Gurgaon - Seeing energy differently, a new Ernst & Young report released today, analyses power and utilities sector on the point of massive change with a new consumer model, new entrants, new services and new ways of delivering them. As the sector prepares to invest more than US$200b over the next five years to radically overhaul its infrastructure and metering, the study highlights how a traditionally conservative industry is at a tipping point in its relationship with its principal stakeholders.
The report has revealed that the developed economies like US, Australia and some of Europe are at the evolution and revolution stage, while the emerging markets, including India will witness P&U invest in new smart technologies for infrastructure upgradation, which will be to address increasing energy demand, alleviate environmental pressure or replace out-of -date infrastructure. Ben Van Gils, Global Sector Leader for Power & Utilities at Ernst & Young, explains, "Power and utilities is a traditional industry with a business model that has changed little in the past 100 years. Companies both within the sector and potential new entrants are now seeing a once in a generation opportunity - the so-called smart revolution - with the onset of new technology and new consumer expectations."
Ben continues, "Smart is not just an infrastructure upgrade. These changes have the potential to transform power and utilities companies' strategy and their entire way of working."
India focus on immediate benefits
Scantly planned distribution networks, overloaded systems, inadequate regulatory effectiveness, lack of customer focus and with flawed metering and billing system has dented the Power & Utility sector in India. A global mapping reveals that aggregate technical and commercial losses in India are far higher than rest of the world. Arun Srivastava, Executive Director, Infrastructure create a smart grid framework for the entire electricity grid; establish common communication standards and protocols and adopt open-source standards to enable the development of smart grid applications.
Ben concludes, "Smart offers huge opportunities and rewards for both old and new players in the power and utilities arena but also potential oblivion if companies either move too quickly and bet the house on the wrong strategic approach or are too slow and miss the boat. The next decade will be the most interesting in the sector's history."
Arun emphasis that India's transmission and distribution grid is in urgent need of expansion and improvement. However, the industry is fragmented - resulting in low awareness of smart technologies, lack of planning for implementation and low levels of standardization. Together, these factors could potentially compromise the successful adoption of smart.
