State of New Jersey
DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
DIVISION OF ADMINISTRATION
FISCAL AND RESOURCES
P O Box 211
TRENTON, NEW JERSEY 08625-0211
Jon S. Corzine
Governor
Bradley I. Abelow
State Treasurer
Request for Information
February 21, 2007
Dear Sir/Madam:
The State of New Jersey, Department of Treasury, Office of Energy Savings requests response from
qualified energy bill processing, analysis, and payment vendors to provide information on centralized
energy management and bill-paying services with Internet and database access. The responder
should possess a combination of energy consulting skills and the technology to perform back-office
and on-line services. The State is seeking input from vendors who focus on energy commodities and
are constantly managing public and private accounts via online reporting and analysis. The goal is to
obtain no-cost, no obligation information relating to the format, conduct, operation and security of
these web-based and bill-paying services.
The State is conducting this Request for Information (RFI) in order to obtain information on a proven
way of providing such services. The informational requirements of the RFI are detailed on the
following pages. This process requires one original response and two (2) exact copies of that
response (or one email response). All should be submitted as follows:
Due Date:
March 16, 2007
Time due:
2:00 p.m.
Location:
Attn: Rodney Richards
NJ Treasury Office of Energy Savings
PO Box 211
Trenton NJ 08625-0211
(Direct delivery: 50 W. State St. 4th fl, Trenton NJ 08608)
Rodney.Richards@treas.state.nj.us
We look forward to receiving your response.
Sincerely,
Rodney Richards, Manager
Energy Supply and Administration
New Jersey Is An Equal Opportunity Employer
Request for Information
Introduction and purpose: The State of New Jersey, Department of Treasury Office of Energy
Savings is issuing this Request for Information (RFI) seeking information from established vendors in
the field of energy tracking systems (including bill analysis and payment) (primarily electricity and
natural gas), for the purpose of finding out about the actual processes, potential and costs of these
services. The State has not used such a process nor developed one for itself. This RFI is for the
purpose of using the services of an energy consulting firm that provides such services and not for the
purpose of the State developing its own equivalent services. Any information submitted in response to
this request is considered public information.
There is no obligation on your part to respond to this request. If responding, your response will be
reviewed by knowledgeable State energy, administrative and procurement personnel. If responding
and the state decides to progress beyond this RFI your firm and others will be notified.
Background: The State has been bidding its energy supply needs (natural gas and electricity), since
2001, under the auspices of the New Jersey Consolidated Energy Savings Program (NJCESP), a
consortium of state agencies and government affiliated agencies, and the State's central purchasing
agency, the Division of Purchase & Property. The State recently awarded a contract for six
Commercial and Industrial Energy Pricing (CIEP) tariff groupings to two energy suppliers for over 626
million kWhs a year for supply only (100 accounts). This contract expires June 30, 2007. Eight
months ago the State awarded a natural gas supply contract for over 25 million therms annually (582
accounts). The NJCESP is currently developing a RFP for Renewable Energy Certificates (REC) for
roughly 61 million kWhs a year of Class I renewables (about 180 accounts). A RFP was bid in the
past for almost 2300 Fixed Price (FP) electricity accounts, but without market success. However, the
State has no method currently to capture energy bill data such as usage and cost by facility,
department and enterprise in one reporting structure. The State is very determined to lower its energy
costs through improved management of its energy bills on a facility, departmental and enterprise
basis.
Response: This consists of two Sections:
Section I. General Services Information
1. Describe your approach and all elements of your services and what you are capable of providing.
Describe the overall process from beginning to end. Provide screen prints as examples if possible.
How do you provide for data capture and reporting? Do you subcontract certain services? Do you
compile a database of customer bill data? What bill data will you record? Do you provide
meaningful access from the Internet to captured data?
2.
Describe the benefits of using your services as opposed to conventional bill payment and
processing. Why do your services reduce costs? Are reduced costs guaranteed? Do you have
proven examples? What differentiates your process from any others' process? What are the
advantages and disadvantages of using your methods?
3.
How much do your services typically cost based on the Background given above, for example? Do
you charge a flat fee, a percentage? On what basis do you charge? How does the customer pay
their energy bill and your processing fee? Does the customer pay you and you pay the LDC or
Supplier?
Section II: Product, Experience and other response elements to this RFI
Part A: Product and Experience Information
Provide the following in your response to the RFI:
1. How many users can your system handle simultaneously?
2. Describe how you handle the following features:
a. Audits to reduce billing errors; recalculating and verifying bill accuracy
b. Budgeting and accounting; interfacing to users financial system
c. Capturing all bill data (electricity and natural gas). Do you use EDI, copying from manual
bills etc?
d. Utilizing facility data like square feet for reports
e. Web-enabled access
f. Web-hosted server/database and how do you secure files?
g. Canned and easy query reports such as:
Enterprise, department and facility level
Emissions data
Importing to other file formats such as MS-Excel
Graphing
h. Security profiling; multiple levels of security for access
i. Calculating energy savings and cost avoidance
j. Downloading bill data from provider, including interval data
k. Capturing or download of meter or sub-meter data
l. Imaging of bills for record retention
m. Weather data incorporated into analysis
n. Rate/tariff analysis
o. Alerts for uncommon conditions
p. Cost-center accounting
q. Interface to Energy Star for benchmarking.
3. Provide at least four recent project references, with contact information, for successful Projects
where your firm has provided bill paying and energy tracking services.
4. Are you providing these services to other state governments or the Federal government? If so
name them please with contract dates.
Part B: Additional Response Requirements
1. Provide name of company, contact person, title, address, phone, fax, cell #, and email address.
2. Provide a copy of your division or company organizational chart and total number of staff.
3. Provide general information and an overall description of your company, years in business, total
number of clients etc.
4. In your response, please restate the question or statement from each Section and Part before
answering.
5. Responses must be received NO LATER THAN the due date, by 2 pm.