BY YULIA BUYNOVA
Yulia Buynova is a second-year MA student focusing on Energy, Resources, and Environment and a Senior Editor at SAIS Perspectives.
Perspectives: Where did you intern this summer?
YB: This summer, I was a Graduate Intern for the Regulatory Affairs Team at Opower, a part of Oracle, cloud-based technology company. Opower focuses on delivering behavioral energy solutions to utilities through a software-as-a-service customer engagement platform. Today, Opower partners with more than 175 utilities across the US and beyond in an effort to reduce residential energy consumption and increase energy efficiency.
The company's flagship product is the Home Energy Report (HER), delivered by utilities to their customers in print and digital forms. HERs provide households with insight into their energy consumption, compares their consumption patterns across the months, and data from neighbors who fit similar parameters (number of people in the household, income, location, etc.). Based on the results, the report gives households suggestions on how to achieve more energy-efficient power consumption and decrease energy payments. According to Alex Laskey, founder of Opower this type of competition could help increase behavioral energy efficiency and bring significant energy savings.
Independent research conducted by Hunt Allcott used randomized control trials to prove that HERs reduce energy consumption by an average of two percent relative to baseline, which is equivalent to that of a short-run electricity price increase of 11 to 20 percent.
Perspectives: How did you find this internship, and what was the hiring process?
YB: I applied for a position through the Oracle careers portal. Mary Sprayregen, my supervisor and Senior Director of Regulatory Affairs and Market Development at Oracle, reached out to me and scheduled an interview. My previous work and grad school experience closely aligned with the position's needs, so I was hired after the second interview.
I always thought that the only way to get internships was through networking. In this situation, I was proved entirely wrong: applying to positions online can pay off if your profile fits the company's requirements!
Perspectives: What were your primary responsibilities? Please describe the projects you worked on.
YB: I worked on two major projects:
1) State and utility regulatory tracker: I compiled and analyzed data from all 50 US states and in-state utilities on the topics of renewable energy standards, energy efficiency, low-income customer programs, saving and spending goals, and others. This database will inform the activities of Opower’s regulatory and sales teams, as policies surrounding energy efficiency differ across all US power markets.
2) Low-income customer solution during and after the pandemic: During Covid-19, most states implemented utility disconnection moratoriums to ensure that customers would not lose access to power and gas due to an inability to pay power bills. However, regulators are lifting the shutoffs moratoriums right now, and customers are facing the threat of disconnection. Opower aims to help utilities find solutions to support customers who are unable to repay accumulated debts due to loss of income.
Perspectives: Was there previous coursework or work experience that you found especially useful during the internship or the application process?
YB: I got fortunate because I was taking the Global Electricity Market Class with Professor John Banks this summer in parallel with my internship. Many topics from the course came up during my internship, from the basics of energy efficiency and distributed energy sources to the motivation of utilities and retailers and the difference between integrated and wholesale markets. I also learned how electricity markets function and how regulators set electricity rates, and such knowledge proved useful to me many times throughout this summer. Even with my prior work experience in the energy sector, the course played a big part in helping me communicate with my colleagues and under the roles and motivations of relevant actors.
My understanding of the statistical analysis and tools from my econometrics and (quantitative) economics classes also helped me perform calculations and support my findings with data.
Perspectives: What were some of your key takeaways from this internship for your academic and professional interests?
YB: The mission of a private company can align with your personal mission. Profits, of course, drive the corporate world, but it does not prevent companies from performing socially responsible and valuable work. Increasing energy efficiency is a complex process and requires coordination from many actors such as policymakers, energy generators, distributors, utilities, and consumers. Still, if we want to see a cleaner electricity grid, it is necessary to decarbonize the economy and reduce energy consumption in the nearest future.