Live from Eurelectric's Smart Grids Workshop: It's All about Consumers

It's nice when you unexpectedly meet an old friend, isn't it?

While sitting in a meeting at Eurelectric's "How will Smart Grids Change the Face of Europe's Electricity Distribution and Consumption?" policy workshop in Brussels this afternoon, in walked Richard Charnah, the technology director for AREVA T&D and a committee member for our POWERGRID Europe show coming up in Amsterdam. It was great to see him, and additionally delightful to get input from someone I trusted about what was discussed.

This afternoon, there was a lot of talk about the consumer. How to sell smart grids to the consumer, what the consumer is afraid of with smart grids, why the consumer needs to be on board with smart grids, ways to bring the consumer into the smart grid discussion.

I have to say, I was a bit disappointed. I'll be honest: Talk about the consumer is, in fact, a bit like an old friend---since I've heard it so much---but I don't care about the consumer. And, in a return act, the consumer doesn't much care about the smart grid.

The consumer is the part of the smart grid equation that just won't die. We don't really care about them; they don't really care about us (as a smart grid industry). Everyone really just wants to be left alone to do our own thing. Yet, still, we end up in the same room when anyone talks about changing the current power distribution system. It's like having to endure those hated relatives at Thanksgiving.

And, although the smart grid will have a lot of long-term societal benefits in making energy more efficient and bringing in more green power, we never, as an industry make the choice to sell them on a culture change. We always aim for selling it like a benefit to the wallet, like they will see so much more money and cost savings with the smart grid.

Well, sure, if they keep up with their own consumption and the time-of-use (TOU) rates. And, additionally, if they have the excess load that's both (1.) not immediately necessary and (2.) planned in advance to shift to cheaper consumption times. But, that's a bit like assuming every single consumer of the smart grid was an A+ science student and went to MIT. Some consumers don't want to track consumption, compare rates and plan ahead for use of dishwashers and clothes dryers.

Some of us are just not that good at organizing the little things like when I might need a clean plate or when I might run out of clean underwear. Not everyone in every classroom was an A+ student. I was in English, but not in math. And, seriously, I would hate, hate, hate to have to run numbers in my head every single time I thought about turning on the TV. While most industries, like the cell phone/smart phone peeps, are opting away from TOU stuff that made consumers angry because they thought they were being overcharged and, conversely, investing in large blocks of minutes and data plans, we're going the opposite way, joyfully assuming a desire among consumers to track graphs on energy use that I doubt is a real for any more than five people on the planet.

I really wish we'd stop talking about the consumer entirely. It's just not the most important part of the smart grid equation right now, but it seems to take up the most thought. So, if we must talk about those pesky consumers, if we must figure out just how to sell the average man, woman and child (be he or she residing in Africa, Asia, Europe or the Americas) on the smart grid, can we please NOT assume that said man, woman or child is going to be gung-ho in collecting, sorting and analyzing data---nor keen on super amounts of planning, either.

Let's sell consumers on the social benefits, the cultural benefits: renewables integration, fewer outages, better outage management, an overall more reliable grid ready to do things like plug in electric vehicles. Let's talk about the smart grid in terms of social benefits and chuck this concept that we can sell it in "pounds and pence," as I heard today.

If the consumer needs to be sold, let's appeal to their hearts and not their wallets because, in the end, we don't have enough control over how they manage, sort and plan their energy consumption---nor over their perceptions of cost---to accurately sell this in terms of coin.

Now, let's all talk about important things like standards and interoperability and let the consumer go back to a bit of evening TV without the fuss of figuring out if this is the right time to use power tonight to benefit our energy bottomline, shall we?

Coal Mine Disaster Brings New Reason to Consider Renewables

The rather dramatic irony of this blog entry is that I thought about writing it yesterday after reading about China’s flooded mine and all the men trapped there. At that point, I was thinking about how much safer our own mines are here in the U.S., how that probably wouldn’t happen here after all the OSHA safety requirements and other issues involved. I was going to write about that, slant the article to say we can help China make mining less dangerous. Then, this morning, I read about the coal mine blast in West Virginia that has killed 25 people with four still missing.

