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.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--The first crack at vital smart-grid technical standards are due next year and some companies are already gumming up the works by pushing their own networking technology, according to the government official shepherding the process.
The need to hammer out interoperability standards is urgent and the task is extremely complex, said George Arnold, the national coordinator for smart-grid interoperability at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) who gave a presentation at a seminar organized by the IEEE here on Saturday. There will eventually be hundreds of standards covering many areas, from cybersecurity to how meters talk to plug-in cars.
"We've never tried to anything of this magnitude before," Arnold said. "It's more complicated than the Internet and Internet standards have been evolving for over 20 years."
By contrast, smart-grid standards need to be agreed on quickly, with the next phase of a multiyear process due next to begin year. Technical interoperability through standards is supposed to safeguard various players, including consumers and utilities, against technical obsolescence and wasted investment. About $8.1 billion of federal, state, and industry money will be spent on upgrading the electricity grid in the next three years.
The smart grid touches a number of different devices in a home and on the electricity grid. There's a push to establish the technical blueprints and standards certification by late next year.
(Credit: Electric Power Research Institute)In the case of smart appliances, Arnold said he is ruffling feathers by pushing networking companies to sort out a dizzying number of options.
With two-way meters installed in people's homes, a meter can send a message that higher electricity prices have gone into effect. For example, during a hot summer day when the air conditioning load on the grid is high, utilities may look to "shed load" and have some of its customers volunteer to lower their consumption.
An appliance, such as a dishwasher or clothes dryer, equipped with a chip should be able to receive the message from the meter and go into energy-saving mode. A "smart" appliance could receive the message and perhaps do a job in an hour instead of half an hour to use less power. That handshake between the appliance and meter needs to be standardized to make sure that consumers can buy products from different suppliers.
The problem is that there are multiple methods for passing energy-related information around the home and the companies involved are pushing their own technology, creating a "mess," said Arnold. There are wireless protocols Zigbee and Wi-Fi and at least six powerline communication protocols that use a home's wiring to move data.
"We're trying to accelerate the normal process and gravitate to a few market solutions, which normally takes years," he said after his talk. "Proponents of various communications standards all have a role but at the end of the day, there has to be some assurances for consumers."
Whirlpool last month announced that it would make 1 million "smart energy" clothes dryers by the end of 2011. That commitment, however, was contingent on standards being cooked by the end of 2010 and changes to regulations to reward consumers, appliances makers, and utilities to shave peak-time electricity use.
General Electric's appliance division, too, is making a complete line of demand response appliances.
But appliance manufacturers will be reluctant to support multiple protocols in their networking chips because that could raise the price of these grid-aware white goods.
Internet as a model
The situation with home-area networking is just one instance playing out among the dozens of technology providers, utilities, regulators, and standards bodies. Conflict over standards is common in the tech industry because betting on a failed standard can be costly. But the situation is more complex in the smart grid given the number of groups with a stake in the process.
NIST was given authority over smart-grid standards in 2007 and in September released a framework and roadmap for interoperability. (Click for PDF.) Arnold said that there has been strong industry support for the effort. But given that a number of smart-grid trials are already under way, NIST is focusing on accelerating the process, which will result in a testing and certification next year.
In some ways, NIST is looking at the Internet standards as a model for how the process should be operated. Last week, there was an event called Grid-Interop where a governing panel was created specifically to focus on interoperability.
"Over time this organization (called the Smart Grid Interoperability Panel) is going to become something like the Internet architecture board," said Arnold. "It's not being set up to develop standards. It's really being set up to develop the overall architecture and select which standards should be used."
Internet pioneer Vint Cerf is on the governing board of the panel, he added.
In its framework document, NIST identified eight priority areas where there is a lack of standards, which includes networking communications, security, and plug-in vehicles. But it is relying heavily on existing standards, including international standards, wherever it can to expedite the process, Arnold said.
That means coordinating among several standards organizations because the smart grid touches so many pieces of hardware and software. For example, to standardize plug-in electric vehicles requires coordination among upwards of 10 different organizations to cover national electric safety codes and standards for car batteries, networking, energy storage, and smart meters.
One of the principles that NIST is pursuing is that standards-based products should be backward-compatible since standards will continue to evolve for many years, Arnold said. He added that communications protocols over time should be based on the Internet Protocol.
