November 1st, 2023 — Today, the Green Button market opened in Ontario, and Mission:data Coalition announces its intention to evaluate the quality of each electric and gas utility’s Green Button implementation. The forthcoming Green Button Scorecard™ is designed with three purposes in mind: (1) to provide the market with a centralized information resource about each utility’s offerings, (2) to provide metrics for continuous improvement as Ontario embarks on its journey toward energy data portability, and (3) to provide the government, utilities, third parties and utility accountholders with a platform to work together to serve the common goals of open data, competition and energy savings.
With nearly 60 local distribution companies, Ontario’s Green Button deployment faces numerous challenges around standardization and interoperability. While Ontario regulations requires utilities to be certified by the Green Button Alliance before November 1, 2023 (O. Reg. 633/21), such certification is necessary but not sufficient to have a fully operational marketplace. The scope of certification today is limited, and differences among utilities arise in data quality, onboarding, operations and system performance.
“The industry lacks a centralized hub for tracking Green Button implementation quality. We believe that a collaborative approach, based upon our independent experience of registering with utilities’ Green Button platforms, will support continuous improvement and improve confidence across the sector,” said Michael Murray, Mission:data’s co-founder and president.
The Green Button Scorecard™ will evaluate distributors on seven (7) criteria, none of which are assessed as part of Green Button certification today:
Terms and conditions
Onboarding processes
User experience
Data accuracy and completeness
Timeliness of APIs
Errors and outages
Support
In Ontario, we have already seen implementation issues include the following:
Some utilities have reported to OEB that their Green Button implementations are live, but there is no way for third parties to register, test or validate data access.
Terms and conditions for third parties vary widely across the province. Some utilities require third parties to agree to a document that does not exist (404 page not found). Many provide no documentation.
Energy usage data provided via Green Button may not match customers’ monthly bills, or even match data coming across multiple utility tools, creating uncertainty in the market about the “source of truth.”
Some utilities require firms to disclose proprietary details of their software application to the utility, raising concerns about unfair competition.
A perfect market opening may be impossible to achieve. Nevertheless, long-term success depends upon the willingness of parties to evaluate performance, acknowledge shortfalls where they exist and make ongoing improvements. Through the Green Button Scorecard™, Mission:data is stepping up to the plate to provide a framework for assessment. Mission:data has already spoken with customers, third parties and utilities who are willing partners, and Mission:data’s goal is to achieve broad participation.
“Across North America, over 40 million electric meters are now covered by a Green Button mandate,” said Michael Murray. “Our experience from the U.S. is that no utility has a flawless rollout. Our task is to work cooperatively with the market to ensure that everyone has equal and unbiased access to their customers’ data. By identifying problems early on and addressing them, we can ensure that customers are able to take advantage of innovative energy services.”
For more information, please see missiondata.io or contact michael@missiondata.io.