Tag Analytics

Energy Transformation: Why EVs will Impact the Utility Grid – MarketScale

With the bipartisan National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) funding fast approaching, what are the implications on energy demand and the utility grid and why is EV charging compounding the complexities of grid transmission and distribution?

Currently EVs account for about 1% of the global vehicle market and according to EV Adoption, there are approximately 2 million EV on the road in the US. According to the Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration, the average vehicle travels approximately 13,500 miles annually and EV efficiency is roughly 3.5 miles per kWh suggesting annual energy consumption of 3,870 kWh. According to the DOE Energy Information Administration, the average US home consumes roughly 10,900 kWh a year. Therefore, an EV would potentially account for the 35% of the average US home’s electric usage.  Most homes can be equipped with a Level 2 EV chargers (240 volts / 50 amps) mitigating any grid impact

EV Charging Grid Impact

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What it Means to Your Business

Key Air Quality Metrics

This post explores how the use of three key air quality metrics can improve the health and safety of your business. Occupant health and safety are paramount in the current environment and sensors that detect harmful compounds can serve as front line of defense.  Given these uncertain times, efforts to reduce risks and improve environmental conditions, will help to better support employees and build customer trust.

Begin the process by establishing a goal such as sustainability or worker productivity.  From your goal or objective identify metrics that are aligned with the goal, and then measure your progress toward the goal. Deploying this process improvement framework will improve your business in measureable ways.  In this manner we are transforming metrics and data analytics into performance improvement aligned to desired outcomes including sustainability and energy efficiency. 

Our approach is to identify metrics aligned to your goals and objectives and provide an analytics framework to assess performance. This involves data curation, our proprietary data architecture and machine learning algorithm to provide context, perspective and visual insight.  Key is performance benchmarking for health, safety, sustainability and energy efficiency. These are core environmental metrics and process capabilities that will transform your business model.

To zero-in on important indoor air health metrics, cost effective sensors are required. Based on health and energy efficiency objectives, we found these core indoor environmental metrics, namely carbon compounds including: CO2 and methane, Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), and particles. In our previous post, Green Econometrics discussed Air Changes per Hour (ACH) as a measure of air filtration performance – how many times does the air in a room change in an hour?  In this manner, monitoring CO2 levels can serve as a proxy for determining acceptable ACHs.  It is more cost effective to monitor the number of room air changes per hour using air filtration than to deploy expensive sensors to detect pathogens and viruses.

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Why the analytics framework for process improvement can translate into substantial benefits around sustainability improvements and energy efficiency. The Coronavirus pandemic has upended social interaction – a new normal, with social distancing and protocols, and so why does sustainability play a crucial role in facilitating a smoother transition into the is new normal.  The reason is sustainability engenders confidence.  Knowing facilities are safe and that indoor air quality monitoring is vital for occupant health and safety builds confidence. Health and safety are also essential in generating the confidence that changes consumer behavior.  Therefore, the process by which you implement a sustainability plan plays an expanding role in orchestrating the activities that adhere to values and performance.

A sustainability framework provides the roadmap to monitor, measure and curate data thus enabling performance benchmarking of conditions and processes.  The analytics framework serves as a roadmap to utilize insight gained from data analysis.  Currently available tools such as data visual analysis, machine learning algorithms and cloud computing architecture enable cost effective approaches to achieve business and sustainability objectives.

A sustainability framework provides the foundation to drive business value across several dimensions and performance metrics.  The use of the sustainability process can drive business value, improve our environment, enhance customer loyalty, and better engage healthier and happier employees while rewarding shareholders and stakeholders with higher business valuations.

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Technology and innovation drive productivity, but transaction costs arising from technology implementation limit gains. Analytics and decision science could provide the means to tame transaction costs and improve productivity. Transaction costs were defined by Ronald Coase in “The Nature of the Firm,” published in 1937 and who earned a Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 1991.

Access to and sharing of information drives competitive advantage. Businesses often require global sourcing of physical and digital resources and collaborative workgroups often span several nations across the globe. Information flow is an integral aspect of collaborative workflows and global supply chains. Data serves as the foundation for business models where competencies are achieved through analytics. To achieve visibility and granularity into business processes, greater amounts of data are generated.

By reducing transaction costs, advances in technology and innovation can translate into higher productivity; lower operating costs, and a greater supply curve shift. At the same time, the network effect, enhanced consumer utility found with increasing number of users, may push demand.

The takeaways are: 1) analytics provide a process to reduce costs and improve productivity; 2) a process to monitor, measure, and benchmark performance; and 3) enable a firm to assimilate new technologies and manage uncertanties.
How Analytics can Improve Productivity