Dozens of home energy monitors are coming to market, but nobody knows whether only hybrid Prius owners will use them.
Whole home energy monitors, or displays, are designed to help consumers conserve energy by providing far more detailed information than a monthly bill. These types of devices are already available, but millions more are poised to enter U.S. homes in the next two years, largely through utility-run smart grid programs.
The gadgets themselves vary, but the common thread among them is the ability to capture a stream of energy information from a meter at a given moment. Simply by surfacing real-time data, either with a small device or Web software, it's believed the system will prompt people to change their habits and ratchet down consumption by 5 percent to 15 percent, according to studies (PDF).
But even as more sophisticated and user-friendly products come to market, it's unclear whether consumers will track energy use regularly, particularly once the novelty wears off.
"Not everybody is an energy nerd yet," said David Schatsky, principal at consulting company GreenResearch. "While people who study this area are aware of the energy space, the average consumer is not."
Schatsky recently completed a study on home energy displays and concluded that they won't likely be a hot holiday season gift anytime soon. In the next two to three years, he projects there will be millions of these devices installed, with the numbers ramping up to tens of millions after that. Existing displays cost roughly $100 to $200 but Schatsky expects that many consumers will initially receive them for free from utilities as part of smart-grid programs.
In a survey, he found that about half of consumers said they were interested in tools to lower home energy bills. But in reality, the percentage of people who will actively manage their energy is probably much less. There are also technical hurdles to making these devices provide real-time information and useful recommendations.
As a result, he expects that energy-efficiency programs run by utilities in the next few years will drive adoption and provide some lessons on what resonates with consumers and not. As part of the multibillion dollar smart-grid grant program announced last month, about one million consumers will get in-home displays from utilities looking to lower consumers' energy consumption in smart-grid programs. Those programs are expected to get off the ground in the next few months.
Motivating consumers
The drive behind smart-grid technologies is to enable the grid to use electricity more efficiently, integrate more solar and wind power, and potentially eliminate the need to build new power plants to meet growing demand.
Countries around the world are investing to upgrade their grids, but there's a gnawing concern in the U.S. that consumers aren't sold on the benefits. Home energy displays are supposed to be one of the ways that utilities can help consumers save money and lighten their environment footprint.
At their most simple, a whole-house energy monitor shows what's happening on an electricity meter and translates that into cost and kilowatt-hours. For example, seeing that a home's current electricity use is higher than typical could lead a person to unplug a video game console or turn off lights. More sophisticated devices can provide information on how much individual appliances use and generate statistics.
When used as part of smart meter rollout, these devices can be a gateway for energy-efficiency services offered by a utility, such as demand response. For instance, a monitor can employ a color system where red indicates that the electricity rate has gone up because it's a time of peak demand.
The Web is a natural extension to these energy gadgets. Google's PowerMeter is being offered through utilities that install smart meters, which feed real-time energy use to the Web-based monitoring application. But Google is starting to offer PowerMeter through other devices, including a small monitor called the TED 5000.
The information and displays are meant to not only inform consumers but to motivate them to be more efficient. In order for that to work, the devices need to be simple to install and useful just at a glance, say monitor makers.
"There's all this talk about the smart grid, but if customers don't participate, it will be a bust," said Paul Nagel, the vice president of strategic development at home automation start-up Control4. "If they don't engage, then they'll never get energy savings."
Home area networks
One of the challenges that all energy display companies face is the technical barriers to getting them installed. The most sophisticated system would use a home-area network built around a smart meter and a network of Zigbee-enabled appliances and thermostat. But even with big investments in the smart grid, millions of homes still won't have smart meters.
Energy management companies are developing alternatives for getting data regularly from the meter to a display. Bridge devices can read meter information using the automatic meter reading (AMR) protocol, which is already available in millions of meters. Another approach is to clamp sensors onto a circuit box to get data or to install "smart plugs," which transmit data from appliances.
Even if a consumer is willing to navigate these technical issues, there is the question of whether the device will provide energy savings over time.
New home energy management companies are focusing on doing more than just monitor data because they are worried about what's called "mean time to kitchen drawer." That is, a person may have a small display on a kitchen counter as a reminder about energy use. But when the batteries run out, will they simply stash it in a kitchen drawer and forget about it?
