Many utilities have chosen to initially deploy smart meters
without analytics. While this approach may appear successful from a deployment perspective, it can be costly in terms of operating this very complex environment. As this white paper explains in detail, the advent of millions of new devices in the field provides opportunities to utilize the resulting mountain of data to build a smarter enterprise.
Presentation materials from the recent 'Making the Business Case for Smart Meters' webinar have now been posted. Another in the Lessons from the Real World series presented by Smart Grid News, this webinar featured insights from Chris King of eMeter along with Steve Sunderhauf of Pepco and Commissioner Richard Morgan of the DC Public Service Commission.
After first denying Baltimore Gas & Electric's stimulus-supported smart grid initiative, the Maryland Public Service Commission granted a revised proposal submitted by the utility. However, there were conditions related to cost recovery. This is a copy of the PSC order that lists those conditions and the commission's thinking.
This graphic highlights the steps involved in creating a data management blueprint, from developing the technology specifications to building the business case.
This 20-page white paper is one of the few documents that tackles utility business models head on. It states that "long-standing electric utility business models are rapidly becoming outdated." It signals three major drivers: new technologies, new policies, and more demanding consumers. It suggests three main strategies for innovating business models, but spends most of its time focusing on the first strategy, which it has named "industry model innovation" -- innovating by moving into new industries or redefining existing ones. It also includes an explanation of "platforms" and how they will affect the industry. A sidebar covers the rise and fall of the traditional grow-and-build business model.
WPPI Energy represents a microcosm of the needs and issues of Smart Grid implementation for municipals across the U.S. Implementation of systems across 52 different organizations (51 members and the WPPI Energy organization itself) makes Smart Grid standards and interoperability not only desirable, but absolutely critical for success. This case study reviews some activities undertaken to develop WPPI's Smart Grid roadmap.
This paper discusses the difficulty in valuing the benefits of environmental stewardship and corporate citizenship to justify smart metering or smart grid projects, even as utility customers, legislators and regulatory agencies and utilities, themselves acknowledge that they are important goals.
Understanding what the smart grid vision and implementation plan is for a specific utility, state, or region and the associated value propositions from the perspective of these beneficiary groups is needed to provide the basis from which stakeholder motivation is created. This document describes a methodology for doing both: developing a region-specific smart grid vision and implementation plan and the associated business cases.
With the worldwide power and utilities sector and public policy makers focused on the environment and power supply, interest has increased on the secure development of the Smart Grid and other critical infrastructures for power and utilities companies.In order to assist with the development of secure software, this document focuses three key resources – Process Guidance, Threat Modeling Tool, and the Optimization Model.
This paper proposes a framework of policies to guide the future development of America’s electric transmission grid so that the electric power industry will be able to serve more effectively the changing needs of the U.S. economy and society. A factual overview of the American electric power industry, with a focus on high voltage transmission is provided. Public policies affecting the electric industry and, specifically, the transmission grid are summarized, and a range of proposals for legislative and regulatory policy reform are analyzed. Finally, a set of recommendations is provided which would accelerate innovation and the evolution of an “end-to-end smart” transmission grid in America.
Cisco outlines reasons for NIST to adopt the Internet Architecture as the framework for smart grid interoperability by adding thesuite of IP standards and protocols to its list of Smart Grid Interoperability Standards.
This article from Mellon University’s Department of Engineering and Public Policy enumerates the many new facets of the Smart Grid from the consumer end, the transmission and distribution component, and the issues related to security and regulation.
