Smart Grid Blog

Utilities, tech vendors and trade groups like the Grid Wise Alliance have openly been complaining that it’s taking too long for the billions of dollars in smart grid grants, which the Department of Energy promised back in October, to reach the projects, and ultimately create jobs. Well, it looks like the dam has been broken, albeit for a small project. Municipal utility Glendale Water and Power announced Thursday that it has signed a contract to start the flow of $20 million in DOE smart grid grants and according to Craig Kuennen, Glendale’s smart grid program sponsor, it’s the first such contract signed in the country. “That’s what DOE told us,” Kuennen said to us Thursday.

via It’s About Time: Glendale Gets First DOE Smart Grid Stimulus Contract.

Labor and environmental groups joined with the U.S. government on Thursday to promote high speed Internet access and related technologies to create green jobs and help lift the United States out of recession.

“In the same way that building the interstate freeway system brought the United States out of the post-World War Two recession … a clean energy economy is exactly what we need in recession-bound America to put people back to work,” said David Foster, executive director of Blue Green Alliance, an organization of unions and environmental groups.

via Labor, environment groups push ‘green’ broadband | Reuters.

As alternative green energy sources come online, power plants and energy distribution substations find their networks challenged by smart grid demands that call for rapid changes between traditional and alternative energy sources. System and network integration on a smart grid that manages hybrid energy sources is on technology road maps for virtually every utility company now, but a majority are still not diversified with alternative energy.  Consequently, the prospect of integrating traditional and alternative energy systems with networks looms large.

via Smart Grid Integration A Daunting Task As Green Energy Comes Online – Network Computing.

The general feeling is that when the dust settles, Long Term Evolution (LTE) will be ahead of WiMax in the overall 4G bakeoff. Many observers suggest that WiMax could end up as a niche technology, while LTE, which is the favored approach of Verizon Wireless and AT&T, dominates.

If this is so, WiMax is making strides with at least one significant niche category: smart grid networking. Earth2Tech reports that startup Arcadian Networks has released the AE20r gateway, a WiMax-focused device. The story says that Arcadian, which owns spectrum in the middle of the country, sells smart grid services to utilities. The story notes other vendors in the smart grid/WiMax arena, including Grid Net, General Electric, Alvarion and National Grid.

via The WiMax/Smart Grid Partnership | Blogs | ITBusinessEdge.com.

Oh, the endless issues with the smart grid stimulus funds — the close to $4 billion in federal grants to over 130 smart grid projects. With that level of funding there were bound to be some hurdles. Here’s another: speed. On Thursday morning at the Wall Street Journal’s Eco:nomics conference, the CEO of Florida power company FPL Group, Lewis Hay III, expressed his concern that “not a dime” of the smart grid stimulus funds had been allocated to the winners to his knowledge.

via FPL CEO: We Haven’t Seen A Dime of the Smart Grid Stimulus.

In a bid to encourage integration of its technology by home developers and manufacturers of a range of electrical devices, Google has released a new PowerMeter API.

The code, which is available here, is intended for manufacturers of electrical devices, from refrigerators and washing machines to other appliances, that have built-in energy monitoring technology. It also works with other smart meter devices.

via Seeking Smart Grid Market Share, Google Launches PowerMeter API · Environmental Leader · Green Business, Sustainable Business, and Green Strategy News for Corporate Sustainability Executives.

Why so much of a buzz over the basic electric power utility meter by hardware and software companies in the electronics industry? The answer lies in what drives the business: money.

Companies around the world are sensing huge business opportunities in power grid design because of two things. First, utilities in US and Europe are embarking upon replacing over 45% of the existing utility meters by 2015. Second, there are huge requirements in terms of units being created by the swelling consumer and industrial base in the developing nations like China, India, Brazil, etc.

According to one projection, there is a requirement of $19.5 billion worth of utility meter and related communications between 2010 and 2015 with an estimated shipment of over 200 million smart-meters [1].

via Embedded.com – Getting basic utility meter designs ready for the Smart Grid.

