So, we're recording and we can get started. So, thank you all. It's been a while and thank you so much for your patience. Paul and Marlena really greatly appreciate it. Sorry, we had to keep changing times. So, I'm going to just start off with some of our business. I don't have the minutes of the last meeting to share. So, I don't even know if they've actually been drafted yet. So, we can put that off till the next time. Are there any updates? I don't have any from Pelham, other than Ra Ra, they're continuing to cheer us on. And the update I have on is more of the joint powers piece and it's still haven't heard back from Alan. Has the, at one point, I think you were going to talk to the mayor to sort of see if we could move him along. Were you able to do that? I don't remember getting into that point, but it's a good point to be at, yes. I think, because I think we're there. I think we really need to move this along with that piece. What about Amherst? Yeah, our legal counsel already responded. We're waiting on. Really? It was there was confusion over what he was responding to. He responded to the CCA. When you should have been responding to the joint power agreement. And then it kind of went dark, but we shouldn't digress here because it's a different topic that was just a quick update. Right. So, Darcy, go ahead. You're muted. Could we, could we see the Amherst lawyers responses so that you have, you all have had them. It's been so it's been quite some time. I'll send it again, but you've had it. You have had it. It's been, it's just been ages since it was back. No, it's very little. Yeah, that's why it's so puzzling. There's so little to respond to. So I don't want to derail us on this. I mean, we know this is outstanding. We know we've got to deal with it. We've. So I'll send it again if you want Darcy, but it's been, it definitely went to the group. So, are there any other updates? Okay, so move us along then to our discussion. Welcome Paul and Marlene. I thank you again so much. And I think I want to actually turn this over to you at this point because I feel like you're guiding us through this process. So, I know we gave you some feedback on the outreach and education plan. So I think that was the last interaction that we had at our last meeting. Excellent. Yeah, so we have, we have some slides if it's alright, I'll share my screen and we'll walk, we'll walk through those. I'll tell you actually before we launch into them that a few of them are slides you've seen before we've included them really just as a reminder just to not spend time on it but just be sure we're all grounded and back in the same spot so I'm going to share my screen now. Can folks see the slide there? Yes. Yeah. Excellent. All right. So the first thing just a just quick reminder here of the aggregation timeline and where we are. So we're over all on the left quite a bit in the planning stage, and we're working towards as a first milestone public review of the aggregation documents which is required by statute we need to make the documents available to the citizens, give them an opportunity to comment on it. Once we once we have the documents done and go through that step then we can file them with the Department of Public Utilities. Then this kind of repeat here this first milestone just kind of what I said a second ago so we draft these documents you give us input, we approve them and then we have that final presentation. So those key documents are the education and outreach plan and you've already as you said at the beginning Stephanie you guys have exchanged drafts there. You guys have provided some great contributions that to that and just a few questions to resolve on that which will go through in a second. And then the other ones are the aggregation plan itself, the opt out mailing materials and the model contract. So do you want to speak to the education and outreach plan just now from this slide, or do you want to do it from a subsequent one. Well actually what I was hoping to do is just to let you guys know that I read through it. It looks great. I've formatted it so it all kind of looks like the format matches. And then I have just a few questions that came into my head as I was reading through what you guys put together. I'm a minor, and I've embedded them in the document and I'd like to flip that back to you I think the easiest thing might be for you to just, you know, look at those questions and resolve them in the body of the document if that makes sense. Sure, we can do that. Great. All right. So then what we'll focus on for the rest of the time is these other documents here. And there are just some questions that which we, some of which we've raised before but you're kind of embedded into these documents. We talked through them a bit last time we sent you I think to a word document that describes the decision some want to go through them now in this call if we can see where you guys are on these questions. Insofar as you're able to answer them now great will reflect them in the draft aggregation plan which will flip to you next week. Insofar as you can't these questions still take more time to resolve what we'll do is we'll just, we'll send you the draft plan anyway but with just placeholders around these questions. But it's unlike the outreach plan, where the best way to deal with the questions is to see the document and insert the answers that works there. The aggregation plan is, is mostly like a regulatory document so you know it's not all that it's, it's kind of, we find it more efficient just to talk about these questions separately. We're doing it here so the first one is relates to our earlier discussion is the, the, the status of the, the joint powers entity. Because we're assuming that you're going to that it's going to be that entity that's the entity that files that aggregation plan with the DPU and we would draft the aggregation plan that way. And as far off in the future, you might want to decide to file under the you you have, which we can also do. It just means we would just write up the documents slightly differently. Do you have a sense of a timeline on the joint powers entity. I mean I'll say my sense of it is that it's pretty close. Once we get the lawyers to, to agree to the final language. I mean, we've been waiting on this for months and I think we just really need to get our executives to push to have it resolved. In fact, I think it should come from them now. We should forward them the last draft that we had and ask them to forward it along to the legal counsel, respectively, because I think we'll even send it to Rick again. And if it comes from them, I think that there might be more push. Yeah, yeah, it's really surprising that Alan hasn't done anything because it's normally more responsive to this. But, I mean, as I recall, everybody else correct me that once we get that finalized. Then we should be ready to go.  Yeah, JPA will trigger for me the board, etc. and have to go back and refresh myself but Paul, you're looking at how many months out still before this goes deep you. Well, so I would say, you know, you know, probably two months so we we need to have a draft aggregation plan mostly because of this public hearing so but why don't I write it it sounds like if this makes sense to you guys. I'm going to write it that I'm going to send you the draft aggregation plan, which assumes the joint powers entity is in place. And if it turns out we get to the point where we're ready to file the aggregation plan, but the joint powers entity isn't ready. And you want to go forward we could change the aggregation plan. So, but I'll just make the assumption that we're going to have that you'll have the joint powers entity if that makes sense to you. I think so. I think so too. I like it to I think I do. I'm thinking about the timeline and what the gating issues are and I think having the option so that this does not become a gating issue is really a good idea. Okay. We'll do it that way. So the next question is, I'll just actually raise these questions here and then we have slides I think on each of them as we go ahead so the next one was you talked about before was the program structure which is two key questions there one is how many options do you want to have, and then whether the standard or default option has additional renewable energy in it. Those are the key decisions for this stage of things. So there's that one. Then the next question is what what do you want to name these different options. We need to put the actual names in the aggregation plan. And then we should talk for a minute or two more on the operational adder. I think you've already given us good guidance on that but I just want as long as we're talking I wanted to confirm. So, let's move ahead and talk about the program structure questions. So, an example here of what's a typical structure, which is a three product offering with a standard option that has some additional renewable energy above the minimum. And then two options from there, one the ability to go up to 100% renewables which would be at an extra cost, and then the other option would be to go down to zero extra renewables for a lower cost. That's the common structure for green aggregations but not everybody does it that way and not every aggregation has additional renewable energy and the standard so that's the, you know, the C key set of questions for you here. You want to address them right now Paul. Yeah, if, if we could so understanding because I think we talked about this a while ago and I thought we came up with four options and a fourth that included local. That's my recollection, somebody can correct me if I'm wrong. That's my recollection to and it's like we don't have the local one to find yet, but we need it in there. And we may not even trigger it away, but we need it in there my understanding is so that we can go to it. Okay. So, that's great so it sounds like you, you guys are, your, your memory is better than mine and that were your were further resolved on further along on this so, and it's, if I just confirm it's the four options, and it's additional but it's with additional renewable energy in that default option. Excellent. All right, I mean if you take, you know, when people are selling residential solar now Paul as you may well know that the good better best so the budget is good. The standard is better and 100% is best and then the fourth one is local. That's the difference between 100% and number four. I think I'm just, I'm asking that as a question not a statement but is that what you're thinking Chris. Yeah, the local it gives us the opportunity to try to be creative. It's really the creative option, where we can direct money towards local measures and programs, extra renewable energy from locals it could be alternative energy credits and stuff that are coming from people putting in the pumps locally yet redefined, but yes it was. It's kind of a creative piece. And Mike Paul premium. Yeah, well I have a question about that as well but before just Paul one clarification. Like, everybody knows that solar is the lowest cost electricity generating source being built today are like what wouldn't 100% renewable I don't keep track of this anymore I'm just asking to delve into it but aren't the renewable options cheaper than the standard options these days. Whatever they call it. Yeah. They're, they're, they're not so there, there is an additional premium for the, for the additional renewables the way at the way these products are structured. Again always with basic electricity which