You can hire Catalyst Cooperative to perform research and analysis related to US electricity system data and policies. We primarily serve climate and clean energy advocates in the non-profit sector, as well as journalists, public agencies, and academic research institutions. We have also on occasion worked with renewable energy developers and trade associations.
Our Services
- Integrating new public data in bulk and preparing it for analytical use by your in-house team.
- Compiling information satisfying certain criteria and extracting it from existing data sources.
- Preparing custom analyses and visualizations based on existing data.
- Researching and summarizing the details of state and federal policy making and regulatory proceedings.
Our Data
We work with publicly available data, primarily from federal agencies. To see which data we have already integrated, and the data sets which we have already identified as priorities for future integration, please see Data We Wrangle, and our Public Utility Data Liberation project on GitHub.
Hourly Work: $150/hr
For well-defined projects serving commercial or NGO customers, we will work with the client to define the scope of work, and estimate the number of hours required to complete it. As of August 2022, Catalyst charges $150/hour for hourly work.
We are committed to improving the accessibility and usability of public data, and creating open source software for working with this information. However, we recognize that there are times when private data and analysis are necessary in both advocacy and commercial applications, and so we will work with the client to appropriately tailor intellectual property considerations to the client’s needs.
Note: If you want to work with the data yourself, and just need a little help with the initial setup, please check out our documentation, search our existing Github issues, and feel free to open your own issue to ask a question if you aren’t finding the answers you need.
Grassroots Organizations
If you are a grassroots, primarily volunteer organization, student group, or other non-institutional group of activists, and need help wrangling data to support your work, we’d still like to be able to work with you! We may be able to offer you discounted or pro-bono support, or point you toward resources that will allow you to use our data to serve your needs. If you’d like to chat, consider joining us for our regularly scheduled Office Hours.
Long Term Engagements
The resources required for complex analyses and large data integrations are much more difficult to accurately estimate, especially when they involve systems we are not already familiar with.
We use an iterative approach based on Agile Scrum to break large tasks down into smaller pieces that can be more easily understood and prioritized. We work in two week sprints, and can provide a detailed progress report to the client after each sprint, to gather input before the next chunk of work is done. After the first couple of sprints, the goal would be to offer a working product in some form every two weeks.
For longer term projects (several months or more) that result in open work products, we may be able to offer a lower hourly rate, especially if the data being integrated is already one of our priorities, or the analysis is of wider public interest.
Contact Us
Want to get more information? Or set up a call to discuss your energy data wrangling project? Drop us a line at: hello@catalyst.coop or call 401-316-8271.