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The President has called for the installation
of 40 million smart meters
and 3,000 miles
of transmission lines.
That means that we
could finally start seeing
real attention
being paid to “Power Grid
2.0” — basically
turning the electrical
grid of the 60s and
70s into a modern network
that uses microprocessors
and software to work efficiently
and to connect
to renewable energy generation.
A build-out of the Smart Grid could also
be one of the largest creators
of wealth
in the decade. As Smart
Grid analyst Jesse
Berst said recently, the
Smart Grid will
“spawn new Googles and
Microsofts,” and is
“akin to the transcontinental
railroad, the
phone system, the interstate
highway system
and the Internet.”
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| What's the BUZZ on SMART GRID? |
Defining the Smart Grid in just
a few words:
The Smart Grid is a way to use the electricity
we are generating in a much more
efficient
manner. This results in more
power delivered
at a lower cost with less pollution.
The Smart Grid in more detail:
Our nation’s electric power infrastructure
that has served us so well for
so long— also
known as “the grid”— is rapidly
running up
against its limitations. The
lights may be
on, but the risks associated
with relying
on an often overtaxed grid grow
in size,
scale and complexity every day.
From national
challenges like power system
security to
those global in nature such as
climate change,
our near-term agenda is formidable.
Fortunately, we have a way forward.
There
is growing agreement among federal
and state
policymakers, business leaders,
and other
key stakeholders, around the
idea that a
Smart Grid is not only needed
but well within
reach. Think of the Smart Grid
as the internet
brought to our electric system.
There are in fact two grids to keep in mind
as our future rapidly becomes
the present.
The first — we’ll call it “a
smarter grid”
— offers valuable technologies
that can be
deployed within the very near
future or are
already deployed today. The second—
the Smart
Grid— represents the longer-term
promise
of a grid remarkable in its intelligence
and impressive in its scope,
although it
is universally considered to
be a decade
or more from realization. Yet
given how a
single “killer application”—
e-mail — incited
broad, deep and immediate acceptance
of the
internet, who is to say that
a similar killer
app in this space won’t substantially
accelerate
that timetable? In the short
term, a smarter
grid will function more efficiently,
enabling
it to deliver the level of service
we’ve
come to expect more affordably
in an era
of rising costs, while also offering
considerable
benefits — such as less impact
on our environment.
Longer term, expect the Smart
Grid to spur
the kind of transformation that
the internet
has already brought to the way
we live, work,
play and learn.
Even More Detail:
Because electricity cannot be
stored in large
quantities, it must be produced
on demand.
So, when consumption hits very
high levels,
the power utility must activate
reserve power
plants, known as “peaking” power
plants,
or re-route electricity from
other parts
of the country, to meet energy
needs.
Smart Grids offer a number of
improvements,
including some that automatically
monitor
and evaluate grid conditions,
and report
these conditions back to the
utility’s control
room. Devices on the network
can communicate
with each other to automate re-routing
and
switching to avoid power lines
with faults,
and detect and even repair faults
in wires
before they lead to outages.
The Smart Grid also introduces
a new level
of communication between the
consumer and
the power suppliers. Smart Grids
allow power
companies and consumers to gather
precise
information about the quantity
and timing
of household consumption, and
enable consumers
to receive information, such
as real-time
pricing and emergency grid requests
to lower
energy consumption.
Smart Grid improvements will
also integrate
with intermittent energy sources
that pose
a challenge to the current system,
like wind
and solar power. New technologies
will encourage
consumers to invest in locally-generated
power sources, such as solar
panels on a
home, to supplement their power
needs. Making
such investments worthwhile to
consumers
also requires regulatory change
to allow
different pricing contracts.
For example,
a home could be powered by its
own solar
energy during the day, and consumers
could
sell any extra energy produced
by their panels
back to the larger grid (“net
metering”).
The credit for the energy sold
during the
day may cover what the home uses
that evening.
Smart Grids would also accommodate
plug-in
cars, allowing consumers to move
away from
petroleum-based transportation.
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The Smart Grid Could Transform Transportation:
U.S. passenger vehicles (cars and trucks)
consume about 390 million gallons
of gasoline
per day and contribute 20% of
our global
warming pollution. The gasoline
for these
cars is almost entirely refined
from petroleum,
nearly 60% of which is imported.
And with
a record year of price volatility
ranging
from $2/gallon to more than $4.50/gallon
in some parts of the country,
fueling these
cars has created severe hardship
and ongoing
anxiety.
The Solution
Commercialize clean, affordable cars that
“fuel” by plugging in to a unified
national
Smart Grid carrying clean energy.
