blog

Who do you trust?

Sat, 01 Oct 2011 13:28:24 +1300

When you look at the electricity supply chain, who do we trust. The national grid operator (Transpower, in New Zealand) is up there, making it all work is what they do, get the power from source to your region. But they are a long way from the consumer, chances are not many people know who they are or what they do and that's fine, it's a government agency providing a core backbone service.

At the other end of the scale is the retailer, we get emails, letters and bills from them, we know who they are because we chose them, we may even have exercised our consumer right and changed retailer to achieve a better outcome (lower cost normally), but they are also the ones that annoy us. Complex bills, high one month, low the next for no apparent rhyme or reason (well not than we can work out if we don't have access to a smart energy platform!). And, are we really on the right plan? Is this the best my retailer can do? Should I really change to another retailer? Will another retailers plan be better for me specifically, not my demographic or my area, but ME? And if I ask these questions will my retailer tell me the honest truth, or just try to convince me to stay where I am? Don't get me wrong, I like the retailer that I have chosed, but I'm just as likely to choose differently again.

In the middle is the distribution or lines company, they get the power to my door and provide the infrastructure for the retailers to provide me with my services. I trust my lines company, I live in Christchurch and when my city was hit by an earthquake which killed 180 and injured hundreds more our lines company, Orion, got the power back onto essential services and domestic homes in an incredibly short time. It repaired and in some cases build new entire new lines to the severely damaged parts of the city. I thank them, I trust them. In the electricity ecosystem they are my trusted party.

Consumers signing up to know more

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 17:10:56 +1200

We have been running Meridian energy's "Daily Energy Report" for their smart meter customers for a couple of months now and the uptake is exceeeding our (or more importantly Meridian's) expectations! We also got a nice feature in the Christchurch Press yesterday http://tinyurl.com/3bm5sz4

Consumers simply haven’t had enough visibility to their electricity use in the past, making it difficult to adjust their consumption or closely monitor their energy provider so we give them clear and timely information about how much power they are using and when, enabling them to make smarter decisions about electricity use.

The focus of Cortexo’s software solutions is to empower energy users with information so they can make better decisions, and this trial with Meridian Energy is a good example of that. The response of Meridian customers to the ‘Daily Energy Report’ – an automated email that lets customers on smart meters know their daily electricity usage and when they’re using it – has exceeded Meridian’s own expectations, with uptake more than fifty percent higher than forecast.

Consumer access to Smart meter data right on!

Thu, 07 Jul 2011 15:50:18 +1200

Energy News reported yesterday that the New Zealand Electricity Authority has annoyed electricity retailers and distributors by saying "consumers [will be able] to nominate whether the retailer or the distributor appoints the metering equipment provider. They would also give consumers the right to free access to metering data for the purpose of bill verification" [read the full article here]

The response has been a claim that its a "problem that doesn't exist" and that "there is no monopoly to be wary of". The best quote to me is "there are no competition or access concerns that create grounds for regulation."

Although my interest is in consumer right to data (as opposed to selection of meter provider) this appears to me to be the standard utility problem of being self focused and not consumer focused, and a wee bit of territory protection thrown in. Our premise here at Cortexo is that the data is owned by the consumer and they have a right to see the results of what is being metered and given the general lack of consumer trust with any and all utilities, the ability to understand usage and compare with billing will give consumers a sense of control. The more granular that information the better, so until we get smart appliances in the shops (wait for an announcement from Fisher & Paykel and Cortexo soon!) or smart plugs in the Warehouse the best we have right now, without having to buy something extra, is meter data and at leat advanced meters give us more granular half hour data.

The easier it is to access meter data the more innovative services that will appear for consumers via third party providers like us here at Cortexo. So we have definate access concerns, the AMI companies think this is their area, but broadband based services will provide far more innovation and value for the whole of the electricity suply chain not just the consumer, so costs can be shared and even be potentially free (or close to it) for consumers.

