1) A White House call for real-time, standardized, and transparent power outage data {OSTP blog]
Our society increasingly depends on electricity, but more frequent extreme weather events are disrupting Americans’ access to power, especially in underserved communities. We need robust, comprehensive, and transparent power outage data to inform investments in grid resilience and restoration, deliver immediate benefits to our existing emergency response systems, and provide visibility into equity. That’s why the White House is launching a Call to Action that asks utilities and outage data companies to voluntarily share their data with the Outage Data Initiative Nationwide (ODIN). This call builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s broader efforts to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by no later than 2050, invest in underserved communities, and achieve a reliable, long-term transformation of the energy system.
Background
We have been gradually electrifying our economy for over a century, enabling sectors like manufacturing, construction, healthcare, and communications. Electricity coverage is expanding rapidly to provide cleaner transport, heating, and other energy needs across the economy. In the zero-carbon future needed to meet our climate goals, around 50% of U.S. energy use is projected to come from electricity compared to 3% in 1950 and 21% today. The Biden-Harris Administration recently highlighted the transition to a net-zero grid and accelerated electrification as one of five game-changing technologies for reaching net-zero. On December 14, 2022, the White House Electrification Summit will highlight current opportunities and gather critical public input regarding the innovation needed to accelerate and sustain progress.
In recent years, power outages, driven primarily by extreme weather events, have increased markedly, exceeding 8 hours of interruption in 2020 and 7 hours in 2021. These outages disproportionately affect historically overburdened and underserved communities. For example, during a 2021 winter storm in Texas, low-income areas experienced more pipe bursts and made more calls for help per person than other areas. Another study showed that after Hurricane Irma in Florida, higher-income individuals were able to evacuate to destinations with lower power outage rates than lower-income individuals. It also highlighted that in the coming years, more people will become dependent on electricity for home dialysis or oxygen concentrators, and this group appears to be disproportionately lower-income. . . .
Accessible, standardized power outage data can improve response times and save lives when combined with other emergency response systems. In the short term, this will allow communities to recover faster, measure progress, and ensure the needs of underserved communities are met. Over time, consistent, comprehensive outage data can help target significant investments to modernize our grid and reduce the severity of power outages.
Currently, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and other federal and local agencies rely on real-time outage data that are usually pulled together piece-by-piece from public data on utility websites. These data are fragmented, fragile due to external factors, and do not use a common standard. While individual electric utilities may announce outages on their website or via social media, outage data can be far more useful when it is shared easily, understandable by all, and able to be integrated with the many other systems and layers of information that enable an effective emergency response.
The Outage Data Initiative Nationwide — A Standard for Real-time Outage Data
The federal government has put data standards, data security, and computational tools in place to take a giant step toward the future. Now, we need electric utility partners to provide access to these data. The Department of Energy’s Outage Data Initiative Nationwide (ODIN), developed via a public-private partnership over the past eight years, is a secure data standard for power outage data that can unlock the value of efficient data sharing. Currently supported by more than 60 electric utilities in 26 states, the ODIN data standards improve visibility of the severity and scope of outages and provide local emergency responders with the data they need to save lives.
OSTP and DOE are jointly launching a White House Call to Action to bring together electric utilities and their data system partners to join us and provide standardized power outage data to ODIN. We aim to increase ODIN’s coverage to collect small-area, real-time, and comprehensive data from all 50 states and Puerto Rico. We encourage utilities to sign up to share their data using the ODIN data standard by December 9, 2022. This commitment will improve the transparency and consistency of outage information, enabling emergency managers, critical infrastructure partners, and other utilities to respond better to extreme events. At the White House Electrification Summit on December 14, 2022, we will announce the utilities that have made commitments to share their data with ODIN.
Looking to the future, we must ensure that communities overburdened by power outages are not left behind as electrification advances. Standardized outage data can provide Americans with a common base of shared information that gives us the power to respond to emergencies. We’re asking electric utilities and other partners to join us in taking a critical step forward and to share their data with the Outage Data Initiative Nationwide.
Blog:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/news-updates/2022/11/22/a-white-house-call-for-real-time-standardized-and-transparent-power-outage-data/
White House Electrification Summit 12/14:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/events-webinars/electrification-summit/
2) About ODIN
ODIN seeks to establish a comprehensive digital reporting standard for power outage data to enable utilities and others to exchange data freely with designated stakeholders at all levels.
The program, led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Electricity, builds on the success of a pilot effort in the state of Washington.
Common operating picture: More than 3,000 utility providers operate across the U.S., from major national corporations to local cooperatives of a few hundred customers. Uniform reporting standards and a central digital framework relieve stakeholders from sorting through tangles of outage maps and contradictory or incomplete reports, freeing time for improved emergency response.
Useful information: ODIN's standards and architecture ensure easy access to the information stakeholders need, from precise geographical data to estimated times of power restoration (when available). Emergency managers can integrate outage details with other critical-incident data for a broader perspective. Customers, the news media, and neighboring providers can look up the latest outage details at the click of a mouse.
Improved decision support: Better situational awareness enables clear communication and a streamlined response. First responders and utilities can use ODIN to deploy resources effectively, reach those in need sooner, and restore power more promptly.
Preparation and prevention: More data means more opportunities to analyze outage reports to spot weak points in the utility grid, prioritize repairs and upgrades, and predict when and where future outages may occur.
Minimal startup cost: ODIN provides free resources and constant one-on-one support. Most participants can be up and running within two hours.
https://odin.ornl.gov/
3) Biden-Harris Administration Takes Action to Improve Electricity Reliability Through Open Outage Data [OSTP press release]
In less than three weeks since the Call to Action, utility commitments have expanded ODIN’s nationwide reach substantially. New commitments from 35 utilities have increased the number of customers in the ODIN network by over 400%. In addition, 13 commitments from outage management system vendors will make it simple and fast for the utilities they serve to share their data transparently. With these commitments, ODIN participation now exceeds 100 utilities in 44 states and Puerto Rico, delivering electricity to over 43 million electric customers (one-quarter of U.S. customers). . . .
https://www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/news-updates/2022/12/14/biden-harris-administration-takes-action-to-improve-electricity-reliability-through-open-outage-data/