How demand response programs contribute to energy efficiency and environmental quality.
David Nemtzow is former president of the Alliance to Save Energy and now an independent consultant, Dan Delurey is executive director of the U.S. Demand Response Coordinating Committee, and Chris King is chief strategy officer of eMeter and board member, Demand Response and Advanced Metering Coalition. Contact them at david@nemtzow.com, dan.delurey@demandresponseinfo.org, and chris@emeter.com respectively.
Demand response (DR) is rapidly gaining ground in the electricity industry and among its regulators, but its establishment may not be going as smoothly or robustly as it could. This is in part because of different views as to where DR fits into the electricity industry. Is it about reliability? Prices? Or is it all about load control?
DR is about all of those things, but it also is about other important policy and business areas that do not jump to mind for most people when they think about DR—energy efficiency and the environment.
Some of the lack of association of DR with these areas may be caused by a lack of information, but there also may be a presumption among some key audiences that there is no relationship between DR and these areas— or if there is one, it is negative.
Record-breaking temperatures and demand, sharper system peaks, expiration of price caps, and rapid technological advances all have contributed to the growth of DR. As global climate change heightens the profiles of energy efficiency and renewable energy, two questions stand out:
• Does DR increase or decrease overall electricity usage, or just shift it to another time with no impact on energy efficiency?