Allison Bates Wannop, Voltus’s Director of Legal and Regulatory Affairs, sits down with Energy/Climate Journalist, Markham Hislop of Energi Media to discuss her recent op-ed, Hold on to your seats. FERC just hit the fast forward button the clean energy transition.
Reach out to our team at info@voltus.co.
At Voltus we place great emphasis on cultivating an environment in which all of our employees can be their best, most productive, and yes, happiest, selves. To keep ourselves in check, every quarter, all Voltans are asked to complete a Happiness and Productivity survey, measuring each on a 1-5 scale. All results are then presented during our weekly company-wide meeting, Veritas, and we track how these metrics change over time.
The Happiness and Productivity survey offers each Voltan the opportunity to conduct an honest self-assessment of his or her own experience working at Voltus. We value each and every Voltan’s input, and our leadership team thinks very carefully and intentionally about how to act on each piece of feedback submitted. All comments, both positive and negative, are addressed directly and anonymously, and action items are presented candidly to the full team. We see this quarterly process as an important vehicle for Voltus to continuously grow and improve as a company.
Our team works hard to foster a culture of transparency, support, and empathy. Some highlights from past Happiness and Productivity surveys underscore these values:
“I continue to be impressed by the transparency displayed by the executive leadership team … I’ve also been impressed with the way all the employees pull together to support each other. I’ve never worked for a company that gives so many warm fuzzies throughout the week. If you are a person that needs warm fuzzies constantly, this is the company to work for.”
“I feel that I am very well supported and have exceptionally bright, gritty and good teammates. I truly enjoy learning and working with my Voltan colleagues … I sincerely appreciate and admire the candor, adaptability, and values of Voltus, from leadership to new hires.”
“Voltus leadership does a great job at offering transparency, leading by example, and hiring the right people.”
“The trajectory and engagement at Voltus is fantastic. I love our mission-driven product and I feel like a supported and valued member of the team.”
“I really appreciate the transparency that senior leadership has with the Voltans; it is VERY refreshing from the modus operandi of typical corporations.”
Our leadership team also works deliberately to implement change within the organization based on the suggestions given in the Happiness and Productivity survey.
Voltans submitted comments about improving cross-team communication, so we developed formalized channels for different teams to align on goals and collaborate better. We received feedback about keeping cleaner and more organized sales and account management tools; we’re now actively expanding our Customer Success team to support account management at scale, including investing in new technologies that enable more streamlined customer onboarding. Requests were made to better define professional development and career growth opportunities for Voltans; individual bonuses are now linked to quarterly performance, and a career path and planning guide is being developed for all functional leaders.
When it comes to employee satisfaction, our chief goal at Voltus is incredibly simple. We want working at Voltus to be the best professional experience our team members have ever had! A happy and productive team is and always will be our true north. We use our quarterly Happiness and Productivity survey as a mechanism to empower and enable each Voltan to make this a reality.
We continue to expand our team of bright, gritty, and good Voltans. Visit Join Us! to browse open positions.
Authored by Ariele Ladabaum
Voltus President and Co-founder, Matt Plante, joins Julia Bunte-Mein from The Seeds to discuss the electric grid of the future, the DER technology and policy to get us there, lessons learned from the Texas and California blackouts, and what makes Voltus special.
Read more about The Seeds and its creator, Julia Bunte-Mein, here. Learn more about becoming a Voltan here. More questions? Email info@voltus.co.
That’s the value of economic loss occurring in the ERCOT region of Texas right now, based on the load sector weighted average of the Value of Lost Load (VOLL), the result of a study commissioned to London Economics by ERCOT in 2013. The weighted average VOLL is $22,243 per megawatt hour (MWh) in ERCOT. Over the past three days about 20,000 MWs of electricity hasn’t been delivered per hour that otherwise would be delivered if not for the effects of the polar vortex. You can do the math on the rolling economic impact.
$180 million per hour is the economic impact to power producers not operating to deliver that 20,000 MWs of power per hour if you apply the ERCOT locational marginal price (LMP) cap of $9,000/MWh. And for many of the 127 retail electricity providers (REPs) in ERCOT who sell a fixed price electricity product to consumers, and who don’t hedge their supply, they are likely facing bankruptcy.
For consumers who have been consuming electricity during the past few days, and who have been buying electricity at the LMP, their power bill for three days will likely exceed their entire annual budget for electricity spend. Griddy, in an act of transparency, proactively communicated this situation to their customers. When the dust settles, these central US power outages will likely prove to be the most costly power outages in human history, measured in dozens of lives lost and tens of billions of dollars, far exceeding the effects from the 2003 blackout that hit the Northeast US.