is just includes the, everything that's required, but nothing more than that might be a cost for that so we'll just say per round number that's 10 cents a kilowatt hour. Then to add additional renewable energy you're purchasing the wrecks associated with that additional renewable energy, and there's a cost always for those wrecks so. I get it that I was curious about how we were treating the wrecks but we're, we're buying them. Yep, correct. Okay. And the budget option is that the, the standard, the standard offer, I don't know the right term for it but is that the same as the states, you know, or as national grid or ever sources base offering. Yes, exactly right in terms of renewable energy content. It's the same. The price will differ and the term may differ, but the renewable energy content is exactly the same. And if we don't put the fourth one in in the original plan then we lose the opportunity to do it in the future is that also remember that correctly. Correct. And though we can, we can put it in the plant, we can put it in the plan, get approval for it. But if it we are not ready with it but it so that's what you need to, to, sorry, to preserve the ability to offer it, you need to put it in the plan. Right. It doesn't have to be available right out of the gate so as Chris, you can have it in the plan, but launch with just the three available at that time, as long as we've said, we're hoping to plan to offer this fourth one down the road. The town of Palom is good with this, these, the four plans outlined here. Darcy has our hand raised. Yeah. I just have a question about the 100% renewable option. Is it possible to provide that using just no England class one wrecks. Yes, and that's what we're exact yes we yes it is. And that's what we're assuming for the extra wrecks in both the 100% renewable, and also any extra wrecks in the standard, we're assuming they would be class one wrecks. And we won't have to specify that will to maximize your flexibility will say it could come from class one wrecks or it could come from others. But we're certainly possible to do with class ones. That's what most communities do. And that's what we're assuming is what you would actually do isn't isn't that what we would insist on. Yes, I mean I will think so in the design of your in the design of your, the products as you launch them so maybe you're saying, or I'm wondering, are you, are you asking, well why do we even want to say that we might do something else in the plan why don't we just say class ones. Absolutely could do that, and it's likely the case that you would never want to do anything different so there would be no harm to presenting it as just class ones. The only reason I'm suggesting maybe you might want to give yourself a little more flexibility there in the plan document is that who knows what additional options might come along down the road, you know some new kind of wreck gets formed. You might want to have the flexibility to start using that, rather than and not be limited to the class ones and not having to get your plan changed in order to offer something different so stepping back a bit. So in the implementation plan, the way we think of that is it's an authorization document it it it it articulates what you're allowed to do. Then when it comes to implementation, you can choose to do anything any subset of things that are within the plan. You can do everything that's in there so we would, there is some benefit to giving yourself a little flexibility on this record question in the plan. But there's certainly nothing wrong with just committing to class ones now if that's the decision you want to make and are sure you're not going to want to change it later. Do the staff have any opinions about that. I would, I would strongly like to stay flexible. I hate to find ourselves someplace where we're kicking ourselves and not having the ability to to adjust at some point in the future. If I have a question so with the standard green and 100% renewable. When you're talking about Rex, are you basically talking about renewable energy Rex. Not so much alternative energy, or yeah so those extra ones so there are other Rex out there already, and we don't know when there's new ones going to be coming out. There might, there might be something to fit in here. So it makes a lot sense to me to go open ended. I would agree. Yeah, Paloma grease. And then, and then just to address it a little bit more the way it works in practice just to be sure we've explained that is, we put in the plan now. Say we go with this more flexible approach that you might use probably you know class one Rex or some other kind of Rex that the communities choose that's in your plan. When it's approved, will go out to the market will get bids for supply and will make it bids for Rex. And it said that moment that you'll decide what exactly is going to be in the program when the in the products when it launches so the the you still get to decide and the decision about what to include comes now in the plan but right before the launch of the program and then you get to decide exactly what Rex you want. Does that seem to make sense. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it would be it would be nice. Since this is the founding, one of the founding documents if it's somehow a preference could be stated in there for, for local meaning New England or something I don't know but yeah, we can certainly do that so we can say in the document. We'll find some language to indicate that it's your, you know you're strong your expectation it's going to be class one Rex you have the prioritize Rex from New England, but also, you know, build in some flexibility just in case some other question develops that you find decide is even more attractive later, but aren't. It's not before us now so we can't say that exact thing. That sounds good. Excellent so the next question, and is the names for these different products. And forgive me so did you guys decide on this to and did I lose track of that as well or did you not decide on this question. And don't think we decided on this question. Yeah, I can't remember. I think we discussed it, but we didn't decide. Yeah. But maybe the thing so let's me ask how you want to proceed you want to bat it around a bit now and see if you can narrow it down and we maybe even see if there's a sense of the group of what your likely first choices, and then I can we can put that in the plan document with the ability once you've seen it to say, yeah, we change your mind we want something different. It's a decision has to be made like over the next month but it doesn't have to be made on this call. I have a gut instinct response just with the what's provided here as options. Yeah, I do too so I think we could discuss it. Is there anyone who thinks we shouldn't. I think we should discuss it. I'm terrible at it so you guys are probably going to come here. Yeah, I'm not very good at picking names like this either. But, but all the ones we have suggested here. Right for names. Yeah, yes, yes, exactly. So should we go column by column. Yeah, why don't we just start with the first. Chris, do you want to go with with your gut instinct for the first one. How about you Stephanie use your talk right now. I'll give you my know okay I mean I have, I have the three that I'm thinking but so I could just I could just say all three that I'm thinking so for the default automatic enrollment, I was thinking actually VGE green for 100% renewable VGE plus, and for the least expensive option VGE basic, and then I would say for the local option VGE local. Those are the ones that I have in my head. I like the how short they're all are. I would have gone VGE standard green but I can see just VGE green. Yeah, actually I would have gone standard green 100% green and VGE basic. Okay we're agreeing on the basics so far. Tom, you want to weigh in. I don't want to cause a riff, but I like it. Say that again Tom. I like your names. Stephanie's. Yeah, Stephanie's. And it makes a nice bingo card too. I prefer Chris's suggestions because they're more descriptive. I would say that if I were somebody, you know, looking at the array and trying to figure out what they really mean. The standard would help describe the VGE green doesn't say that that's the standard. Yeah. And it plus. I'm not have we have we decided that we're having a 100% option I think we did right. Yeah, that that is more descriptive and people who are you know our first adopter types, they're going to go straight for the 100% right. Or maybe they'll go for local who knows. We may not have local to start out with. Okay, and Andrew, you want to weigh in. Well, I was actually thinking that plain old standard would be good because people think that it costs more for green already right so I don't know if I'm going to compromise this standard green. I wish we could call the least expensive option. Dirty. I don't know that one to fly. I'm curious, Paul, if you know, you know, I mean, got any ideas of whether the names matter at all. I think they do. And I mean I do think a good way to, to make the decision is to put yourselves in the shoes of a citizen who may not be as familiar with these terms, who's presented with these choices, and what names you feel might do the best to help them understand what the differences are. I would also offer to the question of the name for the least expensive native calls there's native basic slash brown, which is a bit awkward that they have the same inclination they wanted to offer it but they wanted to make, you know, not, they wanted to tarnish it a little bit so it's this rather awkward basic slash brown but that's what they use. I would concur with Paul that I do think the names matter. There will be members of your communities who are not interested in the environmental aspects of this program. But you would like them I would imagine to be enrolled and to enroll in the default, rather than immediately going for the basic. And in, in that way some of them can be very sensitive to the green naming in the, in the default, if it's just has green. That pushes some people right to the basic because they feel there's an agenda that they don't want to participate in. I'm not saying we should obscure the sustainability focus of the program, just relaying how people react to names they do and a lot of people take great comfort in knowing what most people do that's the other piece I wanted to add and standard feels. It feels like the reliable common option, very frequent question I get on the phone is well what are most people in the standard what most people in it sounds like that's what most people would do if that's what most people will do I'll do that. And so I do think for this for the default, you want to create a name that creates that that feeling of community comfort. And, and, and that that that's that's a really safe place to be. And Marlene if I could ask with that issue in mind, are you suggesting that the name that that would lead towards just standard in the name or would standard greens still accomplish the goal of indicating to people what most other people are doing. I think is I like personally which I don't have a dog in this fight, but having the word standard in the name as long as it's a part of the name I do think can help accomplish both of the things that I'm mentioning, which is making it clear yeah this is probably the one most people are thinking your most people are enrolling in, and that is the power of the program is is your default like we know that. So that sense of okay