The Story of FindEnergy.com
In mid-2021 we holed ourselves up in a house in Venice, FL to launch FindEnergy.com. Many late nights, a few breaks on the beach and a lot of Indian food and Spindrift got us to the finish line.
In February of 2020 two friends asked the question, “What industry is critically lacking online information that would make the lives of consumers easier?”. Little did we know we were about to have some extra spare time to really think about that.
A few short months later and it was clear to our small team that industries relying on energy pricing, utility coverage and power plant emissions data were woefully underserved by the current results we could find on the internet.
Personally, I struggled to understand whether my electricity rate was “good” or “bad” compared to the rest of my state and if I should be happy with the “uptime” I experienced with my electricity relative to other utility companies. I had no idea if the guys knocking on doors touting solar really were offering a great deal. And I certainly couldn’t have told you that my utility happened to have one of the last remaining coal plants in my state, located just a few miles away. I only found out these answers by drudging through file after file of government data. It was clear to us that the average consumer wasn’t being considered when it came to the energy and electricity data that was being published online. And thus, FindEnergy.com was born.
Less than a year later, in June of 2021, we launched the initial version of FindEnergy.com, which looked quite similar to what you see today (we tend to focus on improving data rather than website makeovers) but was powered by government data that was flawed, to say the least. We were happy we were providing some answers but it simply didn’t sit well that there were glaring issues with the government data being reported and used all over the internet, including by us. We spent the next 2.5 years painstakingly correcting these data sets so that we could deliver truly accurate information at the city and county levels throughout the United States. In fact, that journey hasn’t ended, as we continue to improve our data every time we come across better information.
Thanks to this effort, today, FindEnergy.com boasts the most accurate US electric utility service territory data on the internet. This powers all of our geographic and utility level pricing information, in turn making it the most accurate version of these data sets on the web as well. Where other websites use rounded averages that are often 20-40% off of reality, we publish pricing information that is backed by data based on what’s happening in the real world. We literally have yet to find another website besides ours where we can’t easily pick apart their flawed methodology for showing electricity rates and average bills. Either they don’t get it or they don’t care.
So why does this data matter? Why do we keep trudging along?
To Assist Consumers — We’ve seen website after website showing inaccurate utility rate information. If a website looks at government data for a state and see a 13¢ average price per kWh and then makes the logical flaw of saying that every city in that state has a 13¢ price per kWh, that’s bad for the consumer.
The problem? One city in the state may have a 9¢ average rate while another city may have 17¢ average rate. THIS MATTERS! At the lower rate, personal solar may be a terrible option for the consumer, while at the higher rate it could be a no-brainer. Consumers need accurate information to make major energy related decisions!
Even worse? That 13¢ number is often also just the advertised “rate” published by the local utility. Advertised rates might get you in the ballpark, but they don’t consider all of the additional flat fees and variable fees that many utilities use. Our data method uses actual utility financials to pinpoint a true cost per kWh delivered and project average consumer expenses.
We don’t play those games. Our goal is to publish data in as detailed of a fashion as possible, while retaining an extremely high level of accuracy.
To Impact Policy — Why does county “A” have a 30% higher electricity rate than their neighbor, county “B”? Is State “X” really that green when it imports 40% of its electricity from the fossil fuel guzzling state next door? Does an EV being charged at my home reduce emissions or not? Is green energy less or more reliable? Less or more affordable?
The answer is in the data, people!
It is our hope that a general improvement in available energy data will lead to better policy making and better public discourse.
To Clear Up the Conversation — Every day newspapers, blogs, company press releases and social media posts cite inaccurate energy data. Sometimes to further an agenda, other times because that’s the only thing they found out there. We hope to not only be a source of clear and accurate data but to also inspire other organizations to begin to publish higher quality data. It can’t be emphasized enough that more accurate data leads to a more accurate conversation which leads to more impactful results.
Who we are today
FindEnergy.com remains a small, self-funded (bootstrapped, might I add), completely independent team. We have no association with utilities or any advocacy groups and we plan to stay that way. Our goal is to publish unbiased data as accurately as we possibly can, in order to empower consumers and enable a national energy conversation backed by facts.
How we keep the “lights on”
It turns out the saying “data is the new oil” is somewhat true. While I wouldn’t say we’ve struck oil, the flawed data sets that we have spent years fixing turn out to be valuable to companies in various industries. We offer this data for sale in multiple formats. However, our website will always remain free.
Additionally, a small subset of our users are actually in the market for energy related products (such as roof top solar, generators, back up batteries, deregulated electricity plans, etc). We partner with the best companies we can find to bring those products to this subset of users and we receive a referral fee from these partners. That being said, 99% of our user base uses our website without any transactions taking place. They are just here to soak up all of that wonderful free data.
What’s next?
We have big plans, no doubt. Some of them straightforward. Some of them outlandish. I can say with confidence, though, that we here at FindEnergy.com will do everything in our power to make sure that the energy decisions of tomorrow’s consumers and policy-makers alike can be backed up by reliable, unbiased and easy to understand data. It’s time for the energy conversation to make sense. It’s time for consumers to be empowered.