Companies are now building in data analytics to provide recommendations or to automatically control appliances to ratchet down energy use. EcoFactor, for example, is developing a hosted software application that can analyze data from wireless thermostats and make changes to make the home more efficient.
Control4, a company which does touch-screen displays to manage video and music in a home, is now branching into energy management. Its EMS 100 device, which runs Linux on an Arm 9 processor, is powerful enough to analyze daily information to provide recommendations on how consumers can make changes to save energy, said Nagel. The company plans to offer it through utilities starting in the first quarter of next year.
Energy management services could be bundled with other home-automation products or even cable and telecom services. iControl and AlertMe in the U.K. plan to bundle security services with tools to manage heating, cooling, and lighting.
One way that utilities and energy management companies expect to motivate consumers is by comparing one home's usage to neighbors in comparably sized homes. Start-up Grounded Power is using social science techniques already proven with recycling and seat belt programs to encourage consumers to save energy, said Mike Bukhin, the vice president of engineering.
"Our users are taking snapshots of data subsets and comparing their data to others' in the community. 'How does my fridge compare to yours?' They also have the ability to ask resident experts questions about their data. The data in turn is shared with the rest of the community," he said.
Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore discusses his hopes and fears for the future of the smart grid.
(Credit: Josh Lowensohn/CNET)SAN MATEO, Calif.--Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore hopes that America's next-generation power grid will be a lot like the Internet. Or at least that's the plan.
How close we get to that goal depends on what happens in the next five years, Gore said in a speech here on Thursday evening at blog VentureBeat's GreenBeat conference, where he outlined many of the challenges the United States faces in upgrading its power grid. Along the way, he made comparisons to how the advent of the so-called smart grid will enable the kind of solutions and business innovation that the Internet brought during the 1990s.
"The analogy to the Internet is quite an exact one. Not completely exact, but it's very relevant for lots of reasons. We are moving inexorably toward a widely distributed energy generation and storage model. We are still locked into the old centralized energy generation model," Gore said. "The rapid development of new generations of new smart storage systems are going to make a tremendous difference in connection with the smart grids." Those systems are designed to enable easier storage of unused electricity for peak times, when supplying it to large groups of customers can be difficult and more expensive.
Gore also foresees an entirely new set of devices and instruments to help utilities and consumers control and monitor usage--technology and business models that may not yet have been imagined. "(It's) much the same way the Internet made it possible to see this generation of Internet-ready devices that did not even exist before the Internet began to build out," Gore said.
... Read moreThe California Energy Commission on Wednesday unanimously approved the first energy efficiency standards for televisions in the state over opposition from the Consumer Electronics Association.
The rules mandate that televisions sold in California starting in 2011 consume 33 percent less electricity than current models and 49 percent less by 2013. The regulations affect TVs that are 58 inches wide and less.
Video: In this episode of The Green Show, CNET's David
Katzmaier explains the factors that affect TV power use. (He's
introduced at about 1:38 minutes in.)
Although it's a state-level regulation, it is potentially significant outside California as other states are considering adopting similar rules. Unlike voluntary programs, such as the Environmental Protection Agency's EnergyStar program, the rules mandate certain levels of efficiency. For example, a 42-inch TV that consumes 183 watts or less by 2011 needs to consume 115 watts or less by 2013, the Commission explained in its statement.
The effort to regulate television efficiency, which was backed by California utilities and environmental groups, will save money for consumers on electricity and significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, say backers. After 10 years, the energy savings will be $8.1 billion, or enough to power 864,000 single-family homes, according to the California Energy Commission.
The Consumer Electronics Association has fiercely opposed the mandate, which has been under development since early 2007. The industry group submitted a statement arguing that efficiency gains should be done through voluntary efforts by manufacturers and more consumer education. (Click for PDF of submission to the CEC.)
At the same time, some television manufacturers and the LCD TV Association supported the measure.
As consumers upgrade to flat-screen TVs, there's a concern that there will be a significant increase in aggregate power usage, in part because people are buying TVs with bigger screens. The Natural Resources Defense Council estimates that implementing the efficiency rules will cut the state's electricity use by almost 1 percent and mean that a 500-megawatt power plant will not need to be built to meet rising demand for power. (Click for Q&A from NRDC).
The California Energy Commission has energy efficiency mandates for a number of household appliances, such as refrigerators. The state's energy efficiency policies have kept the per capita energy consumption steady since the 1970s, according to the Commission.
