Spring Conference Market Research Report Indicates Strong Growth Prospects for Demand Response

Vallejo, CA, May 7, 2013. Today the Peak Load Management Alliance (PLMA) released its spring Demand Response (DR) Market Research Report which measured responses from the DR community on a host of topics. The research was conducted by Skipping Stone, who surveyed industry professionals attending the recent PLMA Spring Conference in Austin, Texas.

Overall growth prospects for DR are anticipated to be in the 10% to 20% by a majority of respondents with some 20% expecting growth to be above 25%. Key growth drivers were identified as customer ROI, utility incentives and ISO capacity prices. The markets ranked highest for growth potential were Energy Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) #1 and PJM #2. Markets with the lowest growth prospects included MISO #1 and Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) #2. In a related question, a majority of those surveyed call for ERCOT to implement a capacity market to address its resource adequacy issues.

On technology related questions, a strong majority believe that customers will be implementing DR utilizing AutoDR technologies and methodologies and over 80% of the companies surveyed have either adopted OpenADR2 or plan to in the near future. For utilities the biggest challenge with DR for planning and adoption is system integration.

Views on the mix of DR market participants indicate that expectations are that most CSPs (Curtailment Service Providers or Aggregators) will migrate their business models to become energy management firms. There are strong expectations that the retail energy commodity marketers will enter the DR markets in bigger numbers as those surveyed anticipate as many as half of them will add DR to their product and service offerings.

According to Paul Tyno, PLMA Chair, "The survey results confirm that the DR industry has a lot of room to grow, both in megawatts and number of companies in the market. Our goal at PLMA is to grow with the market and broaden our value to members through expanded services, education and market information.”

"To truly achieve what DR can do for system reliability and provide economic benefits to all concerned, the technology and marketing companies have managed to squeeze costs and lower the barriers to customer adoption, now we need regulators and utilities to get behind customer incentive programs as well” said Ross Malme, PLMA Board Member and Skipping Stone Partner.

For a free copy of the Spring Demand Response Market Research Report, PLMA 2013 Spring Market Survey Report.

About the Peak Load Management Alliance. The Peak Load Management Alliance (PLMA) was founded in 1999 as the national voice of demand response practitioners. It is a non-profit organization dedicated to the principles of demand side management, load shaping, and the integration of energy efficiency and demand response. Its membership represents a diverse collection of utilities, curtailment service providers, service and technology companies, industry consultants, and consumers. PLMA strives to be an advocate of critical energy management initiatives – providing a community of expertise within a rapidly changing energy landscape. www.peaklma.org

About Skipping Stone and Demand Response Directory. Skipping Stone is a different kind of energy consulting company. All of its consulting resources have worked in the energy industry and now choose to consult. Its specialty is collaborating with clients on ideas, strategies and tactics and then providing the array of complementary services required to turn those ideas into successes. Skipping Stone produces the Demand Response Directory which is the only complete source of utility, ISO and service provider demand response program data and reports in the US, a comprehensive listing of services providers, and the Demand Response Free Library. www.skippingstone.com and www.demandresponsedirectory.com.

For more information, contact: Ed Thomas, PLMA at (707) 652-5333 or [email protected], or Nancy Young, Skipping Stone at (832) 279-3029 or [email protected].