Liberty Lake, Washington-based Itron, a maker of smart utility meters, appears to be a major beneficiary of the first, smart grid grant under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. According to the City of Glendale, California’s utility, Glendale Water & Power, it was granted a $20M Smart Grid Investment Grant under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act–a large part which will go towards installing Itron’s OpenWay electric and Itron’s Water SaveSource smart meters.

via Itron Benefits From First Smart Grid Grant | nwinnovation.com.

For many years — decades even — we have been waiting for the automated “smart” house — a house that is as technically advanced as our automobiles. For decades, we have been able to remotely lock and unlock our car doors, raise and lower our car windows, adjust temperatures for different parts of the car seating areas, and even clean the back and front windows.

Why can’t we do that with our houses? Why are our homes dumb?

via Green Technology -The Wireless Home of the Future – The Third Home Wireless Network – Smart and Green.

The country’s swift deployment of smart-grid technology has security professionals concerned that utilities and smart-meter vendors are repeating the mistakes made in the rollout of the public internet, when security became a priority only after malicious attacks had reached mass levels.

But when it comes to the power grid, the costs of remote hack attacks are potentially more dramatic.

via Security Pros Question Deployment of Smart Meters | Threat Level | Wired.com.

Google’s PowerMeter tool is taking a bite out of the slow progress we're making toward a smart grid by jumping over utilities that move at the speed-of-molasses and putting energy data in front of users right away, including creating an easy-to-use energy monitoring platform and partnering with home power monitor companies like The Energy Detective. They’ve just made another smart move to speed things along by opening up their application programming interface (API) so that developers can start creating tools to interface with PowerMeter. Now developers can create devices and tools that can talk to PowerMeter, making it that much easier to have a whole-house energy monitoring system for a much lower cost, and much sooner than if we wait for a fully developed smart grid to provide it.

via Time for Developers to Go Nuts on Energy Efficiency – Google Releases API for PowerMeter : TreeHugger.

Arcadian Networks, a developer of wireless broadband communications systems for the energy industry, announced the availability of its new smart grid gateway on March 3.  The AE20r is a second generation router/gateway that incorporates a variety of technologies with many helpful applications and smart devices.

Real time, bi-directional communications are the building blocks for all smart grid solutions.  Arcadian Networks offers customized services to the energy, oil and gas, and renewable energy industries including network deployment, systems integration, and customer service.

via Arcadian Networks launches smart grid gateway.

The global household smart appliance market is projected to grow from $3.06 billion in 2011 to $15.12 billion in 2015, according to the new “Smart Appliance Report” from Zpryme.

Looking at the top product types projected for smart grid interoperability, in 2015 the global market size for smart washers and smart refrigerators, respectively, will reach $3.54 billion and $2.69 billion.

via Smart Grid Appliance Market May Reach $15B by 2015 · Environmental Leader · Green Business, Sustainable Business, and Green Strategy News for Corporate Sustainability Executives.

The Japanese government expects to invest $30 million over four years in smart grid research and demonstration projects in New Mexico.

Japan’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization signed five agreements on Friday in Los Alamos with state officials and representatives from the two national laboratories, Los Alamos County, the Public Service Co. of New Mexico, and the Mesa del Sol master-planned community in south-central Albuquerque.

via Japan signs smart-grid accords with New Mexico – New Mexico Business Weekly:.

Imagine you left town for a weekend vacation, accidentally leaving the air conditioning set on high. No sweat — you can adjust it with an application on your iPhone.

Or imagine getting to work and realizing you forgot to run the dishwasher. No problem, because another application can start your appliances remotely.

These scenarios may sound far out, but they are almost reality for Maryland residents. Thanks to $10.5 billion in stimulus funds from the federal government, the first stage of “Smart Grid” technology will come to your home as soon as this year.

via Maryland Gets Ready for Smart Electricity Grid Technology – Southern Maryland Headline News.