Data for Community Energy

40 minutes | May 24, 2024

The presentation will talk about the opportunities and challenges for data & technology as they relate to the digital transformation of a Community Choice Aggregator tasked with providing 100% clean and renewable energy by 2030. Diego will talk about all-things related to Data and Analytics operations that are required to enable an efficient low-carbon energy transition.

Dr. Diego Ponce de Leon is the Head of Technology at Ava Community Energy, the Community Choice Aggregator serving the cities of Alameda and San Joaquin Counties. Ava’s Data and Technology team focuses on developing and implementing data best practices for a 100% renewable energy future including cloud technology, APIs, customer engagement tech, and ML/AI among other practices. Diego joined Ava from Xinampa, which he founded to close the energy data gap in the 30 fastest growing economies in emerging markets and he worked extensively across Central America, East Africa and Southeast Asia collaboration with governments and international energy agencies. His work has focused on technology and data innovation around wireless sensor networks for flexible demand, and big-data approaches to DERs, energy efficiency, demand response, and environmental justice. Prior to Xinampa, Diego consulted as a data engineer for Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, USAID, IBM Research, and the Inter-American Development Bank, among others. He holds a PhD and MS from the Energy and Resources Group (UC Berkeley), and a BA in Economics and BS in Civil Engineering from Macalester College and the University of Minnesota. He is also a graduate of the United World Colleges. Diego has won numerous competitions and awards including the National Geographic Energy Challenge Grant, the Powerhouse-Schneider Electric 4D Challenge, the IDB Energy IDEAS LatAm competition, UC Berkeley’s CITRIS Foundry innovation fund, and is a Link Energy Foundation and CONACYT UC-MEXUS fellow.