Why not call "a spade a spade?" That utilities' choice of optical fiber networks as the medium for the smart grid can be a shrewd and transformative benefit to the United States, to the utilities themselves, and to their customers.
Steven R. Rivkin - 02/25/2009 - 15:51
Requirements Analysis
While authors essentially suggest starting with a requirements analysis, they appear to begin with implicit assumptions that do not clearly identify the objectives or "end product" desired from a smart grid. Several questions:
1. shouldn't the analysis start with the objectives?
2. shouldn't the next step attempt to identify what is feasible and then prioritize development within both technical and resource constraints?
3. Since there are many business and technical models for implementing the smart grid, given #1-#2, shouldn't those options also be considered before committing to a communication network?
4. Have the security and privacy issues surrounding the access and retrieval of data from within a customer premise been fully vetted and shouldn't this be considered in the requirements and design ?
Roger Levy - 02/26/2009 - 09:47
What’s the first step to a Smart Grid?
This comment adds to my comment “Power Industry's Emergent Whole,” posted under Steve Pullins, “Start with the End in Mind – Utility of the Near Future.” The first step should be to start with the End in Mind, which is an Emergent Whole, based on the true requirements.
Trying to make it readable, I will copy my earlier comment out of the context of Mr. Pullins article below this post.
The true requirements are well hidden by implementations. McMenamin and Palmer called them the essence and the incarnation. Most of those communications technology decisions are part of the incarnation, which in several years may become obsolete.
At the outset of deregulation, we had a vertically integrated utility with regulated wholesale and retail and a supply chain generation, transmission and distribution (with hidden regulated retail to most people) that functioned as the value chain. Without looking at the emerging requirements that Schweppe et al disclosed in the 80s, EPAct 92 separated transmission and wholesale to enable Open Transmission Access to come up with an incremental extension of the original paradigm. Other incremental extensions to solve the unstable deregulation have returned us closer to the initial paradigm, with, for example, capacity markets and NERC mandatory rules.
Distribution was thought to be inactive, as the original paradigm had passive external loads. The true emergent requirement of active loads (and thus active distribution) was the key to Schweppe’s marketplace. Believe it or not, that is the real precursor of the smart grid. As active demand is now sought to be integrated to power system (planning,) operation and control, a big mistake was made in EPAct 92. Notice that active loads are developed in a wide open and vibrant market operating at the Edge.
A real transformation is needed to a different center of attraction. That is the EWPC paradigm.
For more information on requirements go to the EWPC Blog.
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 03/05/2009 - 14:14
Power Industry's Emergent Whole
Steve you have done a great leadership job on the emergent whole of the power industry. It is only over the weekend that I found your posts, which are the result of a system approach.
As a systemic consultant on electricity, I have been doing a similar job since 1996 and with more intensity since 2003. I have written more than 130 articles and received lots of comments on www.energyblogs.com about what I termed electricity without price controls (EWPC) market architecture and design paradigm.
One of my humble contributions on the emergent whole was to discover that the large complexity of the industry included all the resources of the demand side, which is a wide open market beyond the meter – at the Edge – that needs to be integrated to power system planning, operations and control, by the development of the resources of the demand side. It is important to recall that the late Fred C. Schweppe offered important element of what was emerging with his regulated energy marketplace, as the first step before deregulation.
EWPC has extended Schweppe’s work by dividing the whole into two smaller systems that mutually reinforce each other: a free money market and a regulated power market. The money market should close during operations planning, so that security constraint spot prices reflect both supply and demand commitments and not at real time balancing.
In the most recent article "Propelling the Power Industry to a Superior Solution Path," I quoted one your article How Private Investment Is Pushing Utilities to the Edge, which mutually reinforces the EWPC article Just as Pogo, IOUs Found the Enemy.
I hope to get the benefit of our interchanges and those of the SGN new team leader, Joe Miller, to try to raise the bar of the power industry for good, to enable the development of retail market business model innovations for the federal market.
Best regards,
José Antonio
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 03/05/2009 - 14:18
Let's Dialogue on the True Essential Requirements
I sent the following message:
Hello Mr. Houseman and Mr. Shargal,
I posted a comment under your article “Why Your Smart Grid Must Start with Communications.”
I think we must start with the true requirement. I am expecting your reply no to debate, but to help understand the essential true requirements on the communication side.
Once we have the true requirements, we can see how to add technology to get the emerging whole, which I contend generates a new (global) value chain: wholesale, retail, prosumer (a consumer that may produce).
Regards,
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D.
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 03/05/2009 - 14:22
The advantage of fiber nets
Approaching smart grid communications systematically suggests the probability that, where fiber is available, alternatives will be weaker links. Where fiber is not available, utilities should consider extending fiber to sites being monitored, if need be sharing costs with other users who benefit from this critical infrastructure.
Steven R. Rivkin - 03/06/2009 - 04:32
Meir Shalgar Response
On Fri, Mar 6, 2009 at 3:09 AM, Shargal, Meir wrote:
I agree that any system design and implementation should start with requirements. Our article refer to the communication backbone as the key to achieve true interoperability and the need to address the communication requirements early in the Smart Grid deployment.
If the backbone isn't developed early, projects may have to be retrofitted later to accommodate the eventual communications standards, adding greatly to time and expense. Moreover, each individual project will be burdened with communications planning and costs, and the business cases for each will become much harder.
Meir Shargal
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 04/26/2009 - 08:22
NIST-EPRI Workshop.. First Things First
Meir sent the above post me as a private message many days ago. It seems still timely. Thanks!
Right now, as far as I now, at the center of the Smart Grid Interoperability Standards Interim Roadmap Workshop, that "NIST is organizing a workshop on April 28-29 to review the high-level principles for the Roadmap" is the communication backbone.
I suggest that before interoperability is considered, which is one of the essential requirements, the shift to the EWPC Framework need to be considered first.
So far, I have written related comments under other documents on this website, which are:
Smart Grid Stimulus Bill: DOE Snubs IOUs and Meters
The Coming Paradigm Shift and How To Achieve It
Foreign Cyber-Spies Inject Spyware into U.S. Grid with Potential for Serious Damage
Key standards workshop coming April 28-29...
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 04/26/2009 - 08:44
Errata
Please read the above message by changing:
"Meir sent the above post me" into "Meir sent me the above post " and also "now" to "know" in "Right now, as far as I now,"
José Antonio Vanderhorst-Silverio, Ph.D. - 04/26/2009 - 09:01
smart grid communication
simultaneous development of the smart grid's infrastructure and communication protocol is needed.
what must be taken into account are the understanding of topology and emergent behaviors of the legacy and new power grid; then setting up 2-way communication network with complexity thinking in the background. although interoperability is important, security measures that bar unauthorized intrusion must be considered hand-in-hand with the functional requirements of the enabling communications scheme.
Three new demonstration projects caught our attention - a smart grid effort in Albuquerque's business district, a rapid recovery transformer study in Texas and a trial involving low voltage current sensor technologies in the UK. They also got us to thinking: At this stage in the smart grid build out, if you could design a demonstration project, what would it entail? That's our latest Tuesday Topic; click for the details.
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