How utilities can leverage the power of cloud data

by Jay Malin, AGENT511 Managing Director

Resiliency and scalability are certainly important reasons to move to the cloud. However, the cloud offers far more in the way of tools such as data frameworks that can be leveraged to rapidly (both development and execution) deliver real-time analytics. Not just analytics tables and charts, but event triggers such as load curtailment or communications messages.

Data is collected from numerous sources such as meters, outage management systems, weather, and customer preferences. A rule is put in place that combines sources to identify customer patterns and a message is sent letting customers know that due to the increased system load and the own usage, the utility temporarily wishes to proactively cycle energy from their EV charging to the grid.  Another rule looks for customers during severe outages who may not be restored for days and combines restoration rate (in their area), weather, and a series of personalized multimedia content to express empathy.

In the past, this would have required data marts with canned queries and cached data, and a number of systems performing disparate queries. Cloud data does this on-the-fly by querying disparate datasets. We’re now building templates so that customers can create their own queries and leverage this power.

In addition, we’re looking at how to leverage partner content to deliver customer experiences that highlight brand and meaningful, relevant engagement. This gains loyalty and alleviates call center volume during major events.