1. | |December 2014
1CIOReview
CIOREVIEW.COMDECEMBER - 30 2014
T h e N a v i g a t o r f o r E n t e r p r i s e S o l u t i o n s
ENERGY TECHNOLOGY SPECIAL
Nag Ramachandran,
CEO
iSIGMA, Inc: Trusted
Customer Care & Billing
Solutions for Energy
Providers
iSIGMA, Inc: Trusted
Customer Care & Billing
Solutions for Energy
Providers
Company of the Month
FrankLi,
President&CEO,PantonIncorporated
| |December 2014
60CIOReview
T
o address energy conservation, generation
companies and commercial organizations
which deal in services like rating, programs
and measure implementations take a multi-­
prong approach. The nation is cautious about its carbon
emissions and aims to earn carbon credits by curbing
on these carbon emissions. Thermal energy generation
companies, seen today, play important role in this process.
The challenge for the company is to meet the energy
demand of consumers and controlling emission. One
of the approaches taken by the company is to perform
an energy audit of the dwelling before and/ or after
construction. The audit captures data related to heating,
cooling, hot water, lighting, and appliance energy loads
and consumptions. The article scope is limited to single
and multi-­family homes.
The company implements an energy conservation
objective through the program. This program is mostly
implemented by a non-­profit organization which focuses
on green earth/energy
conservation ob-­
jective. The
c o m p a n y
allocates a
Fraud detection need in the
energy program implementation
for Utility companies
By Atul Gunjal, CEO and Ameet Shedge, CTO, iWorkTech
CXO INSIGHT
budget and sets a target for implementation. The budget covers oper-­
ational expenses plus rebate or incentives offered to consumers. The
objective of the program gets implemented by the staff and corrective
measures are implemented by its auditor or rater.
The challenges faced by the CIO is to see that each dollar spend,
is well spend and to detect instances of fraud and incompetency. The
proactive steps taken towards these challenges help in ensuring that
the objective of the program is met.
Program Implementation Platform (PIP)
PIP consists of the following modules
It is not hard-­and-­fast rule that all modules need to
present. Some can be dropped or some other can be
added as per the program needs. These modules are
implemented as portals which can be accessed through a
browser or desktop solution. Some modules are needed to
be accessed by the field executives;; hence it needs to be
available as a mobile solution.
Data Flow, approach and algorithm
The data flow can be depicted as follows:
First, the home data is gathered by the file executive. It is important
that this data complies with the energy model. This helps to get
This approach ensures that
continuous Quality Assurance
is performed to detect and
report any anomalous result
in the submitted data consistency in the rating. To achieve this, the following is
necessary:
Clear and consistent information for the rater
Training needs to cover assessment methods, measures, and
data points.
Independent third-­party assessment needs to be done on the
field reviews and submitted data files. This is done to detect any
fraud or incompetency.
o Establish limit on input variables
o Determine bounds check
o Detect and warn users for input values beyond reasonable
limits
o Generate XML data which is stored in the repository for
pattern detection, future use, data exchange with other systems.
This approach ensures that continuous Quality Assurance
is performed to detect and report any anomalous result in the
submitted data. This continuous approach absolves staff from
routine manual checking. The automated nature of the job helps
to handle any increase in the volume of homes. This process can
also detect existing patterns or establish a new pattern. This
pattern is stored in the repository. This rule-­based approach
helps to build a flexible system.
Some of this system’s silent features are:
Backend system
Sanitize data received
Analyze data based on several data validations
Possess multiple methods for
o data analysis
o pattern recognition
Flag files with issues
Deliver report on analysis
Risks
Unknown nature of data needs to be flagged and further
analyzed. This analysis helps determine whether new data needs
to be consumed by the system for fraud detection or not.
Constraints
Dependency
Conclusion
PIP helps CIO to keep focus on the project objective. PIP’s
Fraud module helps to get consistent rating and helps detect
fraud and incompetency. The fraud detection helps to keep
tab on the unfair practices. By taking proactive measures, like
training, helps to address issues like incompetency.
Atul Gunjal