Research opportunities to improve DSM impact estimates

摘要

This report was commissioned by the California Institute for Energy Efficiency (CIEE) as part of its research mission to advance the energy efficiency and productivity of all end-use sectors in California. Our specific goal in this effort has been to identify viable research and development (R&D) opportunities that can improve capabilities to determine the energy-use and demand reductions achieved through demand-side management (DSM) programs and measures. We surveyed numerous practitioners in California and elsewhere to identify the major obstacles to effective impact evaluation, drawing on their collective experience. As a separate effort, we have also profiled the status of regulatory practices in leading states with respect to DSM impact evaluation. We have synthesized this information, adding our own perspective and experience to those of our survey-respondent colleagues, to characterize today's state of the art in impact-evaluation practices. This scoping study takes a comprehensive look at the problems and issues involved in DSM impact estimates at the customer-facility or site level. The major portion of our study investigates three broad topic areas of interest to CIEE: Data analysis issues, field-monitoring issues, issues in evaluating DSM measures. Across these three topic areas, we have identified 22 potential R&D opportunities, to which we have assigned priority levels. These R&D opportunities are listed by topic area and priority.