EcoFactor has been awarded Cleantech Open's national award, which includes $100,000 in seed capital.
The awards ceremony for one of the leading environmental start-up competitions took place at the Masonic Center in San Francisco following a day-long conference in which contestants and venture capitalists had a chance to mingle.
EcoFactor has developed software that works in conjunction with a two-way thermostat to better maintain stable desired temperatures in homes. The system relies on outside data like weather as well has the thermal habits of the home, and self-regulates based on those factors. The process helps heating and cooling home systems run 20-30 percent more efficiently, according to company statistics.
"Being named the Cleantech Open national winner really validates our solution and our business model, and proves that the market is looking for energy-efficiency solutions that don't ask people to change their behavior or sacrifice comfort," EcoFactor CEO and co-founder John Steinberg said in a statement.
Out of the 12 national finalists, there were also 2 chosen as runners-up: Micromidas, which developed a process for converting raw sewage into biodegradable plastic products and Alphabet Energy, a team from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with a system that produces electricity from waste heat.
SolarReserve and Preneal have garnered the necessary permit to build a 50-megawatt thermal-solar plant in Spain that will use molten salt to store and release solar energy, the companies said Wednesday.
The project will be built in Alcazar de San Juan, a town about 110 miles south of Madrid. The environmental permit that will allow the construction of a project using molten salt was issued by the local Castilla-La Mancha government.
The Santa Monica, Calif.-based start-up, SolarReserve uses a fairly unique method to offer power from a solar plant even after the sun sets.
While the sun is shining, giant heliostats reflect sunlight into a center pool of hot, liquefied salt that absorbs the heat. The molten salt, which can be kept hot even at night or on cloudy days for up to 24 sunless hours, is used to feed a steam-generated turbine to make electricity. The salt is then redirected out of the generator to be reheated and used again.
SolarReserve's partner on the Spain project, Madrid-based Preneal, is a development and construction company that specializes in wind and solar energy plants.
The Alcazar solar-thermal power project is set to break ground in 2010. It is expected to generate 750 construction jobs and 75 facility operation jobs, according to the companies.
Once fully operational, the plant is expected to generate over 300,000 megawatt-hours of electricity per year, roughly enough to power 70,000 Spanish homes.
Would you be willing to pay for home security services if they could also help cut your electricity bills?
In a nutshell, that's what start-up iControl is pitching to consumers with its energy management software and home automation gear. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company is also working with utilities to get its energy management system installed as part of smart-grid trials.
On Tuesday, it said that its home automation equipment can now use the Zigbee wireless protocol to communicate with two-way smart meters.
Will home energy management enter through home automation networks?
(Credit: iControl Networks)It's part of the company's plan to enter the field of home energy efficiency, where there are dozens of companies already vying for business. The path it's taking is either through security service companies, utilities, or broadband suppliers, such as cable companies or phone companies, said CEO Paul Dawes.
iControl's technology is software for managing home area networks for home security. It also makes reference designs for Internet gateways and networked thermostats manufactured by third parties. The system allows a person to set up a network of security cameras which can be controlled by a touch-screen device.
With some additional equipment, the system can also be used to monitor energy usage and help homeowners cut energy usage, said Dawes. He expects these services will be offered for free as part of monthly security services, which cost about $30 to $35 per month. Security company ADT said that it plans to use iControl's software system to include services beyond home security, he added.
iControl's energy management system will also work with smart meters installed by utilities. Using a Zigbee-based gateway box and a networked thermostat, the system can get data via the smart meter which can help cut consumers' electricity bill, Dawes said.
For example, the meter can signal when cheaper rates are in effect or when there is a demand-response program in effect. In those cases, appliances on the iControl network can be scheduled to take advantage of those lower rates.
By buying some additional equipment, a consumer could program lighting and heating and cooling using the system, but the company is mainly working through utilities at this point.
"We don't see consumers willing to pay a recurring fee for energy management. They're willing to spend $50 for some energy management solution. What's going to change is when utilities go to time-of-use metering (where there are different prices at different times). Then, the economic incentive is much higher," Dawes said.
iControl is expecting that telecommunications and cable providers will start offering Internet-based home security services and then home energy management. But at this point, it's not clear how those companies will make money in energy management, Dawes said.
