about clean energy to fill 2 sales associates roles. Reach out to Ariel Smith to learn more about the role and check out the application here.
Fermata is hiring for several roles across its Data Science and Engineering teams. Reach out to Jack Pfeiffer if you are interested and check out the full list of open roles here.

Don’t worry, there are way more jobs than listed above - find our full job board here and be sure to join the #jobs channel in Slack.

Have a job and want to share? Fill out this form to get it in our database.

DER of the Month

The Revel supercharger station in Brooklyn (featured in TechCrunch, no less) wins DER of the Month for October. Some of DER Task Force’s own, including Colleen Metelitsa, brought this monster DER to life. Spooky!

Thanks for reading and happy Halloween!

— DER Task Force Leadership Team

DER Task Force