2022 SEPA Utility Transformation Award Winners

Utility Transformation Program of the Year

This award recognizes impactful, innovative, and replicable utility programs that empower customers to engage in the clean energy transition. Program attributes may include, but are not limited to, efforts to facilitate and incentivize customer engagement, strategies to bolster climate resilience, or approaches to accelerate customer electrification and adoption of carbon-reduction technologies.

Duke Energy – Energy Service Subscription
Duke Energy launched a subscription energy customer bundle, Energy Service Subscription or ESS, in the spring of 2021 in Florida. This cutting edge 12-month pilot aimed to increase customer satisfaction, while also helping Duke Energy meet its ambitious climate goals by increasing enrollment into demand response programs by offering a flat rate. The monthly subscription fee is based on past energy usage, historical average weather temperatures and a small program fee, and is unique in that there are no surprise bill adjustments or year-end settle-up payment for customers to worry about. The offering enabled them to meet their ambitious climate goals by increasing enrollment by 306% while also boosting demand response program enrollment.

Utility Transformation Project of the Year

This award recognizes ambitious utility projects that advance carbon-reduction progress by leveraging innovative technologies and replicable approaches. 

Southern California Edison (SCE) – EASE DER Interconnection Project
The EASE project demonstrates scalable and replicable technologies that allow SCE to interconnect and manage the DERs required to reduce GHG and reach carbon neutrality by 2045. Through the project, SCE demonstrated a control architecture that can be used to develop a Distribution System Operator-type process to work with DER aggregators and provide energy services to the grid. This control architecture can be scaled territory-wide to manage all DERs throughout SCE’s service area and has the capability to increase DER hosting capacity, which can support demand growth beyond the planned loading limits of traditional wires-only solutions. The control architecture can help unlock the potential of DERs to defer distribution upgrades, thereby saving customers money and keeping electricity affordable.

Utility Transformation Leader of the Year

This award recognizes an individual who, while working at an electric utility, has demonstrated leadership to advance clean energy, enable grid modernization, and engage customers, technology partners, peer utilities and regulators. The individual’s ‘body of work’ can span a longer period of time, but the nomination should focus on activity and accomplishments during the eligibility period. 

Nadia El Mallakh – Area VP of Clean Transportation & Strategic Partnerships, Xcel Energy
Nadia El Mallakh leads Xcel Energy’s Clean Transportation team, and she and her team’s efforts are notable not just for accelerating the transition to electric transportation but serving as an exemplary model for enabling the whole ecosystem of stakeholders to move forward in ways that advance clean energy and modernize the grid. Working alongside key community and technology provider partners, Nadia is accelerating EV adoption in Xcel Energy’s service territory while also serving as a model for other utilities and technology providers as the industry ecosystem scales.

Utility Transformation Partner of the Year

This award recognizes a non-utility product or service provider that, in partnership with one or more utilities, has demonstrated leadership to catalyze utility transformation and progress towards a modern, carbon-free energy future.

WeaveGrid
WeaveGrid helps utilities minimize EV integration costs by transforming EVs into flexible grid assets that support resilience and sustainable solutions. The WeaveGrid platform balances EV charging profiles, grid system needs, customer rates, and driver preferences to deliver an end-to-end service for utilities and its customers. WeaveGrid’s data-driven platform helps utilities find EV drivers, enroll them in programs and EV-specific rates, analyze and get insights on charging patterns, incentivize grid-friendly charging habits, and actively manage charge, all while keeping drivers and the grid happy. WeaveGrid’s has recently implemented EV programs for BGE, Xcel Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric, Portland General Electric, and Pepco and Delmarva Power.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Award

This award recognizes organizations, project teams and/or individuals who have demonstrated unique leadership in efforts to advance DEI principles and programs – either at their own organizations or with their customers.

Los Angeles Department Of Water And Power (LADWP) – Racial Equity Action Plan
LADWP developed their Racial Equity Action Plan (REAP) as a guide to creating a more diverse workforce, inclusive workplace and equitable services. Their newly formed Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is taking transformative steps, including expanding partnerships with community-based organizations to diversify their workforce pipeline, training executive leaders, management and employees about DEI concepts, creating psychologically safe spaces for employees to live authentically and feel appreciated for their uniqueness, creating economic growth in underserved communities and underutilized minority owned businesses, continuing partnerships related to utility debt relief and strategic hiring plans making civil service employment accessible to vulnerable populations, committing to expand access to conservation programs and rebates with special attention to underserved communities, and creating Employee Resource Groups.