The Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative (SGCC), an independent non-profit group specializing in research and education on consumer engagement for the smart grid era, announced that it achieved 70 members, an increase of 40 percent since January 2011.

“We've gained a balanced representation of members from for-profit and nonprofit sectors,” said Patty Durand, executive director, SGCC, in a statement. “One of the things that makes SGCC unique is that we embrace all stakeholders, including consumers.”

It is significant that the SGCC gained roughly the same number of research, consumer advocacy, environmental, professional non-profits, and local and federal organizational members as they did technology vendors and utilities.

The main objective of the SGCC members is to pool resources to fund research. They are looking at shaping a consumer friendly, modernized 21st century power systems across America.

The consumer collaborative is expecting that these three new primary research efforts in the next six months will provide analysis of consumer behavioral segments and delve into the overt and hidden messages in consumer communications to date.

Some of the new SGCC members include Aclara, American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, Arizona Public Service Commission, Bonneville Power Administration, DTE Energy, Efficiency 2.0, Electric Power Research Institute, Energy Hub, ENMAX, Georgia Institute of Technology, iControl Networks (News - Alert), Kansas City Power and Light, Landis+Gyr, Market Strategies International and Michigan Public Service Commission, North Carolina Department of Commerce Energy Division, Office of the Ohio Consumers Counsel, Office of the People's Counsel for the District of Columbia, OhioPartners for Affordable Energy, Oracle, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, PEPCO Holdings, Southwest Research Institute (News - Alert), Tech America, Tendril, and Vermont Institute for Energy & Environment.

Recently, agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack unveiled a loan program that will grant $900 million in funding to rural electric cooperative utilities to go toward smart grid technologies and upgrades to generation and transmission systems, benefitting more than 19,000 rural consumers in 14 U.S. states.

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