Smart Grid Essay

The following picture from the California Independent System Operator (ISO) explains quite a bit to me about the current state of our nation's power production and consumption- our system is terribly antiquated and inefficient. (The California ISO is a not-for-profit public-benefit corporation charged with operating the majority of California’s high-voltage wholesale power grid. http://www.caiso.com/outlook/outlook.html) The plot represents the power supply and demand in California over the last 24 hrs. The undulating red curve signifies power consumption and begins to rise at 6am as everyone wakes up, settles in as everyone is working, peaks as we return home, and plummets as we go to sleep. Power usage today varied from 20GW to 30.5GW throughout the day. The green line represents the supply of power available and the fluctuations are the result of power supplies (mostly hydrocarbon based) turned on or off in anticipation of demand. As you can see, the supply far surpasses the demand and is for grid stability.

A smart grid is a set of digitized sensors and controls that aim to minimize this inefficiency in a system whose architecture as not changed much in over 100years. The improvements to the existing system come in two forms: more reliable supply and steadier demand. The grid would have many sensors and allow for two way flow of electricity so it would be more resilient to disturbances and not need so much power generating reserves. If a power surge is occurring as too many all turn on their TV's, the grid will automatically adjust and redistribute power instead of allowing brownouts/blackouts. The data could be collected better too and distributed to power generators so they better plan their generating. It will even allow individual generators like solar panels on a house or hybrid car batteries contribute to the grid when demand peaks. This all sounds great but there are some major privacy concerns to be worked out- ie who will have their power reduced when the grid needs to redistribute?

The other aspect is demand control and will gain more public attention. It is placing transmitters on appliances throughout houses that then send the data to record and store it. The expected benefits are that people will have a better understanding of their electric bills and therefore actively attempt to cut back. They will know what sources are most consuming and what time of day is best to consume. The smart grid monitors would allow electric prices to be updated every few minutes. Households can see the real time price and plan their consumption accordingly. It will provide incentives for everyone to both reduce overall consumption and distribute more evenly over the course of the day to gain better energy prices.

Several pilot projects are currently underway to determine the feasibility. The real problems, however, appear to be social as the technology already exists in scattered forms. Utilities will certain push back and privacy concerns will be generated.

Two large companies have recently partnered to supply smart grid technology to the US- GE and Google- where GE would supply the hardware and power expertise and Google would supply the software. President Obama actively champions the smart grid and GE even bought Superbowl advertising space this year in order to promote the technology (they own NBC which broadcasted it).




To further promote it, they have setup an interactive website to explore the benefits of smart grid technology: http://ge.ecomagination.com/smartgrid/#/landing_page

Included in the website, there is a really neat application that allows for 3D holograms (Augmented Reality) to magically appear on your computer screen. The instructions are on the GE site and this video shows an example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NK59Beq0Sew&eurl=http://ge.ecomagination.com/smartgrid/preview/