Local council hears Kilowatt founder pitch opt‑in, AI energy‑shopping app

The Burrillville Town Council on Jan. 14 heard a presentation from James Grasso, founder of Kilowatt and operator of SilentSherpa, about Kilowatt’s opt‑in, AI‑driven energy shopping application for residential and small commercial electricity customers. Grasso told the council the app compares marketplace offers to the utility’s last‑resort rate, automatically seeks the best savings and will return a customer to the utility rate if no savings are available.

Grasso said Kilowatt is a “savings only” product that will not permit a user to lock into a contract that would leave them worse off than the utility. “If there is no savings available, it will push back to the utility rate,” he said. He described the company’s revenue model as a license fee paid by participating suppliers, not a commission charged directly to customers.

Council members pressed Grasso on how often the app makes switches and on contract terms. Grasso said residential customers currently have a minimum three‑month term and commercial customers can be contracted from one to 36 months; the app’s logic, he said, searches daily but locks in a consumer for the chosen term. He also asserted that Rhode Island Energy collects roughly 3% administrative fees on last‑resort service and “close to $13,000,000 a year” on residential last‑resort procurement, which he framed as an efficiency gap Kilowatt seeks to address.

Members asked about regulatory oversight and endorsements. Grasso said Kilowatt is a technology provider, not an energy supplier, and that—at least in his description—there is no specific state regulation that oversees a platform that only connects suppliers and buyers. He asked the council to consider endorsing or announcing the availability of the program for customers served by Rhode Island Energy while noting the town’s municipal utility (Clear River) accounts would be out of scope. Council members discussed options ranging from an informal announcement to a formal endorsement letter or a small evaluation committee; the chair offered to share contact information for further follow‑up rather than commit to a formal town endorsement at this meeting.

The presentation generated detailed technical questions about smart meters, market timing and supplier cancellation penalties. Grasso said the platform has just over 1,000 users across commercial and residential accounts and that suppliers are licensed to the platform and typically only pay when originating business through it. He urged a cautious outreach strategy focused on education, saying the product will scale “if the town manager and a small evaluation team can review and vet it.”

Next steps: the council did not take a formal vote endorsing Kilowatt but offered to let interested council members and staff continue vetting with the presenter and to provide the presenter with contact information to follow up with town administration.