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By Jesse Berst
What if every consumer had to crash test his own cars? Yet that is what we are doing by asking every utility to stress test every piece of new smart grid equipment. It's expensive, it's time-consuming, and it's just plain dumb.
Our smart grid would have a much higher IQ if we took a cue from industries such as cable and telecom. Those sectors have strong standards that are certified by robust interoperability laboratories. When new gear is invented, it can quickly be tested and – if it passes – quickly brought on line.
In our industry, we are just now getting around to standards. And we are still conducting pilots as a series of a one-off, custom efforts. It is not unusual for a new technology to be piloted dozens of times by dozens of utilities with every pilot covering essentially the same ground.
We need to rationalize our smart grid pilots. EPRI's consortia and the ARRA-funded demonstration projects are a step in the right direction. But we urgently need a permanent, shared-cost facility for quickly vetting new technologies. CableLabs offers one possible model.
For instance, there is a breakthrough smart transformer now in the works that will sit on the sidelines for an extra five years as a series of utilities test it one after another. Instead, we should have one major bout of aggressive, rigorous testing with results shared to all. By squandering years on repetitive, me-too pilots we postpone the benefits of new technologies. That makes our utilities less reliable and less efficient and our entrepreneurial companies less successful.
Even a crash test dummy could figure this one out.
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Jesse Berst is the founder and chief analyst of Smart Grid News.com. He consults to smart grid companies seeking market entry advice and M&A advisory. A frequent keynoter at industry events in the US and abroad, he also serves on the Advisory Council of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory's Energy & Environment directorate.
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