Demand Management

July 12, 2023

A Simple Solution to A/C Driven Energy Demand: Smarter Cooling

By Cavan Merski – Download our new analysis, which examines how behavioral tendencies (like manual thermostat adjustments) and home technology (like smart thermostats) can significantly reduce electricity demand for air conditioning during hot Texas summers. 

April 6, 2023

eGauge Tour: A Quick Tutorial for Pecan Street Participants

By Rachel Jenkins, Director of Operations, Pecan Street – If Pecan Street has installed an eGauge in your home and you’re looking for a quick guide for viewing your data, you’re in the right place. Below you’ll find everything you need to know to log in and nerd out.

March 28, 2023

Community, Local Experts and Showing Up Have Been Key to Pecan Street’s Expansion

By Rachel Jenkins, Director of Operations, Pecan Street – My recent trip to Culebra, Puerto Rico, where we’re recruiting about 50 families to participate, was further proof that community, local experts and simply “showing up” have been key to our efforts.

March 23, 2023

Pecan Street’s Expansion to Puerto Rico Promises Energy Data Goldmine for Researchers and Electricity Customers Everywhere

By Cavan Merski, data analyst, Pecan Street – Our expansion into Puerto Rico is unique; nowhere else on Earth can you find the island’s combination of energy challenges and energy ambition.

February 7, 2023

Energy Efficiency Does More Than Save Money and Reduce Emissions. It Can Strengthen the Grid. 

By Cavan Merski – Energy-efficient homes provide a variety of benefits to customers and the grid. But energy efficiency can be leveraged to produce even more bang for its buck by enabling certain types of demand response.

July 19, 2022

Canary Media: Smart Electric Panels in Homes Could Prevent Overtaxing the Grid

Canary Media – Utilities are worried that homes switching to electric heating, electric cooking and electric-vehicle charging will create major new strains on their power grids. And homeowners looking to go all-electric face steep costs if they need to upgrade their grid connections to handle bigger electrical loads. A new report suggests that both problems could be addressed by the latest smart electric panels.

July 14, 2022

During Texas’ Heatwave, Every Degree Matters. And so Do Conservation and Efficiency.

By Scott Hinson, chief technology officer, Pecan Street – For the second time in a week, Texas’ grid operator (ERCOT) and local utilities yesterday issued “calls for conservation” as the state bakes under a prolonged heatwave. Among the requests: increase your thermostat setpoint to 78 degrees to reduce state-wide air conditioner load. It’s unsurprising that air conditioning increases electricity demand during a heatwave. But it may surprise you to know just how powerful a driver it is and how close it can push the state toward a real problem.

Illustration of dataport dots
July 7, 2022

Pecan Street’s JupyterHub Can Help Rapidly Scale and Iterate Your Research

By Cavan Merski, data analyst, Pecan Street – To allow better access and more sophisticated analysis of this data, we launched our own Jupyterhub, a multi-user server for Jupyter Notebooks designed to support large-scale analysis by using GPU and memory based on a server rather than a local machine. It also allows multiple users – like groups of students or researchers – to share the same document at the same time.

June 22, 2022

More Clean Power in Texas will Require More Grid Transmission and DER Development

By Cavan Merski, data analyst, Pecan Street – The ERCOT power grid is back in the news. Texas experienced its hottest May on record and June has seen consistent record-breaking temperatures as well. ERCOT has been busy trying to balance extremely high grid demand with various electric generation plant outages. On June 12, ERCOT recorded its highest ever grid demand of over 75GW. That record only lasted one week before grid demand climbed to more than 76 GW on June 20. And we're wasting emission-free wind and solar power.

May 12, 2022

Cooling a Warming Planet:  What Homes in Texas and New York Can Teach Us About Cooling Demand Around the Globe

By Cavan Merski, data analyst, Pecan Street – We were interested to see how our homes in these two regions compared now and what will happen in the future as climate change brings warmer summers to most of the country, so we performed a series of regressions to explore differences in the cooling load between homes in Austin, TX homes and Ithaca, NY.

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