this is a safe place to go, I don't have to question they don't have to think about the other options, and then also it. I mean you have the green in there some people will be like, but standard at least makes them feel that it's, it's, I don't know not a scary thing not a threatening thing maybe not something they have to think about. I'm wondering if we, if we went with standard green. Then I like the idea of not going of going with the least expensive awesome option as basic brown, not basic slash brown but just basic brown. So it sort of works with standard green basic brown, like I feel like there's more of a consistency there in the naming. So I would, I would switch my to the VGE standard green or standard I mean I think I would be comfortable with either one. So what do people think about that first default automatic enrollment naming of the first two. Is there no, no green and the standard after now I'm sorry I'm not up on this stuff and I know you just showed something on it all but it truly all brown I my question. You mean the least expensive option. That's the least expensive. I mean, Paul, do you know what the rps standard is right now. Yes, it's 20 20% class one so yes you're the stand the least expensive. It's them as the minimum amount of green, but it doesn't have zero green. It's basically brown. That's where I'm going. Basically brown. I just have one thought, I have one thought that if, have you seen in, you know, where it's offered on a website that you list the names and then in parentheses after it, you could say 20% you know, 40% 100% and I don't know what we'd put after local. So that people would really be able to see how much, what it actually means how much renewables in each offering. Yes, absolutely. Sorry, Marlena go ahead. Yeah, so the website actually, and the letters that go out have to have the full renewable content, both the additional and the different components of the rps. So, all of that would be visible. So you would have the additional voluntary renewable amounts. And then you would have the full rps amount which is, it's the 20% for class ones this year but it's 51% total. So, all of that goes in the letter and on the website. What is 51%. To be clear, the, the rps is comprised of different types of renewables, not just class ones. Oh, I see the class one component is 20%. But there's another 31% that were required to represent on the website and in letters. The public is able to see both the renewable, the voluntary renewable component that valley green energy includes in any program offerings that have voluntary renewable energy added, and also they will see what the rps amount is for each. And that's a dpu requirement. So the rps basically say, 51%. That is how it's presented to the public. Yes, that's the dpu requirement now it didn't used to be but they're now requiring aggregations to follow the same rules as electricity suppliers. So the, the way we do it, it's a table and the public would see, you know, a row so you would have like this this table here with an imagine the names across the tops and then going down in rows you would have one row that's the voluntary amount you've added whatever that is percentage for you for a second Marlene should I just bring one up and then you can look. Oh yeah yeah yeah. Sharing what's a good community to use the best community as an example. Let me think. Maybe acting. Let me take a quick look at theirs. Just so you can see so you know what the public's going to see. Yeah, so acting. This is one way to do it and this can be done. These tables can be done in different ways so what with acting. But once he has it up. Yeah, sorry, let me go back I'm going to share this so this is first I'm going to show the homepage. Okay, so this is. Then we have the homepage here this house explained there. So let's clarify. This is sorry Paul this is the homepage and so here we have an abbreviated description for each which is I think kind of where you were going initially. So for each of them it says how much premium renewables from the Northeast now these numbers are inclusive of the RPS amount that's how acting wanted to do it. So this is kind of just like the teaser, but then once you go to the options and pricing page. So here, each option has its own table, and we can we can look at probably look at Worcesters in a moment just to show a different way of doing it but these each option has its own table so here we have standard. And you can see they're on the cusp of a price change. But as you look down the table, you'll see the renewable energy content, part of it, where you have one row that says from renewable energy sources in the Northeast added by acting. And then you have renewable energy sources required by state law, and then you have additional renewable energy required by state law. So this is, this is how we now need to do it in order to meet the dpus requirements but you can see also that it's very very clear the voluntary amount that's added by the community's program, which is a nice thing. I don't understand the wording of additional renewable energy required by state law. Yep, that's the RPS components. But why is that 31%. So the state law and I'm sorry I didn't need to distract everybody with this, the state law, the RPS the renewable portfolio standard requires that all electricity suppliers have to include a minimum amount of electricity from renewable sources of different kinds. So the 20% is the mass class one component. The 30% is other types of renewables that are also required by state law. And they're very confusing. If you actually dive into it, they're not just wrecks. There's, there's assumptions there's it's a bunch of stuff. Really hard to parse out. Yes, and is it is it required to provide that line in the table. It's very confusing. Yes, we have to provide the full RPS information. And so when I draft your letter, the, the letter that's going to go out to the public that we have to, that's part of what we're drafting right now you're going to see this in that letter. I'm sorry, is that the RPS, or is that, is that some other requirement and that part of the RPS. Well, I didn't know that that's very confusing. Yeah, I never heard of that either. Could you give an example of where that energy would come from the 31%. Yes, when I can give you some of the examples so one chunk of it and it comes from a bunch of different things which adds to the complexity but one chunk of it is clean energy from older projects. So the RPS, if for class one, it has to be both renewable wind solar that kind of thing, but also built after a certain date that's RPS class one. There's also RPS class to, which is projects that are older than that built before that date. So that's in this 31%. And then this 31%, believe it or not is trash to energy, which is where there's the three and a half percent trash to enter the department by state law. It is renewable. It's not very clean, but it's part of the state renewable energy requirements. Just a quick look up on mess just Google Massachusetts RPS categories.  That's kind of the cleanest I've ever seen it listed. So is it possible to add information that helps people with their confusion so that it would say additional blah blah blah required by state law, for example. Yeah, I mean you can put whatever you want on a website right website. Thank you. You can put links to other places. Sure. Yeah. Okay, thanks. I'm really conscious of the time. And I feel like we're, we're sort of getting derailed here. Sorry about that. No, no, no, no, that's fine. I just want to. So we have two options either we could go a little longer if, you know, maybe we could add on a half hour if you folks are available and willing. And if other people have the time or we end when we have to and we just schedule another meeting, like next week. Yeah, can I propose that we just let Paul Marlene draft the plan and then we see what it looks like because we'll have another bite at this apple I think what I'm hearing. Yeah, agreed. Yeah, that's fine.  So just we'll give you another bite at the apple but for the first bite at the apple. Should we go with what names are you thinking are just based on today's discussion what feels most comfortable with you as a starting point to that you can then react to when you see it. So let's start with the default automatic. Are we okay with valley green energy standard green if anyone doesn't agree with that one. That'll be the easiest way I can tell electronically. Okay, so I think we're good with valley green energy standard green. Okay, and then for the 100% renewable option VGE 100% green anyone opposed to that name. Okay, not seeing any opposition there and then for the least expensive option. I'm going to put out my VGE basic brown. Anyone, anyone opposed to that. It's not opposed but I have a question from Elena. So, the community that said basic slash brown. Can you tell that had any effect on who opted in and or, you know, did it kind of change the makeup of how people looked at it. I don't know that I would. I don't know that I would have any data. Okay, I don't I don't know that I could say that I can tell you the people who are looking for the cheapest are not dissuaded by names. And Adele has our hand up so Adele do you want to speak to that. Yeah, I would much prefer VGE budget, then basic, basic brown because it's not really brown, you know what I mean. Well, it's primarily isn't it. Well, yeah, depends how you define it. Anyway, I would not. I would. I would not stand in the way I would not block this decision but I am expressing my opinion. Okay, we could stick with basic. What about VGE left screen. Or minimal green. I would say, I would say no to that. Personally, I just, I just think, you know, standard green means it's acceptable to get someone an option to kind of go minimum green, then that becomes a standard green. Darcy has her hand up. Go ahead Darcy. Yeah, I would just agree with Adele, because I think, you know, if you if we're looking at it from like a climate justice type perspective or just a low income perspective. You know, there are a lot of people that just need to have the lowest priced option.  So, so I'm not sure this is the total, you know, like it's that descriptive of how different it is from the others I'm actually kind of a little. It's all new to me the 31% thing today. Okay. I'm going to lower your hand Darcy. What, how about this. Who, who Adele throughout VGE budget. So, remember this is just a placeholder for now. Right. Yep.  