**The second report (still in draft and subject to revision) examines more than 250 estimates of energy efficiency potential derived from 19 studies that cover all or parts of the U.S. South. The report ends with the following conclusion: “Analysis of published studies of the potential for energy efficiency improvements in the South suggests that a reservoir of cost-effective opportunities exists. In the South as a whole, a 2 percent annual reduction in energy consumption is technically feasible. Approximately three-quarters of that amount is cost-effective. A 1 percent reduction per year approximates the maximum achievable estimate assuming implementation of aggressive policies, and a 0.5 percent per year reduction could be achieved with modest policy interventions. Since electricity consumption in the South is expected to grow at approximately 0.84 percent annually between 2007 and 2020, the maximum achievable potential could offset the forecast growth in demand in the region as a whole. For natural gas, which is expected to experience no significant growth in consumption in the South, the achievable potential for energy savings could produce significant reductions in consumption over time. Of course, states with more rapidly growing electricity and natural gas demand will need to either push harder on energy efficiency or expand their energy resources.”
** How does a Smart Grid evolve? Evolves over time – no single approach. Strategic Drivers. Time. AMR. Energy Markets. SCADA. Real-time. Contingency ...
Answering the question to how we build the efficient, secure, cost-effective power grid of tomorrow, this presentation illustrates and discusses all the components of the Smart Grid, in detail.
This 291-page document identifies issues and proposes priorities for developing standards for the Smart Grid. Prepared by the Electric Power Research Institute on behalf of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, it is the culmination of phase one of NIST's three-phase plan to expedite standards development. It contains a thorough overview of every activity and actor relevant to the Smart Grid, as well as providing the foundation for the all-important standards debates that will take place over the next few years. Although we hate to recommend something this poorly written, this document should probably be required reading for anyone who needs a full understanding of the Smart Grid.
The purpose of this white paper is to help facilitate nationwide progress toward the deployment of dynamic pricing of electricity by summarizing information that may assist utilities and regulators who are assessing the business case for advanced metering infrastructure (AMI). It highlights five dynamic pricing programs that have been implemented in the U.S. and surveys the progress toward deploying AMI.
EPRI funded a successful project to identify, evaluate, and accelerate postcombustion CO technologies. This effort, which is nearing completion, led to the valuation of over seventy CO capture processes.
In many cases, materials that date to the first half of the 20th century remain in components on the power delivery system. As equipment fails or reaches the end of its life, new equipment is installed that generally employs incremental material improvement. But long product cycles are an obstacle to adopting new materials. Although nano engineering and other advanced techniques has offer the hope of new materials, the technology is umproven. Current silicon-based technologies not sufficiently robust to be cost-effective in many applications, and some materials are potentially damaging to the environment. This study addresses this situation by outlining EPRI’s Materials –Delivery and End-Use program, which is designed to aggressively invest in early-stage materials technologies that will be important for the future of the electric power enterprise, and by funding seed research in materials areas that will be critical in the future.
This is a three-page summary of performed by Freeman, Sullivan consultants. It concerns 10,000 customers who signed up for PG&E's residential SmartRate critical peak pricing tariff in 2008. It compares the load impact estimates with estimates based on the demand models developed for California's Statewide Pricing Pilot (SPP). The demand models estimated from the SPP pilot allow load impact estimates to be made that adjust for the differences between different customers in different geographies. Differences in the two estimates were quite similar in each hour. These findings should provide confidence that load impact estimates based on pricing pilots will in fact be realized if similar tariffs are actually deployed.
Allegheny Power’s program to contract with a “distributed generation (DG) manager” to “harvest” existing installed standby generation capacity and recruit future generation resources. The program is focused on reducing demand in the small and large commercial and industrial, and governmental customer sectors, by deploying customer “non-utility” generation resources.
** White Paper on Large-Scale Integrated Smart Grid SolutionsFile - command and control infrastructure in achieving overall system ... d) Monitoring and supervisory control: The proposed smart grid solution needs to provide ...
We're getting mixed signals about the vitality of the smart grid market. On the one hand, the recent DistribuTECH conference was one of the most successful ever. On the other, a well-known Wall Street analyst recently told his clients that the smart metering sector is "facing several headwinds," including weak regulatory support in the U.S. and delays in European adoption. Taking the pulse of the smart grid industry is this week's Tuesday Topic.
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