Will consumers ever want to hug the stuffing out of the smart grid?

Like most people around the world, I find myself still thinking about those Chilean miners, more than a week after the rescue seen around the world.

I was at home in bed watching a live video feed as the capsule carrying the first rescue worker reached the bottom of the mine. The miners couldn’t wait to touch him, to hug him, to reach out to him, and the worker was visibly emotionally touched by their physical reactions to him.

It was an almost child-like reaction those miners had, wanting to make sure the rescue worker was real. It’s the same reaction we have when we’re confronted with something or someone that seems mythical. We want to touch it, to touch her. We want to see if it’s imaginary, and, when it is proven real, we want to embrace it and, as my mother would say, “just hug the stuffing out of it” because we’re so happy it exists.

I thought the miners were going to hug the stuffing out of that poor rescue worker, but, I honestly don’t think he would have minded. That moment where myth became flesh was too amazing to worry about one’s stuffing, really.

In the end, mythology was trumped by reality---after two months of those miners thinking the outside world atop their heads was unreachable, unthinkable, mythological, it became real again.

Mythology is a part of all human culture. We tell stories of great feats, and, if we can’t explain them scientifically, or if we have a large emotional reaction that such things can’t be reality, we tend to bloom them into myths.

The smart grid is no exception. It has its own mythology, especially to the average electric consumer hearing all sorts of horror stories about higher bills and problematic smart meters. The real issue with mythology is that it does not always feed on fact. It can feed equally on emotions, whether positive ones like the hope those miners had of returning to the surface, or negative ones like turmoil, chaos and fear.

With customers today, the smart grid mythology is a negative one and is, unfortunately, based on fear---fear of the unknown. While, as an industry, we seem collectively flabbergasted at the large number of negative stories on the smart grid that have been published in recent months, we have to realize the emotional distance between those of us “in the know” with smart grid technology and all those customers still in the dark.

We are on the surface, and, figuratively, those customers are in a mine, and what exists between the two camps are layers and layers of sedimentary mythology that we must, as an industry, find a way to drill through if we’re going to get those customers to see the smart grid in a positive light.

They need to see it, touch it, find out that it’s real and positive, but we can’t accomplish that by simply telling them it’s positive. You can’t pop a solid myth with pretty words. Unfortunately, mythology is a bit harder to fight and, once established, is much tougher to disperse. We have to accept that negative mythology, whether or not it is based on fact, has been established with customers and the smart grid. And, we have to stop griping about how the average customer just doesn’t understand. You’re right. They don’t.

But, if we don’t find a way to break through that rock-hard mythology, we may find that even the smart grid itself, every digital bit and byte and every physical meter, may fade from fact into mythology, as well. The question is: How do we show the positive truth of the smart grid to the average customer so that they want to just hug the stuffing out of it?

Lineman's Rodeo hits KC

I made a joke to my coworkers that, this weekend, I'm traveling in the beaten track of Wilbert Harrison---going to Kansas City, here I come. Sadly, even with my slightly off-key singing, few people get that joke anymore.

This weekend, Kansas City is host to the International Lineman's Rodeo. Well, more specifically, the rodeo plops down in Overland Park, a suburb of KC.

This is the 27th annual lineman's rodeo, and the 2010 version is packed with an exhibit floor and the rodeo events themselves, which happen on Saturday in Bonner Springs, Kansas, another suburb of KC. Everything's in the 'burbs these days.

Kansas City Power and Light along with Westar Energy are the host utilities for this well-attended event attracting the best of the best in lineman from across the country and around the world. The rodeo on Saturday pits utility teams against one another in a number of traditional lineman tasks from pole climbing to hurt man rescue. There are also a number of surprise "mystery events," where the teams don't know what they will be tested on until they get on site. (Last year, one of the mystery events was replacing a lightening arrestor. Southern California Edison won that event.)

The first Lineman's Rodeo was held in September 1984 with twelve participating teams from Kansas and Missouri. This year, there are teams from Canada, Hawaii and even Brazil, according to the show's registration people (whom I chatted with a bit earlier today). While the exposition that comes into play today and tomorrow before the rodeo is quite a draw (especially for free t-shirts), it's clear that the real excitement is yet to come---at the Saturday rodeo. When even your registration staff is excited, you know you have something special in hand.

The expo at the Overland Park Convention Center over the next two days features a number of exhibitors from Aircraft Dynamics to Buckingham Manufacturing Co., from Duratel to our own sister publication Utility Products. (Utility Products is currently neck-and-neck in the running for the best giveaway t-shirt, right up there with Bulwark, which has a line that extends out from its booth and down the aisle. T-shirts really are the thing here at the Lineman's Rodeo.)