While the pundits and sideline snipers are eager to blame and point fingers, rest assured that ERCOT, or any wholesale power market operator (SPP and MISO currently) in a similar situation, is doing their level best to balance the needs of consumers, regulators, suppliers, and politicians, all of whom establish the electricity markets upon which our livelihoods depend more and more. Now is the time to offer solutions to help electricity market operators deal with the cataclysmic challenges of climate change, the effects of which will accelerate and produce more frequent, similar situations. We can no longer “wait and see.”
The good news is that power market operators have an incredibly powerful tool at their disposal to ensure power quality, resilience, and affordability right now . . . distributed energy resources. 200,000 MWs of these resources lie in wait in the US alone. Much like the mainframes and “dumb terminals” of the 1970s, our current power grid is characterized largely by central power stations and “dumb loads.” The internet now offers a single standard upon which every digital device can choose to connect, creating a platform for massive innovation and unlocking the value of networks. Voltus dreams of a single electricity transmission superhighway, a single wholesale power market, and an interconnected system of distributed energy technologies operating in conjunction with central power stations, grid operators, and local utilities who have the systems they need to ensure that our modern, digital economy has uninterrupted, affordable, clean, and resilient power.
Today, our distributed energy resources are operating at full tilt to help ERCOT, SPP, and MISO. Our Texas teammates are on the front lines, bringing value to our customers, and operating the virtual power plants that these market operators are making use of right now. Our team and technology is built to unleash the massive benefits of distributed energy resources in every market in the world.
Let’s go!!!
Gregg Dixon
CEO & Co-founder
greggdixon@voltus.co
Image Credit: USA Today, https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/nation/2021/02/16/texas-weather-power-outage-rolling-blackouts-leave-millions-dark/6764764002/
Right now, Texas is experiencing the most acute energy crisis in nearly 10 years. This afternoon, due to record low temperatures, load is forecasted to exceed system capacity by 10,000 megawatts.
For the first time in its history, the Southwest Power Pool (SPP) is calling for scheduled blackouts to ensure system reliability as demand surpasses available generation.
Demand response exists for days like today. Our customers are executing their electricity curtailment plans, earning demand response revenue, avoiding $9,000/MWh energy costs in Texas, and doing their part to help the electric grid resume normal operations as soon as possible.
The need for more demand response has never been more apparent. We continue to be in close communication with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), and SPP to provide additional relief today and moving forward.
As our dedicated team of Voltans rallies around Texas on this would-be three-day weekend, we are reminded that although the grid never sleeps, the key to ushering in the clean energy transition lies firmly in our hands.
Matt Plante
President & Co-founder
mplante@voltus.co
Ontario’s demand response market has grown for the sixth consecutive year and Voltus is continuing to grow with it. The IESO procured almost 1 GW of capacity at one tenth the per MW-Year cost of the generator contracts that make up the Global Adjustment. Capacity auctions provide a more flexible and cost effective option than generator contracts, and the IESO will increase its reliance on auctions as contracts expire over the next 20 years.
Voltus is now the 3rd largest Demand Response Aggregator in Ontario. “We are excited to provide our 82 MWs of customers with over $25,000 per MW each year responding to critical grid events in the province,” says Voltus Vice President of Energy Markets and Product Dana Guernsey. This demand response program will run from May through October next year, but is likely to return to running year-round in 2023, as the need for capacity increases. “The time is ripe for Ontario businesses to offer their operational flexibility to the grid as we expect the value of demand response in Ontario to only increase over time,” says Guernsey.
Source: Average of Recovery Scenarios provided in the July 22, 2020 IESO Planning Update
For Ontario businesses considering taking the plunge into demand response participation, this program is straightforward operationally and quite lucrative; the Summer season has historically only seen 1-2 events per year, equating to $3,000 to $6,000 per MWh in earnings potential.
Participation in programs like this helps reduce the Province’s dependence on fossil fuels and keeps electricity rates lower as new power plants and transmission line investments can be deferred. Program enrollment is limited though. The value goes to the first businesses to jump on board.
Interested in earning cash for your business through demand response? Email info@voltus.co to get started.
