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Southern California Edison Expands Forecasting Capabilities with SAS®CARY, N.C. --(Business Wire)-- Because energy trading opens with the markets, Southern California Edison (SCE) forecasters and meteorologists are on the job at 4 a.m., running forecasts for weather, short-term load and renewables output. Using SAS® Analytics for utilities, SCE has begun improving its forecasting efficiency by integrating and analyzing vast stores of data in its energy forecasting platform. Today SCE - one of the nation's largest electric utilities, with nearly 5 million customers - is strengthening energy operations and preparing to address new smart grid challenges and opportunities. With the increase of wind and solar resources and a high penetration of smart meters in the California market, the business of energy forecasting is increasingly complex. The Short-Term Load Forecasting team at SCE creates a larger number and greater variety of forecasts than ever before. However, gathering quality data for analysis is no longer labor-intensive. With SAS (News - Alert), Southern California Edison integrates data from a wide variety of sources and extracts crucial insights for decision making. Model development, data analysis, reporting and visualization are now all accomplished in a single integrated software platform, streamlining the load and price forecasting process. Analze and predict demand, prices "SAS helped us modernize," said Raymond Johnson, Principal Manager of Demand and Price Forecasting at Southern California Edison (News - Alert). "Having more integrated data and models helps us avoid operational errors and speed up the creation of forecasts, which in turn allows us to spend more time reviewing results and making any necessary changes. Since completing the SAS implementation in December 2012, our forecasters now have greater flexibility on improving model performance, reviewing forecasted results and running reports." Energy and utility leaders around the world rely on the power of SAS to deliver the analysis, forecasts, and energy trading and risk management systems for effective decision making across the enterprise. For more information on advanced forecasting techniques in use at utilities today, read When One Size No Longer Fits All: Electric Load Forecasting with a Geographic Hierarchy. Modernizing operations for smart grid Progress comes fast at Southern California Edison. With millions of smart meters poised to usher in big data, the forecasting team will gain access to smart grid analysis this year. Terabytes of detailed customer data will help the utility further improve short-term forecasts. "With new volumes of data from smart grid devices and meters come greater opportunities for utilities to modernize their energy planning with analytics," said Alyssa Farrell, Global Manager of Energy and Sustainability Solutions at SAS. "Large utilities such as Southern California Edison, as well as small utilities, are applying SAS Analytics to operations, customer service and renewables for smarter planning and better business results." About SAS® SAS is the leader in business analytics software and services, and the largest independent vendor in the business intelligence market. Through innovative solutions, SAS helps customers at more than 60,000 sites improve performance and deliver value by making better decisions faster. Since 1976 SAS has been giving customers around the world THE POWER TO KNOW®. SAS and all other SAS Institute Inc. product or service names are registered trademarks or trademarks of SAS Institute Inc. in the USA and other countries. ® indicates USA registration. Other brand and product names are trademarks of their respective companies. Copyright © 2013 SAS Institute Inc. All rights reserved.
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