Those handy folks at registration told me that, on average, the exhibit floor will take in around 2500 people today and tomorrow before the Saturday rodeo. Additionally, for this year, there are over 150 teams registered for the rodeo itself and around 200 apprentices. (It's a bit down from years past due to the economy, but the Lineman's Rodeo is still a very strong event indeed. That expo floor was packed when I left a few minutes ago, and Utility Products was darn close to running out of t-shirts, as were most exhibitors.)

Are you here at the Lineman's Rodeo? If so, leave me a comment or two about what you're seeing and hearing at the event. Reading this after the event? Tell me your favorite winners and moments at the rodeo.

Fess up, utilities: Smart grid stuffs may not save customer cash

Let me preface this entry by saying that I believe in the smart grid. I’m a fan. I think we need a smarter, more self-healing, more active, more adaptable energy system. It is, indeed, the wave of the future, the golden child, the technological messiah.

But, nope, it ain’t gonna be cheap.

Last week, I wrote a blog about the California governor signing into law a bill that (sorta) mandates utility targets for energy storage in the state. You can read it here, if you’re interested.

One of the comments I received was from a reader named Jim. He wrote:

Will investment in energy storage lower my energy bill? Of course not. Is this the most effective way to reduce green house gases? Not by a long shot. The virtue of this plan is that everyone gets to subsidize those who will make a lot money from it.

To be completely honest here, Jim is absolutely right. Is energy storage specifically (and smart grid or renewables generally) going to automatically start Jim’s electric bill on the path to negative numbers? Is the power company going to, eventually, have to pay him? Probably not unless he has own wind turbine or solar panels, and, even then, such technologies would cost him a lot up front for purchase and installation.

And, sure, energy storage is not the most direct way to reduce greenhouse gases produced by the power industry. The most direct way would be to just shut down fossil fuel plants---at least the most direct within our industry. But, we can’t do that. So, we have to look for some outside options that may be more than the mathematically logical straight line between two points. Sometimes, it takes a cloud of dots to clear the air.

And, in the end, will people make money off this stuff? Yes, they will. For AB2514 (that energy storage bill), the companies that make the equipment will make money. For the smart grid, yes, the companies that have those smarter technologies and can sell them will make money. That’s the way capitalism---fortunately or unfortunately---works. Those companies wouldn’t be in business if they didn’t have a profit margin.

And, in the end, the same has to be said for your utility. While they are highly regulated and while they don’t really get the free reign of capitalism that, say, Wal-Mart does, they are still a company and still trying to make a bit of money---while providing a valuable, important service. Whether or not such a service should be socialized, privatized, deregulated or regulated is another argument really. Here, we’re talking about what is.

And, in the land of “what is,” here are the facts:
(1) Smart grid technology costs money.
(2) Utilities can only take on so much of the up-front costs of smart grid before passing it on to consumers.
(3) We also need to seriously upgrade infrastructure for those smart grid technologies, and that, too, costs money.

So, yes, Jim is totally right. Why can’t we, as an industry, admit that? We often market the smart grid as a way to save the consumer cash, but, let’s be honest, that’s not always true. And, to so do, the consumer would have to be willingly involved---checking energy consumption, adjusting their use, understanding rate changes.

In the end, can we set aside the idea of selling the smart grid, renewable adoption and upgraded power technology as a saver of nickels and dimes and dollars? Instead, can we be more direct and say, “The smart grid is good for the individual, good for the marketplace and good for the country.”

As Martha Stewart coined, the smart grid is a “good thing.” It will allow for more renewables. It will give better information on power use, outages and issues. It will add technological options to the grid. And, sure, if you’re super dedicated to your in-home energy management unit and are willing to invest time (and perhaps cash if you had to buy and install that unit), the smart grid could save you money.

It could, but we’ll still need to pay for upgrades, research, investment and pilot programs before that happens. And, while a lot of that cost is being shouldered by utility companies, it is more than true that the average consumer is not going to see a financial benefit to the smart grid in the near future. They may get smarter, more reliable, higher quality energy. And, they may, in a few years, get to help with that greenhouse gas reduction, but it’s time to market the smart grid with it’s definite positives and let go of the idea that the average consumer can only be swayed to join the smart grid fan base if we talk about cash.

Let’s talk about change, about a smarter future. Let’s talk about cleaner energy and fewer outages. Let’s talk about more understanding with energy use and energy production. But, let’s stop talking about the almighty dollar. It’s just clouding an issue that should be about positive and necessary change and not about cost savings.