Raise your hand if you do not want to go that route. So I think we're going with VGE budget. And then for the local option for now VGE local. Yeah. Okay. I think we're good. Excellent. Thank you for that. So the next point is the adder we I know that we did discuss it so it likely we don't need to spend more than a minute or two on this. I'll just repeat back my understanding which is that you would like to collect the operational adder you'd like to use it as you must for program related expenses and you'd like to include the ability to use it for administrative expenses for the joint powers entity and so far as those relate to this program. Correct. We'll draft it up. Excellent. So thank you for that. So the next of the documents which we just was worth mentioning for a minute here to discuss how best to proceed so when the program goes forward and you get bids for supply the towns or the JPE actually will sign a contract with an electricity supplier for them to supply the electricity for the program. It's a no cost contract for the JPE. It really just mostly sets out what are the obligations of the supplier, and you know that they're going to provide electricity they're going to provide actually this many racks, their customer service requirements all kinds of stuff like that. It's a big complicated. So it's no cost for the communities but it's a big complicated electricity contract. Unfortunately, you have to include that contract in these documents that get reviewed by the public and get submitted by the to the DPU. I say unfortunately not because there's any issue any raises any issues with it but just that we have to have this document in there. And because it's a document signed they'll be signed by the JPE. It's customary at this stage to have the JPE's legal counsel take a look at it and so it's going to let let them bless it. There are challenges to that though in that not that there's a frame for that though which is that this is a template contract and it's very much in your interest to use the template, because that's a contract the suppliers are familiar with and they'll all bid to it. Insofar as you want to stray from the template, some suppliers won't bid. For example, we just did a procurement for the city of Worcester you know the second biggest city in Massachusetts, they have their own Worcester version of the contract. It's not substantively different but it just has says things the way Worcester likes to say things, but one of the suppliers would embed because it seemed too risky for them it was different from what they were used to they didn't understand all the little tweaks that Worcester wanted to make. So, generally what we want here is to have legal counsel take a look at it but have legal counsel say yeah this looks fine. What we want is for legal counsel to do what all lawyers do by instinct which is, you give them a document, they take a pen in their hand, and they think of 100 ways, the document could be a little bit better here or there. And without question, every contract could be improved one way or the other, but edits, other than there's this huge showstopper issue here are really not in the communities interest here so the question is to present it to legal counsel with that kind of a framing. I will send you an email with the draft contract where I explained this but I wanted to emphasize the messaging on it. So there's what the legal counsel is going to look at and then there's maybe more of a normal folks understanding of some of the things that's in there. For instance, kind of when the city goes out to bed in the past, although maybe we kind of flexed on this this last year, we've always said that the bill has to be on the national grid bill. We don't want people getting two bills. We don't want to end bill and the supply bill. So we just simply would say no we're not going to accept your bid, if you won't do that. On that kind of level, is there a way to identify what this basic contract spells out. I mean what is it, you know, it will require it will result in ABC and D. Do you understand that. Yes, absolutely Chris that's a great question I can, I can as part of sending it kind of summarize the most relevant terms, not make it a big long thing but highlight these key points, and to your point on this one for example, the contract does say just what you said the billing is going to go through the utility there's not going to be a separate bill here. That's really the point of the contract actually is it establishes the program rules that the supplier is bound to so it's all the things in your plan, you know this many wrecks billing through the utility, you know, 10 other things. So, I will do that I will add a summary with when I send the contract or give a little summary of those key key terms. So are we going to have to decide on for this model, what percentage of renewable. We want in the standard. You do not so you get to make that you don't have to make that decision until right before you start when you see price bids, and you actually see how much the additional renewable energy will cost so because it will, we could tell you what it costs to be different by the time you go out to bed so all those decisions get made later. This document's really just a template and those kind of items get filled in when you're ready to sign it but not at this stage. There's a document that really, you know, only a lawyer is going to want to read through and they're going to want to, you know, read through it with this pen in their hand and, you know, change which to that add commas and stuff like that. Do we have a choice here about whether it's counsel for JPE or the communities for your question there. Right well that was my question for you I think is there a count is meant I could just send it to you and you can decide but if it's the, if it's the JPE that's signing it, I would think it would be the JPE's counsel. Maybe there is one maybe there isn't one that hasn't been decided yet because the JPE doesn't exist isn't won't say that doesn't isn't officially formed yet. And does it have to be specified in this model supply contract. No, it was just my question for you about who's going to get it. In other words, if we go to the town council that we have both, you know, two, two, two ones for the communities looking over right now. We formed JPE. And we decide that we're going to take a third return to be for the JPE and they're going to want to review it. Now both the town councils look at it right now. It's more likely it's going to be one of them that's going to be the council. Perfect. I mean, yeah, I mean, I'm thinking KP law already represents both Pelham and Amherst. I'm pretty sure that we have it in the JPA agreement already that it's possible for the council to be one of the towns. But, and again, we have a law firm that already represents two out of the three. So, okay, and they've reviewed this contract before for other communities so. I don't see well ever reviewed it. You know, sorry, Alex you old. And not as far as I know, but potentially I don't know. Okay. Well, it's nice to take the laws are reviewed. So they're probably not going to pick up that pen at red pen. Well they are they're one of the most person. But we'll deal with it. I mean, at least they're, you know what they they're familiar with these issues so they'll have, we'll manage with them. They will. They'll have comments so they always do. Okay. And then, okay, so we just had a couple of quick things, additional items here, Marlena, do you want to speak to the logo and the website. So, the last time we spoke, you guys expressed an interest in the logo but there was some question about what was going to come first the Valley Green Alliance logo or the Valley Green Energy logo. You know whether there would be an overarching Valley Green Alliance logo and the Valley Green Energy logo would need to be a cousin of that, and we can help you, probably with one of those. I'd be happy to get started on it it would be ideal if we have the logo in place because early because we have to draft these letters and send those to the regulatory review process we also have to draft the exterior envelope that goes with the letters in the mailing and that will need a return address and a logo. If we don't have one in time, I guess we'll just put a box that says logo goes here or something like that and send that through the DPU but it would be really ideal if we had something in place. So I wanted to check in on that because I recall from our last conversation there was some uncertainty about which of those logos you wanted us to help with. We typically create the program logo. And so that that would be kind of my inclination to help you with the program logo versus the overall Valley Green Alliance logo but if you already have done some work in the direction of Valley Green Alliance and you need the program logo to look a certain way or you know play well on a page, or you know somehow be derivative, that would be helpful to know. If you want us to create the Valley Green Alliance logo we could do that. And then I suppose we could use that for the program. I just I need to check in on that because logos take a while to you know you have to get concepts together and then if it has feelings about it so I want to make sure we get that started for you guys. I think we should jump in and say I think we should be going with the program just because I think it's the thing that we need to start moving forward but I'm sorry Andrew go ahead. Oh yeah so I have to go and I think we should go with the Alliance and then the program can just be a word underneath so that that's consistent logo. But that's my say. Bye thank you. All right so how do others. I think so Andrew and I seem to have different approaches here so I'll start with the two community representatives Chris, what do you think. I think should go for the Valley Green Energy logo. Which is the program. Yeah the program, right. And I think we actually do want two different logos, but boy, this is off the cuff, and I'm not an expert at this so it's good instinct. Okay and so, and I think I am agreeing with you on that count as well so Tom. The only thing that I'm worse at than names is logos. I'm in favor of whatever is most expeditious and gives us flexibility. You guys. Have a clearer path. Okay. Adele. I vote for Chris's option. Okay. And Darcy. Yeah, I would, I guess I would agree with Andrew. But my main point is that I would love to have the Connecticut River somehow featured in the logo because it makes sense, because we're the valley.  Well, there's nothing to say that we can't have the program logo and sort of use that elements of that. The alliance logo, and it just seems to me like we have to have the program. We have to have it forward. So, for that reason, I feel like there's more of a, in terms of a timeline, it's more important that we get the program logo going so Darcy, given that if we could use elements of the program logo to develop the alliance logo, because then we'll have it and that will actually give somebody else something to work with. I mean, because it won't be mass power choice developing the alliance logo. It would give somebody something to work with to start with, and to tie them in. So would that be, would you be okay with that? Yeah, it just has to be integrated so that people aren't completely confused by these two names, you know. Yeah, well it's Valley Green Energy and Valley Green Alliance. So, yeah, we can make sure that we, you know, I think it'll be, we'll be able to clarify that. So, so Darcy, are you okay then with moving forward with the program logo? Yeah, as long as we get it in, you know, we have a plan to integrate them somehow. Okay, well we can work on that because it won't be mass power choice working on that so that'll be on us. At the moment we know what Valley Green Energy, the program is aiming for, Valley Green Alliance is, besides being the host of Valley Green Energy, it's still a little bit unclear. So starting with Valley Green Energy makes more sense to me, definitely. Okay. And I love the idea of the river. Yeah, I do too. The idea that kind of comes to my mind right away was somehow this kind of Valley piece had to be in there and a river in there. Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. I agree. Yep. Although again I'm not going to be doing logos. I was once heard that the logo should really be completely empty of meaning so you can then fill it with your branding. There's nothing to anybody until you fill it. So, so this is this is very helpful. And the Connecticut River input is actually super helpful to provide some design guidelines. Are there any, is there any discomfort or interest in renewable imagery in this, if we did some versions that had like a wind turbine or something is that bad is that good. Some people have strong feelings they do want that some people have strong feelings they don't want that. Tommy you want to start. Tommy you're muted. Sorry about that. I, again, it feels like it's complicates a little bit. And so I don't have a strong feeling about it other than keeping the process moving. That's great. No opinion is also a fine answer. I'm just checking to see if there's a strong opinion. I think, yeah, I was going to say if anyone has a strong opinion, could you digitally electronically raise your hand so because we can't see everybody so Chris go ahead. Okay, so I've been involved with trying to get solar or wind and stuff inserted into different things and I agree with Tom is kind of cumbersome. We're all more power for you if you can do it. But on the other hand, might we want this logo to be more warm and cozy you want this to draw people in. We want this to be neighborhood warm cozy energy security. You know all the good things that you want to be drawn to. I think it's probably more with where I would go with it. Feedback is perfect because that's perfect. The type of words and feedback designers want to hear the neighborhood warm cozy security. I'll pass those words along. Yep. I think, yeah, and to me it seems like there should be some kind of a green element to it.  So, I do feel like there should be maybe not renewable symbols but somehow it should hark into that. Okay, yeah, I mean it could just be even the use of green color. Right, exactly. Okay, yeah. All right, that's great. Thank you. So that that helps with the logo I think that gives me something to start with. Moving on from there, just with an eye on the time I know you guys are sensitive to that. If there are no other logo thoughts the website I wanted to touch on that. I know you folks bought your domain which is terrific. We typically host websites for communities. One of the reasons why communities like us to do that is because we have customer self service through the website so people can enroll opt in change their their program options to make customer support queries all through the website and we manage that when it's on our platform. So there's the regulatory compliance piece there's a lot of stuff that just has to be updated on a regular basis the DPS always coming up with new ideas around what they want language to be or to not be. There's clarifications that have to be made as market conditions change and it's much easier for us to stay on top of that typically then for a municipality, or for us to be constantly like chasing someone down. If that isn't something that you're going to do that you want us to do then we should maybe talk about how to work together around the web content. There's not a requirement that the website has to be launched in time for the submission of everything to the DPU. Frequently however though when when we are hosting it we do go ahead and launch it so that you can start to publicize the website address and we create you know some basic background information about aggregation and the regulatory process so if we're going to do that work it would be good for us to know it. So that's I just wanted to touch on that. If we host it the way it would work is you could own the, you own the domain, and then you redirect it to our platform so you could use that domain publicly valigreenenergy.com or however whatever you wanted to use. But when when people type it in, they would land on our website that we're hosting and the website address would then resolve to the actual underlying website address so it wouldn't persist as valigreenenergy.com in their address bar it would say masspowerchoice.com slash something. This is how all of our programs do it we have these vanity web addresses for our programs in general, and people just use them and all the marketing materials. And then they land on masspowerchoice.com slash whatever. So that's that's functionally how it would work. But I wanted to check in on that just so we know whether we're doing this work or we need to work with you in a different way. I would personally I think it would be easiest you have the experience and I think it just makes more sense to have you do it I think if the municipalities have to sort of work with this somehow on their own, or we have to create like it just is another complicated level and layer of coordination which I don't think we want to get into so I would say. My vote would be to have you do it. Chris. You're here. Well said. Tom. You're here. Okay. Great. Good to know. Okay. I just want to make sure our community partners are okay with that. Yeah. All right. Good. Excellent. Excellent. Thank you for that. So the last item on this screen is really just a heads up housekeeping. We can get utility data from the utilities that give us a total number of basic service customers and load in the communities. We need that as part of the DPU filing utilities won't give it. If I ask you the town. The city or town has to send the request. I'll prepare the request for you and email them to use Stephanie and then just ask that you on behalf of Amherst, Christopher Norse and Tom or whoever right. Appropriate from Pellum, just emails them to the utilities and then that that data will come for us. So that could come from anybody in the city. Yeah, anybody and anybody who on city letterhead is fine. They don't, they don't fuss about it. Okay. That's just the, just have to email it just so I'll send you that instruction and it's, it's a simple thing. So, okay, great. I think that around in a hurry. Thank you. I think that's it for our list of things. Sorry for taking a little bit longer than than we had expected. No, that's fine. And I think we, we helped steer that a little bit of the rail. So, no, I think we did okay. And does anyone have any questions while we have folks here. Before we disband. Go ahead, Tom. I said good stuff. Thank you very much. All right, thanks Tom. So, so our next, I guess our next step is my question in terms of meeting with you again. Because obviously there are things you're going to be working on, but there's some information you're going to be looking for from us, just that last little bit of feedback I think in the outreach and education plan. You wanted us to do and then Paul, you're going to forward me that information for the utility data to forward to the communities. And I guess our next, would our next meeting then be to review the draft. Yeah, so we're going to send you in addition to what you mentioned there Stephanie, we're also going to send you the draft aggregation plan and then the draft supply contract the supply contract will go on its own pathway I think the aggregation plan I think yes that the next step would be to get any comments on that, and then make the final decisions around the names and everything or the names I think is actually the only outstanding thing. You'll find in the aggregation plan which I'll send to you for comment, and there's not so much really that you can have input around most of it as you know prescribed language by the DPU and if you read some sentences in there that you don't find are particularly do a good job of actually conveying information. Those aren't our sentences. The DPU says you will say this, and so we say it. So, and I think that's the thing and then. So yes, so if we were to get together. We'll get you those documents next week early next week and then whatever is a reasonable timeframe for you and then they'll just the last thing is the, is the letters which take a bit will take a bit longer to put together. And then we'll get getting these everything else set enables us to do the letters from there. And then I'll get the, I'll get the, I'll get my designer working on logo concepts, she's typically she has a full plate. So it might take her a couple weeks to get some concepts to us but I'll pass them along as soon as I have them so you guys can start reacting to them. That would be great and we can have in the meantime we can have our own meetings to follow up on some of these things separately. So, okay. Great. Thank you so so much. It's a pleasure. Go ahead Darcy. Just wondering what our plan is for our next meetings. Well, let's let Paul and Marlena if you all, if you three want to just hang on just one moment, we can talk. And then Paul can go so they don't have to stick around for that because are you talking about them with them or just our own separate group. Both, you know, like when we would have the meeting about the draft aggregation plan. And so I think we don't we want to wait until we get some of that because we're going to have to give them information back to. So I think, let's us meet separately first. And then we can reach out and try to figure out a time, a follow up time. Okay, so I won't put a date in the notes. No, I wouldn't put a date in the notes. It won't at least not for a meeting with Paul and Marlena quite yet. Okay, I can I can send up a poll out, you know, in another few weeks. Is that okay with you and you too, Paul Marlena. Yeah, it's, it's absolutely fine. I think just for your own planning. I mean, I think reviewing the plan, which is the next big thing we'll send won't take too long. It's not a very lengthy document. It's, I don't know, 1015 pages, double spaced and there aren't so many things you get to change in there so that that shouldn't it's important step and it shouldn't take all that long. Okay. It's quite different from the education outreach plan which had a lot of spaces for you guys to insert stuff it's the aggregation plans not like that. Okay. And so we'll want to review it and then I'm sorry at that point we'll want our legal councils to review that as well or do we want to give feedback before we get to that point. Let's get it final before it goes to them and I will say they may want to review it typically they don't though they review the contract. They typically don't review the aggregation plan. They're welcome to but they don't know that's that's if that's standard procedure then let's go with that. I could take forever. So okay great good alright well then we'll just you know once we get the documents I think we can follow up with a time frame that works with us because we'll probably want to all come together and talk about it a little bit so we can get back to you on when we think it's a good time to follow up and get back with you. That sounds great. Okay, great so thank you both and Darcy Adele and Chris if you could just hang on one moment that would be great. Great. Thank you. Thank you. See you all take care. Thanks so much you too. Bye. I just want us to sort of figure out a next step and also just to clarify where we are with who's doing what. So right now I'm sort of, I'm at the helm of this CCA process. So I will schedule that next meeting with Paul Gromer and group. I feel like this. Like there's questions about the JPE JPA as well as the CCA that we need to sort of maybe come together about so besides having Alan look at this and hopefully I mean Rick actually should go to both Rick and Alan again because they need to agree upon it. Right. What else is there Stephanie. I mean that's like the next for the JPA JPE. I think that's it I mean there were some things that came up about you know the the logo piece. I mean, there's that I don't