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Michael Pohlod, IESO Energy Markets Manager, mpohlod@voltus.co
Voltus CEO, Gregg Dixon, and Suncast’s Nico Johnson are back to talk about the 4 Horsemen of Distributed Energy Resources
The interview is also available on Suncast’s website: https://mysuncast.com/suncast-episodes/325. You can subscribe to Suncast via iTunes.
Interested in becoming a Voltan? View all open positions at https://www.voltus.co/join-us/
Voltus CEO, Gregg Dixon, joined Nico Johnson to talk leadership, building a business, the challenges of growth, the importance of culture, and the future of distributed energy resources.
The interview is also available on Suncast’s website: http://www.mysuncast.com/
Interested in becoming a Voltan? View all open positions at https://www.voltus.co/join-us/
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” -Teddy Roosevelt
Gregg Dixon sat down with Chris Wedding of ENTREPRENEURS for IMPACT to talk DERs, COVID, hiring, and the personal habits that contribute toward success. Read the entire interview here.
Today is a day to honor American veterans of all wars. It is a day most people acknowledge and respect, but maybe – mostly just appreciate the day off. Voltus is actually the first company since I left active duty who recognizes Veterans Day! So, I too appreciate the day off. With that, I want to share what being a Veteran means to me.
Indoc had begun. What I thought Indoc – Indoctrination – would resemble was something close to summer camp and getting to know each other and learn (very kumbaya). I was wrong – very wrong – and in for a rude awakening. Indoc is abbreviated boot camp. With my first step onto the bus to take me to base, Gunny started yelling at me. I apologized: “Sorry Sir,” which sent him apoplectic. Turns out you don’t call gunnery sergeants “Sir.”
My family ties to the military ended with grandfathers I barely knew. I did not grow up learning about the ranks, the branches of the military and their history. I just knew I wanted to be part of the greatest American tradition – be part of something great. I was named after my father’s fraternity brother (Stephen) who died in the Vietnam War. I grew up listening to my father opine about the greatness of the military. He had enlisted in the Navy during the Vietnam War – got rejected due to a heart condition – and then was drafted, and subsequently disqualified when they found out about his medical status. It was his greatest regret not having the opportunity to serve, and I would not have that same regret.
Before my friendly greeting by Gunny on the bus, my father said goodbye and reminded me, that this was “a great time to be in the military – it is a time of peace. You will learn and be given amazing opportunities you cannot find anywhere else.” Three weeks later was September 11, 2001. It was time to prepare for battle. The tradition expanded. The mission even more critical.
Four years later I landed on The Big Stick (USS Theodore Roosevelt – an aircraft carrier) in the Persian Gulf. It was time to finally be part of the mission. During college my Naval ROTC classmates and I shared a lot of similarities, but now that I was joining Air Wing EIGHT in an active war zone, my new teammates ran the gamut. A variety of backgrounds, experiences, ages, ethnicities, but we were all there for a single purpose: the mission. We had almost nothing in common except our drive to serve. This is where I learned the true definition of camaraderie.
The people I served with – most I haven’t seen in 10+ years – shared a unique experience, bond and mission with me. It is the people who are next to you during the endless hours, who ensure together you achieve success – no matter the stress, no matter the sacrifice. No amount of time nor separation could erode the experience. This summer, one called me and it was as if no time had passed. We still have nothing in common, but I could talk to him for hours. I hung up the phone feeling elevated – feeling grateful for the comrades I had made. Grateful for the experience I had had.
There is no doubt in my mind that the two organizations I will have “served” in my career with the greatest and most impactful camaraderie will be The United States Navy and Voltus, Inc. I can say that knowing I have many more decades ahead of me.
The parallels between the two organizations are uncanny.
But the greatest parallel is the camaraderie. We share a unique experience, bond and mission. No amount of separation can erode the experience we have had (and will continue to have).
2020 has been a year. Highs and lows – a lot of lows. A lot of challenges. But some great highs as well. We have been through this time together, but our team is something special. And thanks to the leadership of Gregg and Matt we have the opportunity to expand our team and mission. We might be prohibited from time together right now, but because of the bright, gritty, good people on this team, we still have a rare camaraderie that most never get to experience. This is the group of people we get to do good with. The team we get to charge into 2021 with – armed and ready for what is next.
2021 is upon us. The tradition of (and need for) demand response expanded. The mission even more critical.
I will forever be proud and grateful to have served in the Navy and forever proud and grateful to be a Voltan.
Happy Veterans Day!
Stephanie Hendricks, VP of Operations & Customer Success
Interested in becoming a Voltan and joining our mission? View all available positions at www.voltus.co/join-us.
