Utilities around the world are investing billions of dollars to deploy and implement smart grid technologies to modernize their operational and information systems. These initiatives promise to transform the power grid, enabling utilities to monitor, analyze, and synchronize their networks to improve reliability, availability, and efficiency. According to a recent report from Pike Research, a part of Navigant’s Energy Practice, smart grid data analytics – which examine raw data from smart grid sensors and devices along with other forms of operational data and external third party data – are a crucial part of fully realizing these investments.
“Data analytics are the next level of intelligent network control and planning,” says senior research analyst Bob Lockhart. “The application of smart grid data analytics is challenging, because it involves collating and analyzing data from many internal sources, plus integrating non-structured data from external sources such as demographics, social media, emails, and images, to effectively support decision making. Simply analyzing well-structured meter and monitoring data may no longer be enough to understand how a utility can improve its business.”
This complexity means that the acquisition and employment of smart grid analytics is not a straightforward technology-buying decision for information technologists, according to the report. Data analytics engines must be able to process non-structured data from non-traditional sources. The delivery of this data will be just as varied, coming through dashboards, complex visualizations, general reporting, alarms, alerts, modeling and statistical analysis, simulation, and time series analysis. For utilities, data analytics is not a technology problem; instead, it is about deeply understanding the business to effect meaningful change, while finding the right technology to meet those needs, the study concludes.
The report, “Smart Grid Data Analytics”, analyzes the global market opportunity for smart grid data analytics across four key solution segments: meter analytics, grid analytics, asset analytics, and renewables integration for business intelligence, operations, and customer management. The report provides a comprehensive assessment of the demand drivers, business models, policy factors, and technology issues associated with the rapidly-developing market for smart grid data analytics. Key industry players are profiled in depth and worldwide revenue forecasts, segmented by application and region, extend through 2020. An executive summary of the report is available for free download on the Pike Research website.