know at what point we want to start talking about that. I think we need to talk about the next steps because my fear is we get that signed and then what like we really need to be thinking about as soon as that contract is executed. It exists. So, all our meetings and like we have to bring the board together like how what is the process by which we're going to do all those next step things. I'm going to wait till the last minute I kind of feel like I know we have it spelled out but our respective executives need to appoint people right so there's like behind the scenes sort of things that have to happen and I want to make sure that those things happen. Before we get to the point where we're signing a contract. Yeah. So that it's like in place and ready to go. We're talking about for the JPE. Yes, yes, because we're you sort of had these two tracks of things that are happening. And Chris is now sort of spearheading that piece. So just my own thought of having been sort of keeping this running this along for a while. There's a lot to do for that piece so I want to just make sure we're prepared. It's good. Yeah, so two months to getting to the DPU actually surprised me. That's faster than I expected. So, yeah, that's nice. Yeah. It sounds to me like we need to just two different meetings. We need a JPA meeting which does not have to be open meeting law. And then we need another meeting of the CCA group, which does follow open meeting law. And on that agenda, I would put the topic in addition to some of these other questions. The name, because at one point it was suggested that we go with valley green electricity rather than valley green energy to make it very clear. And so we just need to discuss whether we want to make that change before all these documents get finalized. So that would be one thing that I would put on that agenda but then there are these other issues that were left hanging from today's meeting as well. Yep. Right. And we need we're going to need time to digest some of what gets sent so we have to wait until they send the documents. And they said that would be next week. So I would say if we scheduled a meeting for two weeks, which be the 28th. That'd be good. We good. Okay. So let's just say the next CCA meeting, which would be just us and just to be clear. On zoom now I have two different links, one with Paul Gomer, because I have to list the attendees or presenters. So I've got two different links one is our group without Paul Gomer and Marlena and the other and their staff and the other one is just us. So just be clear. I'm sending the next one is not going to be the same link as today's meeting. As long as it's in the calendar announcements. Yeah, it will be. We're going to be back to like scheduling the meeting for two hours instead of one, just because we, we just want to get this thing done and we have, we have so many issues that we always have to leave at the end of the meeting. Yeah, I think this next one should be two hours. I don't want to make them two hours all the time because they're not always, it's not always necessary. But let's just say this one will be to this next one will be two hours because I think we've, it's been a while and we've got a lot to cover. My recollection from earlier meetings that one of the issues that the mass power choice told us that we needed to include in the CCA which they didn't mention today which I was surprised was that we needed to if we were going to put forward any projects, any specific projects that the CCA was going to do that it needed to be in the application. And so we haven't had any discussion about that. And I'm wondering if we want to have, you know, at least a couple projects that we want to list as something that we would be doing so that we don't have to then go back to them some other time and say, and some of this, you know, local energy advocates. One of the things that we do at all of our meetings is talk about possible projects. And so we could bring that to the group and just say well these are some of the things we've been thinking about and maybe that would be something that this group would also want to take on. I understand. Go ahead Adele justification for the adder the operational adder was that there were projects to be funded by it as well as administrative support. So that that would be where we would have to specify the projects. Yeah, and I wondered I thought that was maybe in relation to an additional adder. That was how I was like I thought if we were requesting additional adder for projects that we were going to have to be specific about what those were. That was my understanding, but we can ask I mean, it's certainly not going to hurt to have a discussion about those potential projects if we decide which would be the ones that we would want to put forth immediately and then talk to Paul about how would that fit in or would it need to, or would that be an additional adder that would cover those specific things. We would just have to have very detailed information I understood was my understanding, if we're going to go with an additional adder. Do you think that we could just send them an email, you know, like, soon to ask them if that is something that we need to be working on. Well, I mean I'm assuming we need to work on it anyway but but if it requires additional adder for this projects and if so, like, maybe examples of projects that other towns have put forward. Other examples. That's kind of the cutting edge piece that we've got here is the idea of trying to do that. Right. Yeah, maybe Cambridge but but Paul would know. Yeah, so let's just I'll just send an inquiry about that. I feel like that's been the sticking point all along. Thank you. I do remember that he asked that was on that initial first presentation that he gave us, you know that if we, if we were going to do projects we'd need to identify them. Okay. Okay, but that's okay. But I again I don't know if that was in relation to an additional adder that that response was in the, you know, the inquiry about having an additional adder for projects, where he said you have to have that project information. So I'll follow up with the question. Also, how much detail about the project needs to be provided. That would be helpful to know. I mean the problem with having to give details on any project is that you're stuck with that project and only that project. You kind of basically applied that this is what we're going to do, but we're not doing more. We can make it, you know, the local piece to provide some examples without going into details, but I'm not sure the DP will go for that but yes I think we need clarity from Paul on just how do we empower ourselves to do stuff under that local piece. How do we get the broadest ability the broadest capabilities without limiting ourselves agreed. Yep. Okay. All right, so we are right. So on the 28th. On the 28th time. So what time works for folks. I know for Tom it's usually easiest for him to do earlier. So could we say like nine to 11. Yeah. On the 28th. I have something at 11 so therefore in mind to 11 works for me. Yeah, that's fine for me. Okay. All right, great. Then that is what we will do. Thank you so much. Yeah. Appreciate it and Adele I don't, did you, I don't know if you heard that I've been made director of sustainability. Yes, I did you send me something I can't remember. I would send you something and I would, because we're collecting job descriptions. I would love to know you, you did send me a job description, but I wasn't sure if, if your job description is going to be changing now that you're a director. I think the one I sent you is probably the updated one but let me double check. I'll send you what I have. Thank you. Sure. Okay, thanks just for your efforts I thought you know, we're making progress here in the valley slowly but surely wonderful. So, all right, well thank you so much greatly appreciate it and I will see you all very soon. All right, thanks again. Bye.


My goodness, after that introduction, I might as well, I'm going to go and say bye. Leave everyone on a good note. I see a couple of you are still eating. I love it. I love it. Keep eating. It's all right. I'll ask you a question when you've got something in your mouth. So, as Priscilla was saying today, I'm going to talk to you about open banking. Originally my talk was intended to talk specifically on the challenges that we face as designers in open banking. Who here knows what open banking is? Awesome, because that is why I wasn't going to talk about the challenges of open banking, and instead I was going to tell you about what open banking actually is. But before we start, when it comes to banking, sometimes I really do feel like we still live in a world that looks a little bit like this. And don't get me wrong. I signed up on my first bank account about 17, 18 years ago now with HSBC. God bless them.  I don't know if any of you are old enough to remember. You've got this tiny little passbook. And when my piggy bank was full, I would go to the bank and I would drop all my coins on the counter and they would count them up and they would write a credit. And then when I had saved enough money back then, a very long time, I would go back into the bank. I'd ask for my money.  She's like, darling, what do you want to buy with this money? I'm like, I want to buy a Nintendo game. Now give me the money. And she used to just, you know, write a little debit. And that was pretty much what banking was about. It was just a sum of your credits and your debits. Now the interesting thing is that it feels as if time hasn't really changed. You know, in the intervening 20 years, we've had telephone banking, internet banking, mobile banking, but really it still is just a series of credits and debits. And now we've just got a passbook, but it's, you know, it's, it's this big, right? There's nothing really intelligent that we've seen in our banking services. But I do have some good news. I'm not all doom and gloom, I promise. There's currently going, most of you will know now, we're going through this huge financial technology innovation period where people truly are trying to revolutionize and disrupt the fintech industry or the financial industry. And thus comes the rise of what we call open banking. And open banking specifically is talking about something called open APIs. I won't go into the technicalities of it, but for those that aren't technically minded, essentially it's just a way for a third party to be able to communicate to your bank. And after all the permissioning and authorizations, be able to extract specific data back. So the particular third party will not hold your information themselves. They will just seek the information from the third party as needed. But let's have a look at what open banking is actually defined as. Fundamentally, open banking really just changes the, changes who has control over the financial data. So who here has banked over five, more than five years? More than five years, yep, more than 10 years, more than 15 years, now I'm starting to feel old. All right, fantastic. Now, for those that have banked for over 15 years, if you want to get a mortgage or if you want to get a car loan or if you should be so lucky to get married or want a large-scale vacation and need to apply for a loan, I can guarantee you the process of getting a loan will be harder than the holiday itself. And why is that? The data is mine. The information is about my spending. All of the things that I have done in my life is I spent, I paid the bank back, I provided you