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Case Studies

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Boosting Energy Forecast Accuracy with C3 AI & Fractal

Boosting Energy Forecast Accuracy with C3 AI & Fractal

Boosting Energy Forecast Accuracy with C3 AI & Fractal

How a U.S. utility unified data & insights to cater to evolving customer needs and grid shifts

How a U.S. utility unified data & insights to cater to evolving customer needs and grid shifts

Unified siloed data sources

Improved forecast accuracy

Faster dashboard delivery

Self‑service insights access

The challenge

Unlocking actionable insights to enhance forecasting precision

A leading U.S. utility needed to improve its ability to forecast demand as electric vehicle charging, heat pumps, and other distributed energy resources gained traction. Siloed smart meters, weather systems, and external data reduced visibility into demand trends, while the lack of curated features and intuitive dashboards increased manual work and delayed decisions.

Key challenges

  • Unifying smart meters, customer programs, weather, and other external data sources

  • Understanding how emerging load patterns influence demand

  • Translating data into precise, forecast-ready insights

  • Delivering insights via intuitive dashboards

The solution

Analytical tools and dashboards to enhance forecasting confidence

Data & insight development

Developed behavioral features, trend analyses, and regional aggregations to understand the impact of emerging technologies.

Collaborated with product owners to form hypotheses to uncover patterns influencing demand.

Intuitive dashboards

Created functional prototypes of analytical workflows using Jupyter notebooks within the C3 AI platform.

Iterated with product owners and quickly turned prototypes into dashboards that met evolving requirements.

Curated library of reusable assets

Identified common patterns across use cases and captured them in a curated library of technical assets.

Teams now reuse these assets to accelerate delivery and reduce time to value.

Implementation approach

1

Discovery

  • Engaged product owners to clarify evolving forecasting needs and align data and dashboard requirements with business priorities.

2

Feature & dashboard development

  • Created statistical summaries, behavioral features, and intuitive dashboards that deliver actionable insights for forecasting and planning.

3

Operationalization

  • Transitioned processes and visualizations into automated, repeatable dashboards within the C3 AI platform to support long-term planning.

The impact

Richer data, faster insights, and enhanced forecasting inputs

Data quality

  • Cleaner, unified data across sources

  • Richer features for deeper analysis

Delivery speed

  • Faster rollout of actionable dashboards

  • Quicker response to forecast needs

Decision confidence

  • Intuitive, self-service dashboards

  • More time spent on strategic planning

Looking ahead

Broaden coverage

  • Embed behavioral trends across electric and gas systems

Data-driven planning

  • Support clean energy transition and grid readiness

Dashboard optimization

  • Deliver insights faster and more efficiently