Most energy organizations in North America don't use RSS or Really Simple Syndication to push information to web users. That means that energy professionals who rely on these websites must check them a few times a day for updates. Of course, RSS is not very useful if you don’t have much information to share. But that's not the case with energy companies, RTOs and ISOs and national and state government agencies.
What information is available for possible RSS Syndication
Energy companies, regional energy organizations and government agencies routinely issue important press releases, regulatory decisions, energy data and reports that affect electricity and natural gas prices and markets. This information can certainly be syndicated since it is public information.
Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs) and Independent System Operators (ISOs) have daily and hourly data on prices, energy, capacity, etc. that could also be syndicated via RSS. This data would be very valuable to market participants and also make these markets more transparent.
I also believe that RTOs, ISOs, energy companies, and State agencies could also use RSS syndicated content to alert business and retail customers of possible shortages and the need to conserve electricity and natural gas during peak periods.
Who’s Using RSS and Who's Not in the Energy Sector?
My company, BC Consulting, searched the websites of some energy companies, RTOs, ISOs, energy trade associations, energy publishers and financial organizations for available RSS feeds. For a sector that prides itself on technological innovation, energy sharing and transparency, I was a bit disappointed. Here’s a summary of what we found.
1) The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the US Department of Energy (DOE) use RSS feeds to push content to web users. FERC has three RSS feeds: What's New at FERC, Market-Oversight and Technical Conferences. Over 156 users subscribe to the FERC What’s New feed according to data on RSS feed provider NewsGator.
DOE has an RSS feed for its press releases and several feeds on energy efficiency.
State Commissions' use of RSS was quite variable. We found that the New York State Public Service Commission has an extensive list of RSS feeds. In contrast, the California Public Utility Commission, California Energy Commission and Public Utility Commission of Texas had no RSS feeds. The Public Utility Commission of Ohio has two feeds for Latest News and Consumer Updates.
2) We found no RSS feeds on the websites of the Energy Bar Association, Edison Electric Institute, National Gas Association and other energy trade associations. The reason may be that information is not regularly available or not for public consumption. Probably the latter. However, many of these associations try to educate the general public on energy issues. RSS syndication would make sense on those reports and articles to ensue broad circulation.
3) We were really surprised that very few RTOs and ISOs use RSS to push information to users. No RTOs or ISOs syndicate price information.
a) Californian ISO is looking into RSS
b) PJM- has feeds on meetings and calendar events
c) The New York ISO, ISO New England, and Midwest ISO had no RSS feeds
d) ERCOT is considering RSS syndication.
e) Southwest Power Pool had no RSS feeds
f) Ontario's IESO had no RSS feeds
g) Alberta Electric System Operator had no RSS feeds
h) ISO/RTO Council had no RSS feeds
4) The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) had no RSS feeds.
5) Energy companies were a bit better than the above regional organizations. We surveyed Entergy, Southern Company, Pacific Gas and Electric, TXU Energy and National Grid. All of these companies used RSS to some extent except TXU Energy. National Grid syndicated its auctions and presentations. No companies syndicated energy price information and
6) As expected, the energy publishers and financial markets like Platts, SNL, NYMEX, and the Intercontinental Exchange, all use RSS feeds to push content to users. NYMEX and SNL provided numerous RSS feeds.
What information should energy organizations be syndicating?
The short answer is “not everything.” If you do that, than web users will be no better off than they are with email. Energy organizations should start off with high value information like press releases and data reports which can affect markets. An example of a report that would be good to syndicate is DOE’s Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Natural Gas Storage Report. Other EIA reports may also merit syndication.
Next on my list, would be daily and hourly price information on electricity and capacity from RTOs and ISOs. These organizations should also survey market participants to get a better idea of what their needs are. Again the idea is to push important information to users who may be normally relying on information from several energy websites.
To locate RSS feeds on any website, look for the orange icon. Here is a list of RSS feeds or webpages that list the energy feeds of an organization.
FERC- What’s New: http://www.ferc.gov/xml/whats-new.xml
FERC- Market Oversight http://www.ferc.gov/xml/market-oversight.xml
FERC- Technical Conferences http://www.ferc.gov/xml/technical-conferences.xml
DOE Press Releases http://www.energy.gov/pressreleases.xml
EIA has no feeds. Even the popular Weekly natural gas storage report at http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/info/ngs/ngs.html
The following energy feeds can be accessed at http://www.usa.gov/Topics/Reference_Shelf/Libraries/RSS_Library/Agriculture.shtml#vgn-energy-vgn:
• Biofuels Information Feed Digest
• DOE Pulse – Research Highlights from the Department of Energy's National Laboratories
• Energy Codes News Feed
• Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy News
• Energy News from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
• Energy News in Your State
• Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Market Oversight
• Federal Energy Regulatory Commission News
• Green Power Market News
New York Mercantile Exchange has RSS feeds on press releaes and energy markets
Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) has RSS feeds on press releases and its Futures Circulars.
Platts has an extensive list of RSS feeds at https://www.platts.com/RSS/index.html?query=rss+feeds. So does SNL at http://www.snl.com/interactivex/rss/
Final Words
I'm not really certain why more energy organizations have not capitalized on using RSS to disseminate energy information to their customers and stakeholders. If you have some ideas on this matter, please comment on this post. If you wish to discuss this offline, please contact me via email.
As someone who is following the energy sector, you owe it to yourself to stay informed and to be as productive as possible. You can do that right now by using RSS. If you want to subscribe to some of the above RSS feeds and need a tutorial, see my previous post on How to use RSS.
Hope this helps make your job easier.
Regards. Nora
You're right, RSS is not the only way to provide automatic updates. However, there's a cost to EIA and also you.
Of course there's the dollar cost. I also wonder whether EIA is really effectively disseminating their reports as well as they can with RSS. Also, most energy websites have Content Management Systems (CMS)that have the ability to syndicate content using RSS.
Then, there's your email box which is subject to spam. I use My Yahoo which allows me to keep my personal email in front of me and also allows me to use RSS to get the news I really want. It is rather nice to just see the news pop up free of spam.
Posted by: Tom Russo | September 15, 2007 at 11:23 PM
EIA does not use RSS, but they do use a mailing list server. It pre-dates RSS and is very active. I have signed up for several notifications and recieve each of them as new versions of reports are released. Since most of what the EIA releases is file based, I prefer this to RSS. Several other organizations also use list servers. RSS is not the only way to provide automated updates on new information.
Posted by: Doug Houseman | September 14, 2007 at 07:52 AM