Big Data & Analytics Utilities - 10 Ways UK Utility Firms Can Boost Operational Value

7/23/2019 Big Data & Analytics Utilities - 10 Ways UK Utility Firms Can Boost Operational Value

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UTILITIES

BIG DAT A & ANAL YTICS

10 W ays UK U tility Fi rm s

Can B oost Opera tional Value

OCTOBER 2015

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As more tools surface for capturing and analysing data, new designstrategies to improve processes and generate transformational change

for their businesses are being increasingly seen in the energy and utility

sector. Inefficiencies in the industry encompass a plethora of wasted

energy each year. Advanced technology, such as big data, analytics

and smart metering can help UK utility companies to eliminate this

waste and improve customer experience to gain full control of their

resources.

The UK utility and energy market is characterised by high levels of

churn and a 38% average switching rate with domestic consumers

changing electricity or gas supplier every week. With the advent of

Smart Grid too, the levels of data collection are dramatically increasing

which is opening up huge opportunities for utilities to exploit. The big

question though, is how do utility companies leverage the hugevolumes of datasets to create value for their businesses?

Ahead of the Big Data & Analytics Utilities event in London (06 – 08

October, 2015), we bring you ten quick ways utility organisations are

improving their operations, uncovering monetisation opportunities and

understanding customers better across their value chains.

Jason McGee-Abe

Editor, PEX Network







1

MANAGING CHURN USING CUSTOMER INSIGHT

Creating a dedicated analytics function to focus on key areas

including customer segmentation, churn assessment, probability

modelling and product placement modelling helps to address this.

The Customer Insight team of EDF Energy (part of EDF Group), one

of Europe’s largest power companies, is using a Statistical Analysis

System (SAS) to deliver strategic analysis of data and gain new

insight into factors that motivate and drive customer behaviour. “Wecan meet customers’ needs better by learning more about how they

think, what they buy, what they use and how they want to interact

with their supplier,” says Clifford Budge, Customer Insight Manager,

B2C Energy Sourcing and Customer Supply (ESCS), EDF Energy.

2

DATA MINING AND PREDICTIVE MODELING

Using analytics to forecast the impacts of weather helps to

streamline utilities’ processes. For example, Yorkshire Water, a

water supplier and waste management firm which supplies around

1.4 billion litres of water each day, has been using analytics to

forecast flooding and pollution in its network of 62,000 miles of

water and sewage mains. These systems enable water engineers to

predict when damaging pollution may occur in sewer overflow. Datamining tools forecast the overflow sites likely to develop blockages,

helping operators to better target engineer visits.











3

ALIGNING AND INTEGRATING FUNCTIONS

Jan Staack, Lead Enterprise Architect at DONG Energy says that

data helps to closer align and integrate IT and Business Functions.

DONG Energy is collaboratively working in collaboration to manage

a high energy demand by using data insight and forecasting

analytics to pro-actively manage resources and maintain a

consistent supply. Higher quality of data collected supports business

cases for strategic change within an organisation and helps to buildmore robust data architectural designs and foundations for

continuous improvement. DONG Energy also has a mobile solution

that supports the workforce management and tasks in connection

with maintenance of the electrical distribution network.

4

GREEN ENERGY POWER

Danish energy firm, Vestas Wind Systems, has adopted Big Data to

define and establish preferred sites for smarter wind energy. Vestas,

which produces 20% of the world’s wind energy, is addressing the

issue of turbine placement by analysing petabytes of structured and

unstructured data such as weather reports, tidal phases, geospatial

and sensor data, and weather modelling research to pinpoint the

optimum locations to install new wind turbines. By using Big Datatechnology, the analysis for pinpointing new optimum locations can

now be done in less than one hour; a job that used to take weeks. It

also assists with determining the best times to schedule

maintenance of the turbines.











5

DISTRIBUTING GRID SENSORS

Deploying distribution grid sensors and control systems, including

smart meters, is an area of focus for a number of utility companies

as they set the future foundations of data collection engines to

analyse energy demand. It enables intelligent maintenance,

minimising faults and reducing downtime and disruption, delivering

better service and better systems.The addition of grid sensors puts

pressure on utility organisations to find profitable uses for collecteddata. They can tap into other sources of data, including smart city

projects, including data on water usage and carbon emissions.

6

SMART METERS

Converting billions of data points coming from millions of smart

meters deployed around the country will enable utilities to turn them

into actionable intelligence on the operating conditions of their grids

to improve network reliability and efficiency.

Smart meter adoption varies across European companies though.

Some EU members, such as Italy and the Scandinavian countries,

have largely completed their smart meter rollouts. Others, including

France, Germany, the U.K., are just getting started. Benefits of

smart meter rollouts include being able to better estimate the state

of the grid and assess lifetime durations of distribution grid

equipment. However, there are challenges, such as embedding the

right algorithms into substations for smarter operations of the grid.










7

SECURITY

Across the pond in the US, a Verizon report states that $6 billion of

electricity is stolen each year. Smart grid solutions can detect where

this power is being lost, plus enable remote control and automation

of grid equipment to help keep costs down.

Smart meters keep consumers informed and enable more accurate

billing and demand forecasting. This opens up the window ofopportunity for more transparency, and cost savings. In 2011, the

UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change mapped out plans

for the installation of 53 million smart meters in 30 million homes

and businesses by 2020. Given that utility firms have typically

struggled with the accuracy of customer and billing data, mass

smart metering can address this, but it also raises concern as to

how utility companies will manage the huge volume of meter

readings.

8

INTEGRATION

European utilities have put a big emphasis on integrating utility-

scale wind and solar power, integrating on-site power generation,

and managing new sources of demand such as plug-in electric

vehicles, according to an Accenture executive survey. Unlike our US

counterparts, the survey also found that European utilities have put

much less emphasis on data analytics as a top investment category

over the next five years.









9

MONETISATION

From a customer point of view, utilities now have a better picture on

how their products are used. This provides an opportunity to create

new revenue streams, such as advantageous smart home tariffs for

residential owners, or packages designed to promote use of spare

capacity during periods of low demand. Smart meters also allow

energy firms to make recommendations to customers designed to

help them use energy more efficiently and reduce bill shock.

Big Data and Analytics bring vast monetising opportunities, both

internal and external, for utility companies. Internally, advanced data

insight helps you to truly understand your customer from marketing

and sales points of view, tailoring bespoke products, services, or

indeed marketing campaigns based on your respective customers’

preferences. The external monetisation potential will boom as

homes become smarter and products and services are created tocoincide with customers’ behavior and habits.

10

EFFICIENT FORECASTING AND CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT

Through the use of big data-enabled utility management systems,

utilities can become smarter at asset and infrastructure

management. Having a system which constantly monitors andevaluates events across an organisation’s footprint will not only

identify inefficiencies, but deliver actionable scenario insights from

predictive modeling tools. Creating dashboards for data

visualisations to identify information gaps and communicate insights

enterprise-wide is helping to develop pro-active cultures.









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Big Data & Analytics Utilities - 10 Ways UK Utility Firms Can Boost Operational Value