with information. Now, why can't you as a bank allow me to take that information and go to whoever I want to and ask them to provide me a better service than you do? Well, luckily for open banking, because we will soon be able to do just that. So, in our current model, our banks have held all the information themselves in this tiny little silos, right? So let's say I wanted to go to a third party, be it lending, be it anything really, they've typically had to go, well, could you print out three months' worth of statements and I need your SING pass and your passports and I need your employment contract. And before you know it, you've got a stack worth of papers and you're going, I thought we live in a digital age. Do we? I'm not too sure. Well, with open banking, it now kind of offers you that choice to securely share your financial information. With the businesses, of course, that you trust. So financial products and services really will be faster and more personalized. And I'll speak a little bit about what that means in a little while, but it does mean that you'll get loans that are more affordable, your savings and your budgeting apps are really built around you and your needs and mortgages will really be able to be completed just like that. Done. And how cool would that be? No more thousands of trees that we print. So let's look at how we can take advantage of some of these services. So first I'm going to talk a little bit about secure identity services. Now here in Singapore, we're very, very blessed. We have something called the SYNC Pass. Who here uses their SYNC Pass regularly? Yes? If you don't, it's amazing, do use it. SYNC, for those that don't know that are not Singaporean, SYNC Pass is a way for you a government identifier, essentially. So whenever you open up a bank account or so and you just provide your SYNC Pass details and it says that I am who I say I am. But in other countries, unfortunately, the UK, the US and New Zealand, Australia, we don't have those luxuries. So every single time you try and do something with a new third party, you have to provide your passport or a driver's license. But in open banking, what you are essentially saying is instead of... Actually, let's step back a bit. If you connect to other apps with... connect with Facebook, connect with LinkedIn, connect with Instagram, anyone? Good. Now imagine if you couldn't connect with your bank. Imagine if now you can download a new app that helps you to become more financially savvy and all you need to do is go through a similar process as connect with Facebook, but you connect with your bank instead. And this app suddenly knows you, has 20 years worth of data about your spending, can start using algorithms, machine learning, AI to truly decipher what that data means rather than just giving you a list of credits and debits. Which one would you prefer? And ironically, a lot of people kind of go, oh, but what about the security aspect of it? Because, you know, I'm giving my information to somebody else and information is power, right? Well, one of the key priorities in this whole open banking regulations is around financial security. So they are building APIs and forcing third-party service providers to also adhere to financial regulations. So we need... There's lots of technical things that I can go into, but essentially what I'm saying is you really don't need to worry about the security aspect of it because at any point, you know, another example that I use quite frequently is anyone here give third-party apps access to their Facebook. So you log into Facebook and then you start signing up for another app inside Facebook, yep. And you know how you've got a little modal dialogue that pops up and goes, do you want to give this person access to this data? Well, this is exactly the same way. This is just open APIs. It's exactly the same way that it would work with banking. So the third-party provider will say, please log in here.  That screen will be your online banking. You enter in your credentials, which are secure. The third-party cannot see. And then the bank goes, hey, we've had a request from Merchant XYZ. Do you want to give access to them? What data do you want that person to have? And for how long? And that's important for how long? Because in open banking, at any point, if I no longer trust you or if I feel like you're no longer providing a service that I need, I just retract my access rights from you. And you don't have any copies of any of the data. So that's cool, right? Right? No? Okay, well, let me give you some more examples. Who here has more than one bank? Who here banks with more than one bank? Brilliant. How's that working for you, logging into five, six, seven different online banking accounts? Pain in the arse, right? Absolutely. Well, guess what? Open banking will solve that for you. And you know why? Again, because you have one single app, the app will then ask you, the one-off, logging into all of your different bank accounts and then will aggregate all the data for you. Now, what is the one thing that you don't have if you bank with multiple banks? No idea? You can't budget, right? Who here has multiple accounts and then has a spreadsheet where they budget? Right? So, exactly, yeah. A few people are like, hmm, budget you. About that. But look, essentially what we're trying to say is we now have a very smart tool to be able to aggregate your data, the perspective of which banks you bank with and how many thousands you have, and then use the technology out there to start crunching numbers. The other thing that I've noticed recently that an app in the UK has recently come on and done this is technology like just computer smarts. There's nothing really that savvy, but it told me that I had paid twice for a monthly subscription. Now, I wouldn't have noticed because day in and day out, I don't really check my transactions, but it was smart enough to send me an alert and go, hey, are you sure you want to pay for this twice? And all I needed to do is just ring my bank and go, please, I don't want to authorize the second payment. I would have been out of $75 had I not noticed. But secondly, the interesting thing that has now allowed me to do is to be able to kind of say, I have this goal, be it a wedding, be it a house or whatever, help me get to that goal. So the app is now able to say holistically, irrespective of what bank account or what card I use, it can give me suggestions like, hey, did you notice that you've actually spent $200 on groceries today or on restaurants this month?  So you start to get a much richer view of the financial information that you hold. The second bit on financial forecasting and personalization is the personalization part. So again, who here uses comparison sites? Comparison sites, good. Do you find them useful?  Yes? Good. Is it personalized to you and your situation? You have to personalize yourself. Bingo. Okay. What if you connect with your bank and then it'll tell you all of the products that you're eligible for and those that you aren't. And it'll tell you, based on your current spending, how much it will cost you to do a repayment on a particular loan or on a particular credit rating. But more importantly, the personalization part is what if the next step of that is you can just apply from it, from right there. You don't have to go to your bank or to your mortgage lender or to your, you know, anything. You literally just press a button there and that's done. And that's the next bit that I'll talk to you about in a second. But the personalization aspect that I love the most is the ability for me to start comparing like for like. So when I look at credit cards, right, there is cashback. There is reward points. There's air point miles. What else am I forgetting? There's free holidays, room upgrades. Okay. And how do I compare HSBC card to a Barclays card to a City card to a OCBC and all the other banks? How do I compare them? Because I can't compare like for like. Because at the end of the day it's just marketing, right? They're just telling me what they think I want. But instead, with an open banking, they're forced to give you a synopsis of what the product holdings actually are. So you're comparing like for like. And you're able to say as a customer, these are the things that are important to me and you see the list of credit cards reducing or loan applications or whatever, reducing down to that one single product that you as an individual want. Again, the power is yours rather than having to do all that crazy homework. I now talked a little bit about application being instant and I want to talk about cheap, easy, instant money movement. Who here uses PayPal? Right. Is it useful? Okay. Imagine being able to do that everywhere and not having to use PayPal. Imagine being able to move your money as easy as sending a text message. Right. That is what we're going to be able to do. And we already see lots and lots of providers out there being that intermediary or not even intermediary that we've kind of slashed away the intermediary because you remember currently on PayPal you go from your bank to your credit card provider, your credit card provider through PayPal, PayPal to the merchant, right? So I've got three people in here before the merchant actually gets paid.  You are in your prices, right? So with open banking you go straight from your bank to your merchants. No intermediaries, no excess prices, cheaper prices for us. So let's have a look at a real life example. Let's say Beth and Jason are looking to either get a new house or maybe see whether or not they can expand their current house, right? So these are the typical steps that you would go through. Am I missing anything? I do a search on what houses there are, right? I do some online research about whether or not it's better to upgrade or it's better to expand my current footprint. I need to compare rates. Who here even understands rates, right? Floating rates, variable rates, whatever rate. Budgets, I love these spreadsheets. I saw a few people with budgets, yeah. Don't forget the calculators because they always work, they're always personalized. Then you have the advice from friends and families and that is probably one of the fundamental part that I think we don't do enough of. And then you've got to consult your contractors, right? And after all of that, if you've done that and if you haven't quite lost your will to live, which most of us have by this stage, you might have a decision about whether or not you want to expand or whether or not you just want to buy a bigger house. Or what typically happens, somebody just falls in love with a house in their research and just goes, oh, screw it, let's just do that. Whether or not it's a good financial decision. And then after all that, you then go to the bank and you try your hardest to get alone. Now, what if that would change? What if you have... And I'm not... This is genuinely... Right now, there are three apps that put together will do all of this. They would help you with the budgeting. They would help you with the property search based on the things that you can afford. They will help you find... Calculators and try and understand what it is that your repayments will be. They will do all of the research for you, all in one centralized place, personalized for your situation, so that you can then make a decision about whether or not you can live with $200 a week less or you can live with a mortgage of $500,000. Right? So it's very, very big choices that we need to make that we're currently not making with any amount of education. It's just a stab in the dark. And having that kind of ability to be able to centralize all of that, to have it all mean something to us, I think in terms of financial astuteness, it's really gonna get us places. So there really isn't really any dispute in saying that using smart technology will help us improve our lives and will help us improve making better, smarter financial decisions. But as a designer, this really kind of opens up a whole new world for me because I'm now excited about what all these APIs can do and allow me to do. The experiences that I can now design centered around me, centered around financial problems, rather than centered around the technical limitation that my bank has.  