How We Estimate Electricity Demand for the Russell County Holon

By: Sam Ross

When you see a number like “Estimated Annual Electricity Demand” on the Russell County Holon dashboard, the obvious question is:

Where did that number come from?

This post answers that question directly — without magic, without guesswork, and without pretending the data is more precise than it actually is.

Why Estimation Is Necessary

Electric utilities in the United States do not publish county-level electricity totals.

Service territories cross county lines. Utilities report to regulators at the utility level, not the county level. There is no official CSV that says:

“Russell County, VA used X megawatt-hours last year.”

Because of that, any county-scale energy planning effort must rely on derived estimates using federal datasets. This is standard practice in regional energy analysis.

The Data Sources We Use

We intentionally limit ourselves to public, authoritative federal sources.

1. U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) — Form 861

EIA Form 861 provides annual retail electricity sales and customer counts by utility.

This includes:

Total electricity sold (MWh)
Total number of customers
Sector breakdowns (residential, commercial, industrial)

Source:
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/eia861/

2. U.S. Census Bureau — American Community Survey (ACS)

Census data provides:

Population
Housing units
Occupied households

This data is used to proportionally allocate utility-level sales to the county.

Source:
https://data.census.gov/

The Core Problem (Plain English)

Russell County is served by more than one electric utility.
Those utilities report total sales, but not county totals.

So the question becomes:

What share of each utility’s total electricity sales reasonably belongs to Russell County?

The Estimation Model

We use a proportional allocation model, which is transparent and repeatable.

Step 1: Identify Utilities Serving the County

For Russell County, the primary providers are:

Appalachian Power (AEP)
Old Dominion Power / Kentucky Utilities (smaller share)

Each utility is treated independently.

Step 2: Allocate Utility Sales to the County

For each utility $u$ u, we calculate: $\text{CountyMWh}_u = \text{UtilitySalesMWh}_u \times \left(\frac{\text{CountyCustomers}_u}{\text{UtilityCustomers}_u}\right)$ CountyMWhu=UtilitySalesMWhu×(UtilityCustomersuCountyCustomersu)

Where:

UtilitySalesMWh_u = total annual electricity sold by utility $u$ u (from EIA-861)
UtilityCustomers_u = total customers served by utility $u$ u (from EIA-861)
CountyCustomers_u = customers served by utility $u$ u within Russell County
(derived from Census housing data and published service territory information)

This allocates each utility’s sales proportionally to the county.

Step 3: Sum Across Utilities

$\text{EstimatedCountyDemandMWh} = \sum_u \text{CountyMWh}_u$ EstimatedCountyDemandMWh=u∑CountyMWhu

This produces the Estimated Annual Electricity Demand shown on the dashboard.

Holon Target Calculation

The Russell County Holon currently uses a 50% energy independence target.

That target is calculated as: $\text{HolonTargetMWh} = 0.5 \times \text{EstimatedCountyDemandMWh}$ HolonTargetMWh=0.5×EstimatedCountyDemandMWh

This target is policy-driven, not a claim about current generation.

Update Frequency

This estimate is recalculated annually.

Why annual?

EIA Form 861 is released once per year
Census ACS data updates annually
More frequent recalculation would not materially change the estimate and would introduce unnecessary churn

Each update is versioned based on the datasets used (for example: “Updated using 2024 EIA-861 and 2023 ACS”).

What This Estimate Is — and Is Not

This estimate is:

Transparent
Reproducible
Based on federal data
Appropriate for county-scale planning

This estimate is not:

A meter-level measurement
A real-time value
A claim of perfect precision

If utilities ever publish true county-level totals, we will happily replace this method. Until then, this is the most defensible approach available.

Why We Show the Math

We publish this methodology because trust matters.

Anyone can:

Check the sources
Reproduce the calculation
Disagree with assumptions — and propose better ones

What we will not do is hide the process behind a single unexplained number.

Sources

U.S. Energy Information Administration — Form 861
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/eia861/
U.S. Census Bureau — American Community Survey
https://data.census.gov/