The purpose of this report is to provide an annual time series analysis, a point in time report for the US and Canadian program industry on trends in energy efficiency and demand response budgets, expenditures, and savings. While this effort constitutes a large and comprehensive survey of program administrators, and while extensive ongoing attention is devoted to data standardization, CEE cautions against making representations and comparisons beyond those provided in this report.

The report documents annual electric and natural gas DSM program industry budget, expenditures, and impacts at the national level and, where appropriate, by Census region, across the United States and Canada based on data collected through a vast and comprehensive survey of DSM program administrators. CEE believes that using these data in conjunction with past survey efforts, portrays an accurate representation of energy efficiency program industry trends over time. The limitations of the data are disclosed below.

There are many limitations to budget, expenditures, and savings data in the DSM industry. First, this survey represents self-reported data by an individual or group of individuals within each responding organization. Although CEE and our collaborator, the American Gas Association, work closely with each responding organization to help respondents properly interpret survey questions and enter the correct information, the accuracy of the data is not verified outside of these efforts. Second, respondents provide data at different times during the data collection period from June to October, and not all program administrators report their information according to the calendar year. CEE and our collaborator have sought greater consistency in data collection from respondents over the years, however, the accuracy of the data are ultimately dependent upon each individual respondent’s interpretation of the survey questions, ability to retrieve the relevant information, and verification of the data provided. Furthermore, variation in state policies and reporting requirements along with what we suspect is inconsistent use of terminology likely adds to variation.

Read more (Consortium for Energy Efficiency)