So, not surprisingly, I wanted to talk a little bit about open banking in Singapore because obviously this has been a very generalized approach of what open banking is. And the reason why I wanted to talk about open banking in Singapore is so the monetary authorization of Singapore or MAS is I'll refer to, they have not given out any compulsory regulations and what that means is basically they've said, here's some guidelines to banks, you can do it, we encourage you to do it, but it's not law, which is fine, right? And you will see that some banks have kind of taken up the challenge and have opened up what they call API platforms. So it's basically just a central data platform where you're able to kind of call the different APIs. Now, here's the difficulty that we have with not regulating APIs. We now get to, sorry, before I get to that, the International Data Corporation, which is international as it says, was very, very wonderful enough to give us a super high readiness rating saying that Singapore is creme de la creme, you know, like we are so ready for open banking. Now, if you look underneath all of this, the problem with that statistic is that all they were basing the data on is are there banks out there that have created open banking platforms. Great. HSBC have OCBC. Visa MasterCard have got their own one. CTF said DBS has got one. Basically every man in this dog has one, but guess what?  And the reason is there is no regulation behind it. So you will find that they won't provide a consistent APIs across all of them. So in terms of the language and the structure of our APIs are very different. The data that you get is very different. The comparison that I talked about before around product to product, you know where I compare like for like, that's not possible because there's no regulation that tells you infield X have this data. Infield Y have this data. So you still haven't been able to unlock that true potential of open banking. But wait, apparently there's all these different banks that are currently doing it. Which on the flip side means that at some point there will be some international disruptors that will turn around and create such an amazing experience for us individuals or even for us designers that suddenly the banks out there will realize if we don't change the world will move from underneath us. So I'm hoping that even though, you know, has anyone here heard about Monzo? No? Okay. The first digital bank in the UK, they basically started with just offering a card that had money on it. Name escapes me. But they eventually got their credit, their license to be a bank. And within six months went from a startup to having one million customers. One million customers in six months. And you know what? I've got plenty of friends back home that are still signing up for Monzo. Why? Because they're using APIs, they're using smart technology to try and help me do better budgeting. And I can see a lot of Scandinavian, Swedish banks are also starting to do really amazing stuff. This is just the start of it. For me, I really think that banking is on the brink of just a revolution. I think it's next companies that will be like Uber, like Facebook, like Google, that will be built on top of these APIs, right? So we won't be a bank. There won't be financial institutions as we know it. But it will really open up this phenomenon and allow us to create functionalities that we've never even dreamed about. But the one thing that I want to challenge you with as designers is what are you going to do in 2019? If all of this amazing data is out there, why not take the time to think about what your problems are as a financially astute individual and see whether or not there's APIs out there where you can build a platform that will help other people around you to solve that? Who here is going to look into it? I've got a couple of hands. Awesome. I'll sign up as your first customer. Promise, right? Any questions? So either people have fallen asleep. Thank you. So I've worked with open APIs enough to understand that while there are rules governing how you should use them, often people can use them in different ways. And maybe this is going too deep down into it, but what guarantees are there in the open banking API world that your data once transmitted will actually not be retained? So that comes back to that financial regulation that I was telling you about. So even though this is a startup, even though this is the likes of the latest app that you've downloaded, if they deal with financial APIs, they need to get financial regulation certificates. So they have to adhere to similar controls as the bank does, but they do not have to have the monetary backing because obviously they're not the ones holding the money themselves. All right, so Irina, we also have questions behind. So these are from the audience. I think the top question is very, very interesting. So who owns the data? Who's the GDPR person? Awesome.  Come stand up. Awesome. All right. So for those that don't know what GDPR is, this is a very astute individual over there. Okay. So GDPR is around protection of your personal data. It came out of the EU. Open banking actually also came out of the EU. There is something called Payment Directives Regulation 2. They're on to their second version. They're about to go on to their third next year, which essentially keeps that data protection in mind. In terms of who owns the data, currently the banks. With open banking, they will no longer own that. You will own that. Well, they will still hold it as the database, but you have full access and rights to provide visibility to anybody else of that data. It could be anything. It could be the customer segment that you belong with, the full transaction history, and any applications that you've made with the bank. It's all up to you to determine what data you want to give this particular third party. So again, remember the example that I used with Facebook and the app, where you have a little pop-up and it says, this particular organization wants to access this data. This is the data that they want. Either they call it by the API names. Let's hope not. Or they might just say they want transactional data. They want history. They want application. They want product holdings, card holdings. And then you say, I give them this right? Yes. For this period of time? Yes. Okay. Off it goes. So you are the one that's in control of it, but the bank still retains it. What are the...  Right. Are there any institutes that will facilitate open banking? If so, wouldn't there be a certain commercial bias to steer users towards certain providers? Yes, that's happening right now. The reason why this is happening right now is banks are specifically in Asia, not so much in the UK, because they're heavily regulated, both from the EU regulation and the local regulation. But in Singapore, what they're doing is banks are opening relationships, partnerships with these third parties. So banks typically have a much larger voice, because they've got a larger customer holding at the moment. So your DBS will say XYZ product backed by DBS. And because you know DBS as a brand, you're typically more likely to say, yes, I'll go with that particular provider. But again, this is about the fact that you hold the information, so you can determine whether or not you want to give them access rights. If they have the experience that you need, then fine, I'll go to whichever provider. Just give me a good, bloody experience. Solve my problems, rather than just give me a series of credits and debits. What about open banking versus digital wallet? Okay, so digital wallet uses exactly the same functionality as open banking. So your Alipay, your WeChat, is that third, you know, the third box that I had on the far right? It's all about moving money easily. So again, Alipay and WeChat and Google Pay and Apple Pay kind of got ahead of the curve. The way they did that is through partnerships with Bank, which is why now there are certain bank accounts that you can't transact with on Apple or Google Pay, wallet, whatever you might call them. But in the future, because it'll be open banking, all banks will be able to go through those channels. They've gotten ahead of us, but it doesn't mean that there aren't providers out there in the future that will be able to facilitate that and cut that third party out. Will it be dangerous if central banks hold our sensitive data and provide an open bank API to share to the vendor? Okay, I would love to know who that person is because I don't quite understand the... Okay, so it's not a central bank that holds it, right? It's not... I think this is around the example that I gave. It's not a central bank. If you have five different banks, those banks will still store that data. It's just a way for you to collate all of that information into a centralized app or a centralized experience. I hope that I've answered that question. If I haven't, whoever asked that, please stand up. What are the challenges going to be with open banking? Good question. Several challenges. So there is an organization... I talked a little bit about APIs and the way that you structure it. There is an organization coming out of the U.S., not surprisingly, but they're not for profit organization, and they're trying to create a global API standard so that every single bank will structure the API for know your customer exactly the same way so that from a technology perspective, it'll be easier for us. From a developer and designer perspective, currently it's really hard for us to know what data is out there. If you have a look at the DBS API platform, they have a fancy-ass marketing name that I can't remember, apologies. But their database has got 278 APIs at last check. Now, that's 278 pieces of data that you can request. But how do I know what those pieces of data do? So there is a certain aspect of designers in this area to truly start to have to understand how finance fits together on all the different elements. So that'll be the hardest bit, I think. Could you help us understand what's the business motivation for banks to give APIs? Oh, I missed that last part, so I'll just answer the first part. What's the business motivation? Currently, there is none here in Singapore other than the fact that the rest of the world is getting ahead of them. So again, it started as the EU regulation, and regulations are law, so therefore banks had to do it. The reason we did that was because of the financial crisis, the regulators and European regulators in particular realised how much power banks had, and therefore when Lehman and Delights collapsed with them, they took quite a lot of information and data. All right, I think that's enough questions for you to answer on the spot. Thank you so much, Irina, for enlightening us on open banking.