What if you could better control home appliance energy use by making your wall socket more clever?
That's the idea behind TalkingPlug from Toronto-based Zerofootprint, a company that makes software for measuring and monitoring corporate carbon emissions.
TalkingPlug is a plug that fits on top of existing electrical outlets. But it's equipped with componentry to make it a controllable node on a network, including an RFID chip, microprocessor, and wireless networking. The company plans to introduce the product next week.
Zerofooprint's wireless plug, coupled with hosted software, is designed to let people view energy use and program appliances.
(Credit: Zerofootprint)The "smart plugs" will be able to give detailed information on how much electricity individual appliances are using. Because it's programmable, people can also control appliances. For example, a person could have a TV set-top box turn off at midnight and turn on again at 7 in the morning.
A set of plugs create a mesh network and can send information via a home or office building router to Zerofootprint. The company's software processes and analyzes the data, showing people how the energy use compares to others.
"It will completely transform our world when plugs talk to each other and interact with each other," said Ron Dembo, the CEO of Zerofootprint.
For residential customers, it makes most sense to use plugs for areas that draw a lot of power, such entertainment centers and home computers, Dembo said. He estimated the cost is about $50 now but he expects that price would drop significantly if made at larger scale.
The company has built early versions of the product and is seeking companies willing to test it out, such as utilities or appliance makers looking for a way to get information on products.
There are many companies developing energy-management software and devices aimed at helping people reduce wasted electricity use. One of the main technical challenges is getting information from appliances.
For example, IBM and utility Consert are running a trial smart-grid program where large appliances, such as HVAC systems and hot water heaters, are equipped with controllers that can feed data to a meter with two-way communications. Data is collected using a home's Internet connection, and the consumer can view energy data and control appliances from a Web page.
Google's energy-monitoring application PowerMeter can get detailed data using either a smart meter or a home energy display, typically installed by an electrician. Zerofootprint's Dembo said that the TalkingPlug approach, where monitoring and control is placed at the point of use, can be cheaper than existing methods once products are made at large scale.
Start-up EcoFactor is looking at home energy management as a big math problem.
The Silicon Valley-based company on Tuesday is formally launching and is announcing that the largest utilty in Texas, Oncor, has signed on with EcoFactor's residential energy-management service for three years.
There are several companies developing Web-based software or displays to show consumers, in more detail than a monthly bill, how much energy they are using.
A conduit for gathering data.
(Credit: Carrier )EcoFactor's software, by contrast, works behind the scenes by gathering data from a two-way thermostat and then analyzing the information to optimize heating and cooling systems, which often account for about half of home electricity use.
Collecting thousands of pieces of information a day helps create a picture of a home's "thermal characteristics" and make heating and cooling systems run 20 percent to 30 percent more efficiently, said Scott Hublou, the company's senior vice president of products and co-founder. Even homeowners who have programmed thermostats can benefit because the analysis is customized for a single home, he said.
"People want to do the right thing but they don't necessarily have all the answers, which depends a lot on the thermal characteristics of the house and the mechances of the HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) systems. Sometimes it's the best guess," Hublou said.
EcoFactor combines thermostat settings and information on weather forecasts to run HVAC systems more efficiently. For example, in a trial it found that in two nearly identical homes it was more efficient to turn on the air conditioner one hour before residents came home, rather than to run it at a slightly higher temperature all day long. People can also override settings, which is another piece of data the software uses.
To use the service, consumers need to have a two-way thermostat that can send data over a home broadband connection to EcoFactor's hosted application, which is written on the open-source LAMP stack.
EcoFactor plans to offer the service through business partners, including utilities. There are also a number of service providers, notably telecom operators and cable companies, that are looking to offer home energy-management services to existing customers.
In the deal with Oncor, the software will be used as part of demand-response program in Texas in which customers get a discount to cut electricity use during peak times, typically the middle of a hot day when the air conditioning load on the system is high.
Rather than adjust thermostats higher during peak times, the EcoFactor software will be able to "pre-cool" homes in anticipation of the demand-response event, which should make it more comfortable for people participating in the progam, Hublou explained. Altogether, the software will be used to cut three megawatts of peak power, the equivalent of about 2,000 average-size air conditioner units.
EcoFactor, which was founded three years ago, is funded by angel investors. The company is now in the process of trying to raise a series A round of venture capital.
