Press Releases
ConsumerPowerline says "demand response" participation helped save the city from a wider blackoutEnergy Management Firm Calls on the Governor to Expand Strategic Implementation of Program to Avert Blackouts in the Future
NEW YORK, August 28, 2006 - As New York City recovers from a triple-digit heat emergency and braces for the next, ConsumerPowerline, which helps companies manage their energy use more efficiently, says that a recently released Con-Ed report to the Mayor on the crisis provides confirmation showing that Emergency Demand Response programs helped save the city from an expansion of the blackout that crippled western Queens for more than a week, while also affecting Westchester County and other parts ofthe Tri-State area -and could hold the key to averting blackouts in the future.
The company, which is asking Governor Pataki to increase strategically placed emergency demand response participation - where, currently, large energy consumers agree to reduce their consumption in an emergency to help avert a power failure-says these programs led to a three percent reduction in critical energy use throughout the region, saving 411 megawatts, or enough to power more than 400,000 homes, and helping to stave off more widespread failures.
Citing a just released report from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) recommending that states implement Demand Response 'solutions', the firm wants state and local rules re-written so both large and smaller energy users, including single-family homes, restaurants and mid-sized apartment buildings, can be reliably called upon and economically targeted to the precise areas that are in danger of losing power during a heat emergency. The company says such changes could have spared Astoria its suffering in the dark, and would spare future Astorias from similar suffering.
Con-Ed recently submitted a report to the Mayor on the power outage, including the role of Demand Response, in helping to prevent a wider blackout to customers in Queens, New York.
"Our examination of the report and chronology of events, convinces us that a Demand Response program that included smaller energy users, and one that could be better targeted to the trouble spots, would have certainly helped to prevent the outages that left 25,000 Queens residents without power for more than a week, " said Mike Gordon, president and founder of ConsumerPowerline. "In the first critical hours, when damage to Con-Ed's secondary system knocked out power to those customers, there were clear opportunities for localized demand response that would have made the critical difference."
According to Gordon, "While the Governor wisely encouraged all state agencies to intensify energy saving measures during the heat emergency, we not only need a louder call for demand response participation throughout the city and state, we need rules that will permit the 'the little guy'--small merchants and building owners, for example, to be a greater part of a targeted emergency demand response solution. If we had had 500 small-sized buildings in Astoria, for example, cutting back on electricity just a bit during the crisis, the data shows we would have provided the power to stave off the failures that left them and their neighbors in the stifling darkness, for days," he said.
Gordon says the story of Electchester, a large apartment complex in Queens, shows energy consumers are willing to sacrifice during a critical power shortage.
Third Housing Co., Inc. of Electchester is a Demand Response participant that cut back on air conditioning usage when the call to conserve went out during the recent crisis. The complex and its neighbors saved enough electricity to power 2,000 homes, while suffering no loss of power itself, despite the up to 10-day blackouts in nearby Astoria and other parts of Queens.
"The residents of Electchester are really among the unsung heroes in helping to prevent a wider blackout--and not only because they cut back on sorely needed power," said Gordon. "Due to their critical location on the electricity grid, next to blacked out Astoria, it appears that their energy curtailment, in tandem with others' nearby, helped contain the blackout to a local area and may well have prevented a domino-like tripping of the system that could have resulted in a wider Queens problem, or even a problem that spread to other boroughs and beyond," Gordon said.
"It's not easy to cut back, when we'd all like to get some relief from the heat," said longtime Electchester resident Mike Arendt. "But after the blackout in 2003, we were determined to make a difference-and I think we did."
ConsumerPowerline says while we need to determine precisely how Electchester and other emergency energy providers may have helped. The way to make the biggest difference for New Yorkers is to strategically expand local Demand Response programs and to include smaller energy users so they can be targeted in an emergency to help stave off blackouts in specific areas on the brink of failure. "The homeowner, the small businessperson, the small building owner--these people could have made a difference in Astoria, and they will make a difference in the future, if we allow them, as energy consumers, to be part of the solution to our electricity woes during a heat emergency," Gordon added.
"We feel that any change that encourages small end-users to participate in demand response in New York, is good. It would encourage providers like our firm to get involved in New York and, ultimately, it would help electric service to be delivered more reliably to all New Yorkers" Jeff Lines, chief operating officer of Demand Direct, LLC said. Demand Direct, LLC is a major provider of demand response services in Connecticut, providing substantial relief and reliability for Connecticut Light and Power and its end-users.
Gordon says that increasing strategic demand response participation from the current two percent to about 10 percent, would give the city much better tools to avert selective power failures, and full-scale blackouts.
Two federal agencies have recommended that demand response become an integral component of the nation's energy policy:
A just released report by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), citing procedures that will prevent localized, as well as system-wide power failures, recommends that states work cooperatively in finding demand response solutions to provide relief from an overloaded electricity transmission system.
A February 2006 US Department of Energy study, which recommends the implementation of Demand Response programs nationwide, indicates that these programs typically deliver needed electricity to the grid, "just in time," reducing the likelihood of blackouts.
About ConsumerPowerline
ConsumerPowerline (www.consumerpowerline.com) is full service strategic energy asset management firm with a proven track record of helping its clients, large energy users, uncover hidden market revenues and cost savings opportunities available with their real estate assets. Currently, CPLN is the largest non-utility provider of demand response services in the U.S.
ConsumerPowerline was recently named to the Inc 500 list for 2006 as well as being the recipient of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Emerging Business. ConsumerPowerline's client list features notable public and private firms including: CB Richard Ellis, Morgan Stanley, Macy's, Starwood Hotels, Hines Property Management, Forest City Ratner Corporation, Co-op City, Macklowe Properties, RFR Realty, New York Presbyterian Hospital, NYU Medical Center, Newmark Properties, Douglas Elliman Property Management, Cooper Square Realty, Wentworth Management and dozens of other substantial end-users of energy.