Siemens unveils utilities’ struggle with limited behind-the-meter DER visibility

Limited visibility and understanding of distributed energy resource (DER) behaviour is creating operational challenges, Siemens has found in a new study with utilities in the US and Canada.

At least half of the utilities reported increases in solar panels and electric vehicles over the past three years and just over a third an increase in batteries. Looking ahead, the majority also foresee further increases in all these resources.

But while this broad panorama is understood by the utilities, more granular details are harder to track, the survey found, with data showing a lack of clarity as they try to understand the location, size and activity of these resources.

For example, DER location information is often accessible only for resources that are either connected to grid management software such as a distributed energy resource management system (DERMS) or required to submit interconnection requests to connect to the grid – or in some cases both.

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Almost three-quarters of the respondents rely solely on interconnection requests and/or integrations with platforms like DERMS to gather location information but it remains incomplete as the majority of customers are not enrolled in DER management programmes.

Overall, the utilities estimate, they have visibility into little more than a third on average of the DERS on their grid – and this is creating operational issues with nearly three quarters citing challenges including voltage visibility and control, back-feeding, protection and control coordination, distribution transformer and conductor overloads and masked or hidden loads.

“The complexities associated with behind-the-meter DERs are a significant challenge to electricity distribution utilities in North America,” comments Marcus McCarthy, SVP of Siemens Grid Software, US and Mexico.

He points out that technology can help by providing actionable insights into the opportunities and challenges of these resources to improve grid resilience.

“The software and digitalisation tools we implement today, will not only increase capacity, but aid in reliability – laying the foundation for an autonomous and advanced clean grid of the future.”

Demand side management

That technology, DER management programmes but especially the more easily implemented demand side management programmes, is pointed to in the survey with over two-thirds implementing such programmes and planning to expand them in the next five years.

With this, more than half of the respondents expect visibility into the behaviour and location of behind-the-meter DERs to benefit their operations by reducing their SAIDI and SAIFI metrics and increasing productivity.

Based on the findings of the survey Siemens offers three key recommendations for utilities, of which one is obviously to invest in the technologies that boost visibility behind the meter as a necessity to successfully navigate the energy transition and future-proof the grid.

The others are to prioritise strategies like demand side and DER management programmes for increased flexibility behind the meter and to strengthen customer trust to enable boosting participation in management programmes.

“With a deeper understanding of their customers’ needs and preferences, utilities can develop transparent policies and practices that reduce barriers to programme enrolment, including lack of interest and hesitation to share information.”

The survey Seeing behind the meter was undertaken with Oxford Economics and was based on input from 100 decision makers from electric utilities in the US and Canada.