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.
California’s Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger announced last week that the state was creating a California Green Corps that will work to protect the state’s ecology, and provide valuable experience and training to the young people who go through the program, to help them prepare for employment in the emerging green economy. The program will provide at least 1,000 young people between the ages of 16 and 24 with jobs and training. The governor stressed that the program is targeted toward youth considered “at-risk” of failing academically, foundering in the workplace or getting into trouble with the law, and will consist of a minimum of 10 regional Green Corps throughout California.
