Data Analytics is Critical to Utilities, Cities, and Consumers

As utilities and communities face unprecedented change from extreme weather, the adoption of electric vehicles, renewable power and other disruptors, nine out of 10 of utility executives say they recognize data analytics to be vital to their ability to serve customers reliably. Meanwhile, half of consumers say they are actually willing to pay more for data-driven insights that help them conserve energy and lower their bills. These are just two findings from the 2022 Resourcefulness Insight Report, released today by Itron, Inc. (NASDAQ: ITRI), which is innovating the way utilities and cities manage energy and water.

Published today at Itron Inspire 2022, the company’s premier customer-focused event, the new report explores how utilities and cities are using real-time data and analytics to transform how they deliver energy and water to customers, improving the quality of life for residents. More Intelligence and More Possibilities: An Itron Resourcefulness Report dives into why 93% of utilities say it’s extremely/very important to be able to gain insights from real-time data and analytics. Driving this significance is the need to gain insights for greater efficiency, reliability in the face of extreme weather, personalized customer experiences and integrating renewables/promoting sustainability. Consumers agree that the top priority is improving efficiency to lower their costs, however they rank gaining personalized insights higher than utilities do.

“Data is one of the most important assets for every organization and individual. But data becomes much more powerful when we recognize its value in real-time and then act on it. Our future – especially within the utility industry – will be shaped by data and the actionable insights that come from it. By using this intelligence, utilities and cities can get the visibility they need to address pressing challenges and ensure they can continue to reliably deliver energy and water services and improve the overall quality of life for consumers everywhere,” said Marina Donovan, vice president of global marketing, ESG and public affairs.

The differing opinions of consumers and utility executives lead to additional key findings including:

• More than half of consumers say they’d pay up to 7% more on their utility bills to receive more personalized insights to help them manage their usage.
• Building greater grid resilience remains a key priority with 77% of consumers stating it is extremely/very important that utilities use data analytics to help with extreme weather. This is especially true in India where 96% agree with this point.
• Conflicting smart cities priorities between utilities and consumers demonstrate their different priorities. Utilities see EV charging, which is likely to have a massive impact on the grid, as more critical while consumers state the need is for smart streetlights. However, both groups agree that traffic management and air quality monitoring are among the top three concerns.
• Sustainability is increasingly important to consumers—and consumers who are early adopters of one technology tend to invest in others as well. The survey found that EV owners are five times more likely to generate electricity and are 2.6 times more likely to have battery storage. Of those producing their own electricity, 77% have their own battery storage, and 84% would like to sell their electricity back to the grid (14% already do).
• Securing and protecting consumer data privacy is a larger concern for utilities (81%) than consumers (42%). The consumer’s concerns are based on hacking/cyberattacks (41%) and keeping their personal usage data private (27%).

The report summarizes key findings from surveys of 600 utility executives and 600 informed consumers from five countries – United States, Australia, India, Spain and the U.K. – on the key usage, priorities and barriers that data and analytics bring to the utility market.

The survey found that among all technology deployed by utilities for key use cases, data analytics is currently ranked between third and sixth, yet it moves to be in the top three investment priorities across the use cases of operational efficiency, extreme weather, personalization and sustainability in the next five years.

Utilities in each country have different perspectives on the most important use for data analytics:

While smart city services are ranked lower in the chart above, the deployment of solutions related to EV charging is a high concern for utilities especially as many countries and regions implement legislation around required adoption of EVs beginning in 2035. Today, EV charging ranks third in deployed smart city services but this moves to the No. 1 investment priority in the next five years.

“Smart meters and sensors provide the real-time data that will assist utilities in improving grid resiliency in the face of disruptions from weather, unpredictable demands from EVs, supply from renewables and growing urban populations. And as utilities implement the next generation of distributed intelligence solutions over the next five years, there will be unprecedented visibility into every area of the network, especially the areas that are least visible today,” added Donovan. “Utilities and communities will need that data—and those resulting analytics-driven insights—to meet enormous challenges that are only now taking shape.”

To download a full copy of the Itron Resourcefulness Insight Report as well as the research, visit www.itron.com/resourceful.

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