DOE smart-grid trials fund utility-scale energy storage

The Department of Energy on Tuesday awarded $620 million in smart grid projects, the second major wave of government-led funding to modernize the electricity grid.

The money will come from the stimulus package and be matched by commercial companies, making the total spending $1.6 billion spread across 32 demonstration projects in 21 states. A total of $8.1 billion in smart-grid spending from public and private sources was announced late last month.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced the awards at Ohio-based utility AEP, whose GridSmart program is considered one of the more technically advanced.

The bulk of the DOE awards--$435 million--will be aimed at adding communications to the transmission and distribution grid through the installation of two-way meters, sensors on the transmission lines, and in-home energy displays.

This is a large megawatt storage device already on AEP's grid. Click on the image to see a photo gallery of power grid storage technologies.

(Credit: AEP)

By networking devices along the grid and adding digital controls, utilities can more easily locate and fix outages and use their energy supply more efficiently. For consumers, in-home displays will allow them to get a real-time readout of their electricity usage to help ways to cut down consumption. Some utilities also offer programs where consumers can get cheaper rates to shave power use during peak times.

The rest of the DOE funding will go toward testing a range of energy storage technologies, including flow batteries, flywheels, and compressed air storage. With storage, utilities can more easily use solar and wind power by better managing the flow of energy on the grid.

[ducttape36]

How much has been spent towards security? I know $18.8M was awarded to the university of illinois and their partners in the TCIPG project. If smart grids were attacked the results could be devestating.

[MD_Willington]

Digital Line Protection Relays already have fault location and communication capabilities - they've been around for over 25 years now... AEP already uses one of the best line protection relays around, the SEL-421. Hit up google and search for AEP SEL 421.

[directorblue]

wonderful. let's bring back the politburo for more central planning exercises.

[SteveChicago]

I think that the "smart-grid" needs to be done from production down to the local substation. You can put smart meters at large corporate customers. However, what homes need is a way to meter the circuits in the panel or major appliances and report on that. <br /><br />From my bill I know that I use about 250kWh per month. I know that I use more lights at night and the AC increases the bill, duh. What I do not know is what portion of the bill the AC or fridge is. If I did that I could look at efficiency numbers on new models and do a cost analysis of wether I should get a new one or not. <br /><br />Point is, I do not see what a smart meter on my house is going to do unless it can tell me room/appliance usage on a reportable basis.

[MD_Willington]

Smart meters are really snitch meters, as Steve points out the meter cannot tell you what is happening with everything in the house and in what room, at least right now, wait for the mandated legislation that every device has a an ID similar to a MAC address and that device will report to the meter. The main idea behind the existing smart meter is that the utilities will be able to charge you based on "time of use" and for other things such as harmonics and power factor. Industrial customers are billed on TOU, PF and harmonics right now - soon non utility customers will be based this way.