Energy savings from electric utilities’ efficiency programs for customers have stagnated in recent years, according to the Utility Energy Efficiency Scorecard released today by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE). The Scorecard evaluates fifty-three of the largest U.S. electric utilities on their incentive and other programs for energy-saving improvements and finds that energy savings dropped 5.4 percent between 2018 and 2021.
Utility programs are the primary drivers of energy savings in most states, and leading utilities can serve as models. Eversource Massachusetts topped the Scorecard for the third consecutive time. Rounding out the top five utilities are Pacific Gas & Electric in California (#2), National Grid Massachusetts (#3), Commonwealth Edison in Illinois (#4), and DTE in Michigan (#5). Overall, the report finds a wide range of performance, but only 15 of the utilities earn at least half of the Scorecard’s points.
“Amid ever-higher temperatures and increasingly common extreme weather, most utilities, regulators, and state policymakers should do a lot more to help reduce energy waste,” says Mike Specian, utilities manager at ACEEE and lead author of the Scorecard.