Several news sources are reporting that Democratic leaders are removing the most contentious issues from major energy legislation: specifically, — raising vehicle fuel economy standards and setting nationwide mandates for renewable fuels and electricity. Our focus is H.R. 3221, passed by the House of Representatives on August 4, 2007, establishing (i) a Federal Grid Modernization Commission, (ii) requiring development of protocols and standards for information management, (iii) establishing a Smart Grid investment grant program matching 25% of qualifying Smart Grid investments ($250M appropriated for 2008 and $500M appropriated per year for 2009-2012). Further, and most importantly, it requires (not asks as in EPACT 2005) utilities to consider ways to encourage Smart Grids, energy efficiency and demand response.
We welcome simplification of the negotiation process. In and of itself, building the Smart Grid should not be held hostage to other issues. These other issues are important, but as pointed out by opponents, the mandate for renewables could be considered a tax and over 20 states already have these kinds of standards. Smart Grid proponents should applaud this move. Simplification will advance Smart Grid Facilitation
Partially funded with a $13.3M DOE grant, Southwire just installed a superconducting cable at an two Entergy substations in Louisiana. The superconducting cable eases electrical congestion. The good news is that the award was made in June and installation was completed by the end of August this year. The not so good news is that DOE grants for transmission hardware are not what the Smart Grid is about. It would be preferable to see this DOE funding focused on digitization of the grid with meters, controls and measurement systems. The House of Representatives has proposed $1.25B in similar funding through 2012. Let's hope that this funding is directed at digitizing the grid and not just replacing hardware that needs replacement.
Entergy Arkansas was told last Friday ‘to take steps necessary to aggressively pursue cost-effective demand response and energy efficiency resources to meet anticipated loads.
The Arkansas Public Sevice Commission gave Enetergy what it wanted -- the ability to contract for more gas-fired generation; but, it pointed out that Entergy, an investor owned utility, needed to start meeting additional load through demand response and energy efficiency techniques. The PSC mde a point that Arkansas coop utilities had a long history of using demand response...so why not Entergy?
Wind generation is growing at a faster pace than any other renewable according to recent data published by the Energy Information Administration.
Renewables constituted about 11% of total energy consumption. Wind capacity increased more during 2006 than any other renewable generation source with 2,413 megawatts of new capacity.
The House just passed the Smart Grid Facilitation Actrequiring utilities generate 15% of their energy through renewables by 2020. Nationwide, EIA statistics show that renewables are less than 10% of energy generation on a nationwide basis with many states producing little, if any renewable energy. We expect a major struggle for a Federal Renewable Portfolio (that is what the renewable requirement is called) when the act goes into conference with the previously passed Senate bill which is considerably different.
Our electrical grid is poorly secured; at least that is what a recent study published by the Society for Risk Analysisconcluded. This is not an unexpected conclusion, but the study completed by the USC Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of TerrorismEvents put a cost to this lack of security -- it would cost LA about $1.46 billon a day.
The report analyzed the affect of a 2 week black our from a terrorism event. If you are interested in this topic, look at the several white papers issued by the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL)on the characteristics of a modern grid that outline how the smart grid would resist attack and heal itself in such situations. It is not big news that our gird is poorly secured or will cost billions if it goes down, the item that should be of interest is how do we avoid this disaster.
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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