The US Department of Energy (DoE) once again opened up its stimulus fund war chest yesterday, awarding over $57m to eight smart grid demonstration projects across the country.
The new investment, which follows $17m of government smart grid funding awarded last year, will aim to accelerate the roll out of projects designed to demonstrate the feasibility of smart grid technologies capable of managing and reducing energy use across the grid.
“Modernising our electrical grid to make it stronger, smarter, more efficient and more secure is a crucial step in expanding renewable energy and creating jobs,” said Energy Secretary Steven Chu. “These investments will help lay the foundation for American leadership in the clean energy economy.”
Grid technology specialist American Superconductor Corporation was the big winner, securing over $12m in backing for two projects focused on restricting power surges and improving the reliability of power cables.
Meanwhile, Zenergy Power Inc received over $8m in funding towards the development of a different technology for restricting power surges and Edison received over $5m to help fund a trial of demand response technologies in New York.
Awards of between $4m and $6m were also distributed to a range of university and city government-backed projects designed to enhance the resilience of local grids, help reduce end-user energy demands, and improve the management of energy fed into the grid from distributed sources, such as solar panels and small scale wind turbines.
via US government pumps $57m into smart grid – 21 Jul 2009 – BusinessGreen.com.
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