In today’s AUSenergy News Update: Cold weather in New England keeps power prices high, Combined heat and power installations growing, smart grid technology alerts consumers.

Cold weather keeps New England power prices elevated

Summary:   Real-time power prices in the Northeast Wednesday morning stayed above $100/MWh with cold weather lingering in the region.

AUS Comment:   Just another reminder from Mother Nature on how much weather dominates the volatile swings in energy pricing. Added reason to lock in energy prices early – before they spike due to weather.

Combined heat and power installations growing globally

Summary:   Commercial combined heat and power (comCHP) systems produce electricity while also capturing heat. The major advantage to building owners is that CHP technologies produce thermal energy that can be used as heat, converted to electricity, or converted to cooling when coupled with an adsorption chiller.

AUS Comment:   Commercial CHP can provide an economically viable solution to businesses, while delivering another form of distributed energy back to the grid. But is CHP right for you? AUS can help with a no-investment option (PPA) available.. Visit AUSenergy.com to find out more.

CenterPoint Energy uses smart grid tech to alert consumers to outages

Summary: “CenterPoint Energy is making strategic investments in technologies that use real-time smart meter and intelligent grid data to increase operational efficiency, enhance customer satisfaction and transform the way we communicate with customers about outages,” said Kenny Mercado, senior vice president of Electric Operations for CenterPoint Energy.

AUS Comment:   Despite the small groups of people who fear smart meters for health or privacy reasons, we at AUS endorse the use of new technology to help bring better efficiency to the distribution, management and reporting of energy use.