FRED: Free Energy DatabaseA platform for making better decisions about energy

June 2012

• Energy & sustainability plans to 2030

• Cut energy costs for Gov. and Citizens

• Flashy green program “press releases”

• Less budget for sustainability programs

• Climate Change cools off

• Don’t hurt economy or job growth

Government’s mantra: Do More with Less

“We need to measure and understand the energy used across our area” But collecting energy statistics is not easy.   Most energy planning departments don’t have sufficient staff of energy experts nor funding for external consultants

“How do we predict our energy needs for the next 10-20 years?” Most forecast models are too complicated and don’t necessarily align across energy, cost, C02, etc.

“What clean energy investment is best for our area? We can’t do them all” It is difficult to forecast and compare the impacts and costs of different types of programs (as, solar or wind subsidies, building efficiency targets, or EV rebates)

“How do we compare to other states, and what can we learn from them?” Different governments report energy with different formats and standards --- making comparison difficult.

“How to convince my administration to support and fund my program?Energy data is dense and doesn’t communicate simply and clearly --- especially for administrators and the public

What keeps a Government energy planner awake at night?

Swimming in energy data, but… Difficult or expensive to collect Different, non-compatible formats and standards Often at resolutions too coarse for local planning Data often overly-complex --- difficult for policy-makers to use Private data is everywhere --- but privacy concerns prevent aggregation

Hundreds of energy forecasts and models, but… Models often complex --- built for scientists, not policy-makers Focus on specific energy problems --- not broad, cross-sector answers Few address issues critical to policy-makers --- costs, jobs, C02 Accuracy and assumptions often unclear or proprietary

Result -- we’re swimming in energy data and analysis, but we’re not helping government policy-makers make the best decisions

Despite lots of data and tools, we aren’t helpingEnergy Planners to make the best decisions

• Tool for government energy planners & policy-makers (state/county/city/town)

• Why? Because their energy offices typically are under-resourced

• Create strategy for reaching climate and energy targets Assess the energy footprint for their own region Compare their performance to other regions Forecast their future energy needs Set improvement goals Choose high-priority policies for action Track and report progress

• ‘Bridge’ to link non-energy professionals with available data/analysis resources No cost for government users “For the social good” Open-access & Open-source

‘Analytic Exchange’ based on www.openei.org community• normalize non-compatible data formats• API’s to integrate analytic models

Simple & intuitive to use

FRED Concept -- Make energy planning simple, intuitive, and …. almost fun for non-energy professionals

Decision Support for Policy-Makers

Free Energy Data Exchange (FRED) via openei.org provides a pioneering approach to bridging together energy data, tools, and models to help policy makers understand

historical data, forecast, scenarios and area for deeper analysis

Energy awareness and

reporting

Historical analysis and energy

investment planning Forecast and

What If scenarios

Decision support:Energy supply/demand, flows, cost, CO2

Supply and Demand

across GDP and population

Easy to use aggregation of

important energy datasets

Energy flow analysis for understanding priorities and considering options for further investigation

FRED allows planners to facilitate collaboration with

stakeholders and data owners

Sankeys and statistical graphs for analysis

FRED Platform: Open planning environment for energy policy/planners to streamline and simplify access to data, forecast, and models

Open Data Exchange Energy Analysis

Analysis

Planning

Awareness

Reporting

Monitoring

Forecasting

Scenarios

Model Exchange

Policy Planners

Isn’t it time you met FRED?

http://testpsi.planetaryskin.org/FRED/prototype/v00/