Expanding EE and DSM for LMI Customers and Leveraging Third-Party Financing: Con Edison

Con Edison is looking for scalable methods to reach low-to-moderate income (LMI) customer segments with energy efficiency (EE) and demand side management (DSM) programs for both electric and gas. The Company is looking to ramp up its initiatives that reach LMI customers, and through identifying initiatives that have subsequent scalable opportunities, it is looking to decrease the cost of LMI customer acquisition. Additionally, the Company is interested in leveraging non-utility sources of funding from State, Federal and private investment for financing solutions. Con Edison is looking for solution providers with multiple areas of specialty that can manage and implement solutions in either a turn-key or partial capacity.

Through this solicitation, Con Edison is seeking scalable solutions to improve the reach of EE programs to a larger population of LMI customers throughout its service territory. The goal of this opportunity is to receive information on strategies that can expand current offerings, increase the number of initiatives, and provide financing to LMI customers and business owners.

It is understood that not all initiatives will have full offerings for both expansion of LMI offerings and financing, however, the Company is looking to understand what partnership and collaborative options are available to leverage individual partners’ specialties.

The Company is seeking proposals for single family and small (less than 4 units) multifamily residential units, as well as large multifamily buildings (5+ units). Eligible applications must be able to serve LMI populations located within Con Edison’s service territory and Con Edison customers.

Information on the Con Edison service territory can be found here. For those familiar with NYISO market zones, Con Edison’s territory is Zone J.

Con Edison will consider proposals to partner with entities that offer innovative and creative EE and DSM solutions targeting LMI customer energy usage. Partnering entities should have:

• A track record and successful case studies in other similar utility jurisdictions,
• A proven track record implementing LMI customer EE and DSM solutions;
• A full range of project capabilities or the capability to form partnerships to create a full suite of capabilities;
• Inclusion of a model with shared savings between the customer, the utility, and the third-party (i.e., the partnering entity);
• Inclusion of third-party capital; and
• An established presence or willingness to partner with entities with an established presence in New York.

Con Edison is requesting information and will consider a number of solutions from qualified parties to work to design, plan, implement and provide outreach for one or more initiatives that will test creative ways to reach LMI customers with EE and financing solutions. Con Edison is looking to test solutions that have the ability to scale, however it is open to explore creative options that do not meet every condition specified in this request.

Con Edison would also be interested in any partnerships that are able to leverage data, community groups, and knowledge of New York City markets and of population demographics to provide effective marketing strategies. The Company is also open to considering solutions that provide customers with financing, including elements such as on-bill financing, on-bill repayment, energy service and subscription services if the contracts are managed by the submitting company.

Con Edison is technology agnostic and will consider any technologically mature and commercially established solutions that can both target LMI customers and can over time lower unit costs when delivered at scale.

The proposed solution is intended to be both replicable and scalable across the targeted customer segment. Respondents shall identify the long-term value of the proposed solution to customers, the third-party partner, and Con Edison. The ideal solution is cost-effective across both low and moderate customer segments.

The Company seeks a commercially viable and scalable solution, and thus will not consider unproven or pre-commercial efficiency measures to reduce energy usage. Con Edison will also not consider any offerings that only propose a short-term solution or do not have potential for quantifiable growth based on market conditions. Any proposals that are unable to point to past work and/or case studies in other territories or have a proven record in New York will not be considered.

The primary REV objectives addressed by this opportunity are the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, statewide growth of energy efficiency, third party participation partnerships and customer community engagement.