Of course these third party services might actually highlight to consumers the choice they have and ability to decide who will get their hard earned dollars, as well as how they can take control and save. This might not quite be what utilities want and so what better way to close this down than keep meter data inside the monithic silos of the utilities. So do we have access concerns, you bet!

So for me, the Electricity Authority consultation paper hit the nail on the head, I'm all for it, bring on consumer access to meter data.

Software Collaboration

Mon, 23 May 2011 15:21:52 +1200

Cortexo is pretty passionate about interoperability, open source and collaboration. It was good to be part of a discussion with some leading software industry leaders discussing collaboration in the New Zealand software sector. There's only 4 million of us New Zealanders, if we don't work together (to conquer the world!) how will we succeed?

Have a look at the video...

Cortexo post earthquake

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 09:40:00 +1300

On Tuesday 22nd February 2011 Christchurch was hit by a 6.3 magnitude earthquake which devastated the central business district and many residential suburbs also claiming over 160 lives.

Fortunately or unfortunately I was away in Auckland but the rest of the team dived under desks for what was a very scary 30 or so seconds. Damage in our office was minimal (and the building is still standing) and, after ensuring neighbouring business were safe the team headed home to locate family. This was a very scary time as phone lines were out of service and the destruction was evident everywhere. Not knowing if partners and children were safe was stressful for all concerned.

Fortunately all Cortexo staff and families were ok, something I am so grateful for. Homes however suffered and for some it has taken two weeks to get electricity and water operating. One of us was evacuated from his home as there was a fear that a hill area would collapse, I’m pleased to say it didn’t.

I can’t speak highly enough of the New Zealand Civil Defence structure and the work of emergency services, local and central government. The entire country of 4 million Kiwi’s kicked in behind Christchurch within minutes of the disaster. I would also like to thank the rescue workers in the Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) teams who came from around the world to help search the rubble for survivors. Thank you, thank you.

Cortexo applications and services continued working throughout the disaster and our team was up and running from their homes within a day, although our emphasis was on helping family, friends and the community. Our normality now is that we have an early morning conference call and then get on with our work like any other remote working team and it seems to be working quite well. We also meet up for a lunch during the week and a beer on Friday nights. It’s weird, but its working!

So for Cortexo its business as usual (but just very unusual circumstances) and we are continuing to develop our energy portal and support our customers as we have always done.

Kia kaha Christchurch!

Few customers are engaged with their electricity retailer

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 18:04:44 +1300

The full quote was “relatively few customers are open to taking on some risk and are sufficiently engaged with their electricity retailer” said Mighty River power in an article for Energy News today. They were commenting on the rejection by most retailers to provide customised compensation schemes, which will run during energy conservation campaigns.

It really doesn’t matter what the customised compensation scheme is all about (its compensation if consumers save electricity), what matters is that retailers still don’t get it. They are still deciding what consumers want, what consumers can have and what consumers cannot have. We consumers really do need to turn that on its head and demand services that benefit us, not just cheap electricity because hey it does cost to get power to your door, but information that helps us choose whats best for us and services and plans that suit our lifestyle and our desire to conserve natural resource. Customers will be engaged with their electricity retailer when the electricity retailer starts engaging with the customer.

UK Entrepreneur regional winner

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 22:26:50 +1300

Yesterday (Monday 1st Nov), UK Trade & Investment named Cortexo the regional winner of the UKME competition (UK Entrepreneur) in New Zealand.

The UK-Market Entry (UK-ME) competition encourages business growth and expansion, exporting, entrepreneurship and accelerates high-growth ventures in New Zealand.

The final judging for the national winner is on Friday 5th Nov. We have our fingers crossed!

Data Privacy

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 16:08:59 +1300

The issue around data privacy is a big one for Smart Grid players. Who owns that data? If its my hot water your monitoring, surely I own the data?

Its definitely private to me because you can infer things about my behaviour when you look at how I use energy, for example can someone tell if I am at home now?

Cortexo believes the data belongs to the individual and if we want to do Demand Side Control then the end user (home owner) should opt in to that. These aren't new questions and they aren't easily solved as this interesting HBR article on Smart Grid security shows