A portion of Xcel Energy's Smart Meter customer interface. Gives meaningful equivalents to current power consumption, as well as hour-to-hour consumption (unseen). Brilliant!
“I love this site,” says Yeakel as she clicks through bar charts of her family’s energy use. “I called PPL and said, ‘Did you design this for me?’ Because I’m one of these people who love to know where my dollars [are] going and how can I save.”
How fabulous.
In a story on NPR today, Tammy Yeakel raved both about the ability to manage her electricity consumption and the web based application that makes it possible. (Smart Meter Saves Big Bucks For Pa. Family) She’s absolutely tickled as describes the measures she’s taken to lower the numbers reported to her online; how she watches her electricity consumption spike when her husband arrives home at 8pm; and how thrilled she is to be able to compare her consumption to her neighbors.
What’s striking about all of her comments is that they show a deep appreciation for level of thought that went into designing the user experience.
- Opening up the power company’s real time data to the consumer online. At the company’s own expense. To request people buy less of their product.
- Including not just a canned metric of current consumption, but archived hour-by-hour data that’s presented to the user in a graphical format. Customers can use the data to spot trends, often real time.
- Offering comparable consumption data from neighbors. Simply Genuis! People LOVE to compare themselves to other.
This is what a thoughtful user experience looks like, and it shows. What a tremendous compliment to those involved in its creation. As we moved toward this system in the U.S., power companies should consider this user experience model.
Be sure to check out the online NPR article too. It has a full screen capture of the Xcel customer portal homepage as well as a lovely infographic on the troubled U.S. electric grid. (Who knew Washington state got so much energy from