With the
development of a unified national
Smart Grid
that transmits carbon-free electricity,
transition
to a cleaner, more energy-efficient
fleet
of plug-in passenger vehicles,
will help
speed the transition by supporting
American
companies (big and small) that
are pursuing
plug-in cars and advanced vehicle
and battery
technologies.
The Benefits
Clean plug-in passenger vehicles will reduce
dependence on foreign oil, provide
transportation
for as little as $1 per equivalent
gallon,
create price certainty with renewable
energy
sources that are abundant and
free, and help
solve the climate crisis. A plug-in
fleet
will also contribute to energy
storage on
the grid. This transition may
revitalize
the American auto industry.
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Does It Work?
In Washington State, the GridWiseTM Olympic
Peninsula Project, managed by
the Pacific
Northwest National Laboratory
and funded
by the U.S. Department of Energy,
tested
Smart Grid technologies in more
than 100
homes as well as with several
commercial
and municipal partners. In the
Olympic Peninsula,
population growth is putting
pressure on
the existing system. Rugged terrain
and the
citizens' desire to maintain
the area's scenic
beauty led to a search for alternatives
to
new power plants and wires.
During the project, residential
customers
chose among contract types ranging
from today’s
fixed-price contracts to real-time
pricing
that could change as frequently
as every
five minutes. Their homes were
then equipped
with technology that allowed
them to program
appliances such as thermostats,
water heaters,
and clothes dryers via the internet
to automatically
respond to retail price changes.
For example,
one could set an ideal temperature
for their
home, as well as an acceptable
range the
temperature could fluctuate within,
based
on price. If customers preferred
their homes
to be a warm 75 degrees during
January, they
could set a minimum of 65, allowing
the temperature
to drop temporarily if prices
climbed too
high. Consumers could change
their settings
(and override them) to reflect
their preferences,
allowing them to choose along
a continuum
of comfort and economy.
The project also included cash
incentives
based on the actual costs of
producing and
delivering electricity—when demand
was higher,
so was the price . These incentives
were
designed to encourage consumers
to decrease
their consumption during peak
periods, which
would alleviate stress on the
grid, making
the system more reliable and
less vulnerable
to outages.
After one year, consumers saved
approximately
10 percent on electricity bills
over the
previous year, despite the fact
the electricity
prices generally rise from one
year to the
next. At the same time, peak
demand fell
by 15 percent. Peak demand reductions
are
especially meaningful, because
power plants
and wires built to meet peak
are only used
during a few hours per year.
Reducing peak
means spending less to build
those resources,
and it can also mean an increase
in environmental
value, because less efficient
resources are
often called in to meet this
kind of demand.
Although the project involved
only 112 homes,
it showed that Smart Grid technology
not
only enhances electric grid reliability
and
reduces outages, but also creates
smaller
electricity bills for consumers
and could
alleviate the need for additional
infrastructure.
At a time when advantages to
the economy
and the environment are so critical,
smart
grid technologies could prove
to be a real
solution to our growing energy
needs. As
shown by the Olympic Peninsula
project, the
necessary technology already
exists. For
Smart Grid investments to become
a reality
and benefit consumers, regulatory
rules and
industry business models will
also have to
change, because existing regulation
gives
consumers and utilities few incentives
to
pursue energy-efficient, price-responsive
technology.
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Power Facts:
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-In many areas of the United
States, the
only way a utility knows there's
an outage
is when a customer calls to report
it.
-If our current power grid were just 5% more
efficient, the energy savings
would equate
to permanently eliminating the
fuel and greenhouse
gas emissions from 53 million
cars.
-If every American household
replaced just
one incandescent bulb with a
compact fluorescent
bulb, the country would conserve
enough energy
to light 3 million homes and
save more than
$600 million annually.
-In the US, the average electric
power generating
station was built in the 1960's
using even
older technology. Today, the
average age
of a substation transformer is
42, two years
more than their expected life
span.
-10% of all generation assets
and 25% of
distribution infrastructure are
required
less than 400 hours per year,
roughly 5%
of the time.
-Today's electricity system is
99.97% reliable,
yet still allows for power outages
that cost
Americans at least $150 billion
each year
- about $500 for every person. |
Consider "The Prius Effect".
The Prius makes a strong anecdotal case for
'letting the customer drive'
when It comes
to energy decisions. Toyota's
hybrid vehicle
features a dashboard monitor
that constantly
indicates what effect your driving
habits
have on your efficiency, and
makes visible
- in real-time - the consequences
of your
energy usage. The resulting "Prius
Effect"
has been cited by various energy
and computing
researchers as evidence that
consumers will
readily change their habits if
exposed to
feedback in real time.
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