To support our client’s needs, we seek individuals with expertise in the understanding of SmartGrid technologies, as well as implementation and policy issues. In this role you will build and manage a group of engineers, economists and other professionals to support utility and government clients that seek to evaluate and install SmartGrid technologies. You will work directly with internal ICF staff, our customers and partners for the purpose of providing advanced business solutions that address the SmartGrid challenges of the utility industry.
This, the fourth and final installment of our four part article series on the report on the Smart Grid put out by the U.S. Department of Energy, titled “The Smart Grid: An Introduction”, covers the DOE reports section that deals with how the various constituencies are working to realign themselves so that they participate in and are positioned to thrive in the emerging Smart Grid future that is beginning to be built out. It summarizes the five fundamental technologies that will drive the Smart Grid. It illustrates concrete examples of current Smart Grid projects ranging from West Virginia to California to Hawaii, that illustrate how a smarter grid is already taking shape. Finally it asks: What’s Your Stake in All This?
This, is the third installment of our four part article series on the report on the Smart Grid put out by the U.S. Department of Energy. The report is titled “The Smart Grid: An Introduction”. The current installment covers the DOE report’s section that defines what is meant by Smart Grid; what it is and conversely what it is not. It covers the various critical aspects that working together will form the Smart Grid. It continues with a summary of the DOE Smart Grid report’s “Compare and Contrast: A Grid Where Everything Is Possible” section that outlines the many benefits of creating a smarter grid.
This is the second installment of our four part article series on the excellent report on the Smart Grid put out by the U.S. Department of Energy that delves into this complex subject matter in considerable detail. The report is titled “The Smart Grid: An Introduction” and is dedicated to the education of all interested members of the public to the nature, challenges and opportunities surrounding the Smart Grid and its implementation.
This installment of our article series covers the DOE reports section that deals with where our current electric grid currently stands and what are the risks that it faces.
The U.S. Department of Energy has produced an excellent report on the Smart Grid that delves into this complex subject matter in considerable detail. The report is titled “The Smart Grid: An Introduction” and is dedicated to the education of all interested members of the public to the nature, challenges and opportunities surrounding the Smart Grid and its implementation. Building out the Smart Grid is a colossal task comparable in scope to the construction of the interstate highway network or the construction of the Internet. It is daunting, but it is a task that can no longer be postponed; one that simply must be done; as well as something we need to do as a nation for reasons of national security, to lay a foundation for our continuing prosperity and to preserve our nations global influence.
In a significant boost to the emerging high temperature superconducting wire sector, American Superconductor Corporation (AMSC), a leading supplier of super-conducting wire, announced that LS Cable Ltd. (LS Cable) has ordered approximately 80,000 meters of its 344 superconductors, AMSC’s proprietary brand of second generation (2G) high temperature superconductor (HTS) wire.
Superconducting cables are poised to play a critical and important role in the evolving smart grid. Superconducting cables are capable of carrying much more current and have significantly lower impedance than conventional cables; because of this they facilitate more efficient AC power flows within the grid.
Quite a bit is happening in the smart grid sector. In this post I quickly look at the breaking announcement by Vice President Joe Biden of more than $3.3 billion in stimulus funding for grants to drive the rollout of a nationwide electrical smart grid.
I continue to follow the hacking of the grid story and try to give some various perspectives on this issue and what is being done about it.
Finally I post on how the growing adoption of renewable energy like solar and wind will require the grid to evolve into a much smarter, robust system and to incorporate systems for storing transient excess energy.
The Smart Grid promises to make our energy (and also water and sewage systems) more efficient, robust and responsive by building a paired parallel information and control network onto the existing distribution networks. However hooking up the grid’s multitude of component units to a network also opens up the potential for the grid to be hacked — in much the same way anything that is exposed to the internet can be hacked.
The Smart Grid will require substantial information processing, storage and data mining resources. An entire new software sector is rising to meet the challenges and fill the many new needs opened up by its arrival. Spending on the smart grid is estimated to be $165 billion over the next 20 years (Source: EPRI) and a good portion of this will be on software and data services. Here is a list of seven of the up and coming software companies that are actively offering software for the Smart Grid, for Smart Meters, for Power Analytics, for systems focused on improving the energy efficiency of the grid, and for energy management systems for homes and businesses tied to Smart Grid networks and designed to operate with it.
