5 Programs to Make Energy Real in Your Utility Communications
Lack of customer participation will kill at least one of your utility’s strategic initiatives. Perhaps it already has. But you can prevent the premature death of a strategic initiative by using these utility communications tips. Every interaction with customers is a communications opportunity. Utilities show what they value—positively and negatively—when they communicate with customers. That […]
Communications Breakdown: Xcel Energy’s Smart Grid Program
Will Poor Communications Destroy Xcel Energy’s Smart Grid Program? Some utilities are having trouble implementing Smart Grid or Smart Meter projects that rely on customers changing the way they use energy. Reaching customers and getting them to consider changing their behavior requires a long-term, integrated, campaign that includes customer communications, media relations, and public relations, […]
How NOT to Communicate with Utility Customers During Outages
“A live electric line just fell on a bus filled with senior citizens—what do you do?” No, that wasn’t a line from Dennis Hopper in the movie, Speed. In fact, I was asked that question during an interview to become a spokesman at Salt River Project, a Phoenix-based electric and water utility. I got the […]
Wait! Before You Raise Rates …Strategic Steps to Take Prior to Raising Residential Energy Prices
View the pdf Price increases, both large and small, are or soon will be a reality for many utilities across North America, and someone must break that news to residential customers. This report provides strategic advice on properly communicating price increases. Drawing from interviews with professionals in marketing, media relations, customer communications, advertising, community relations, […]
Regulatory Decoupling Removes Financial Barriers to Utility Energy Efficiency Programs
From Direct Options Executive Market Intelligence January 2010 Download pdf As regulators and utility executives confront expensive capital programs and looming carbon-dioxide reduction goals, efficiency and conservation are gaining more prominence as the low-cost, instantly-available alternative to building new power plants or gas distribution lines. For too long, utilities have been financially penalized if they […]
Dodged a bullet. Whistled past the graveyard. Rolled the dice. Whatever metaphor you prefer, it looks like utility communicators will not get “fracked” by the fast-disappearing Matt Damon film, Promised Land. And that’s good, because it doesn’t appear that utility communicators invested a lot of time or effort preparing for the potential negative PR impact […]
Speak First, Then Build: Renewable Energy and Transmission Lines
SUGAR LAND–July 6, 2010–Written by John Egan for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)–Climate change, renewable energy, interstate transmission lines, and coaching the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team were among the top items discussed when governors from Western states assembled in Whitefish, Montana, last week for their annual Western Governors’ Association (WGA) conference. Lakers coach […]
CCS: Economics and Communications Challenges
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND–May 21, 2010–Written by John Egan for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)–Pre-commercial demonstrations of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology in the U.S. continue to show that CCS technology is sound, but CCS is increasingly being questioned on economic and communications grounds, according to a breakout session at the 12th Annual Electric Power […]
Broader Stakeholder Engagement Needed to Site Transmission Projects
DENVER, COLORADO–March 8, 2010–Written by John Egan for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)–State and federal renewable electric standards (RES) cannot be met without the construction of new transmission lines to connect often remote renewable generation sources to far-off load centers, speakers told a wind and transmission workshop sponsored by the American Wind Energy Association […]
“Ding Dong, Energy Services Calling”
By John Egan, for E Source, March, 2010 Utilities, government entities, efficiency organizations, and civic volunteer groups are working together in some areas to provide neighborhood energy sweeps, also known as energy blitzes, as a way to rapidly capture energy savings in homes. Some time ago, when energy prices were high, energy sweeps were used […]
