Conservation and Demand Management Programs (CDMs) have been a top priority for utility providers for decades. Conservation programs are implemented by utilities, both public and private sector companies, to help achieve environmental, financial, health, and resiliency goals.
Most consumers are aware of the wide range of initiatives, from financial incentives / rebates, various promotions, awareness campaigns, and access to tools, that have been offered by government organizations and utilities over the years, to increase awareness and incent demand reduction. Making consumers aware of cost savings using off peak power, or Smart thermostat upgrades, are a few examples.
Conservation and demand management for customers strategies typically focus on:
- Demand response: changes in usage in response to financial signals
- Conservation: adopting a behaviour to use less electricity, gas, or water
- Energy efficiency: using energy more effectively with new technology
Organizations often have several CDM strategies they are pursuing at the same time. A utility company may offer online energy usage monitoring, as well as content related to energy saving best practices.
Some of the learnings from early CDM programs (pre-1990), such as the importance of consumer feedback (direct utility usage and comparative / neighborhood usage), are regarded as essential in successful conservation programs today.
“The effectiveness of intervention strategies increased when participants were given feedback on how they fared in their energy saving effort. The more frequent the feedback, the more effective it was… Comparing one’s performance to others (comparative feedback) appeared to help in reducing household energy consumption because of a sense of competition or social pressure.”
These research findings were identified before consumers even had access to online web platforms offering real-time data!
Today, the ability to provide feedback as part of a Conservation and Demand Management for Consumers Program is a must-have feature of utility customer portals. Customers need data and an easy to use tool to be able to make decisions in the moment, to take advantage of peak variable pricing, for example. Customer portal technology is the perfect solution because it offers consumers real-time access to their usage data, and comparisons to other homes in their neighborhood for benchmarking.
Customer portals offer a consolidated view of Conservation and Demand Programs. Successful programs bring together real-time data, information about utility promotions, and helpful educational content, all component parts of a typical CDM Program initiative.
The SilverBlaze Customer Portal provides this comprehensive functionality with these key features
- provides utility customers with an easy-to-navigate, intuitive, feature-rich hub where they can track and monitor their consumption
- data can be broken down to provide customers with a clear picture of when and how they’re using their utilities
- customers can compare their data usage with previous years—as well as with neighbors—in an effort to reduce and better self-regulate their utility consumption
- push notifications allow utility providers to instantly notify their customers if they are exceeding their usage goals on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis
The SilverBlaze Customer Portal “software has become a key tool in helping our customers understand, and manage their energy consumption and costs. We are excited about taking the next step for our customers’ interface with our upcoming deployment of the latest release.” John Thomson Customer Solutions Supervisor, Kitchener-Wilmot Hydro.
By engaging and educating utility customers to monitor and adjust their consumption, the SilverBlaze Customer Portal provides the tools utility providers need to achieve success in their Conservation and Demand Management Programs.
Our platform is ready to go out-of-the-box, and easy to integrate with your existing systems.
To learn how the SilverBlaze Customer Portal can help with your CDM objectives, schedule a consultation or product walk-through today.
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