Coal mining is a dirty, nasty business---even with our OSHA regulations, even with our laws and safety requirements. We’re not so different, at the core, from China, after all. It may, in fact, be impossible to make mining a really safe endeavor.

I come from a long line of coal miners. I’ll bet you are surprised by that revelation. My grandfather was a coal miner. And his father. And his father’s father. My family’s dug a lot of black chunks out of the ground.

My grandfather used to talk sometimes, quietly about what miners fear most---back then it was a scary term called “blackdamp.” Blackdamp is the removal of oxygen in the air, which is replaced by toxic gases. Pretty much all tight, sealed environments can create blackdamp, but it’s especially nasty in coal mines because the coal itself adds to the problem. Coal, once exposed to air, begins absorbing oxygen and giving off carbon dioxide and water vapor. My grandfather used to talk about blackdamp as if the mine itself was breathing, cutting off air from the miners inside its gullet.

You can’t smell blackdamp. You usually only become aware when you get lightheaded and dizzy, uncoordinated like you’ve had way too much to drink.

Blackdamp was what miners feared most in my grandfather’s day. But, that wasn’t usually what killed them. It did kill some, of course, but most miners were killed from the force and power of collapses or accidents, not from the creeping blackdamp. Still, the blackdamp scared them most---that slow, crazy spiral to asphyxiation that it represented. My grandfather said the scariest thing was an awareness that death is coming down that mine in bits and parcels, in small steps and strides. And you had to watch. You had to realize what was coming.

My grandfather stopped fearing the blackdamp in 1947 because he stopped being a coal miner in 1947. March 26, 1947, to be exact. He was running late for his shift at the Centralia Coal Company’s No. 5 mine on the edge of Centralia, Illinois. He wasn’t usually the type to run late---at least not as I recall. (We always made it to the movies and the circus early enough to get sodas and popcorn when I was a kid.) But, that one day in 1947, he was a bit behind. He told me the reason was something to do with a family birthday celebration that had kept him up way too late the night before.

The celebration hadn’t, however, slowed down my great-grandfather. Not a bit. He was bang on time for the mine collapse---the worst coal mine disaster that the country had seen in nearly 20 years. 111 men died in that mine disaster, including my great-grandfather Jacob Rethard. My grandfather, Raymond, would talk about digging with shovels and picks and bare and bloody hands---anything to get to his father and those other men trapped, even though they knew just minutes after the shaft fell that hope for the lives of those men was completely futile: If the force didn’t get them, the blackdamp and growing lack of oxygen certainly would. It was a race against time, and they didn’t have the equipment to win. Still, my grandfather kept digging until he recovered the body of his father. His father was no. 110---the 110th body. No. 110 out of the 111 dead men pulled from that mine.

And my grandfather walked away from that disaster dirty and bloody and done. He left coal mining behind without a second thought.

As human beings, we are incredibly resilient. My grandfather certainly was. He became a security guard, working everywhere from Vegas to Oklahoma City. He raised a family and rarely talked about that coal mine collapse that killed his father. He was funny, a great cook, and he used to build the most amazing blanket-and-kitchen-chair forts in his living room, much to the annoyance of my grandmother. He pressed on.

As a society, we often mirror my grandfather’s ability to move forward. Hundreds of men in China die, and it really doesn’t stop us from flicking a light switch. We don’t make that connection much. 25 men in West Virginia died today, and it hasn’t stopped me from using my computer or my television. We have a great capacity to accept and move on. But, maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to adapt.

I’ve thought a lot about the place of renewables in this industry in the last few years---most of it focused on the practical. I still think they are expensive and lacking in a certain economy of scale. But, perhaps I should think less about the financial cost of renewables and more about the lives they might save---not just with reducing global warming but direct human lives like those we lose regularly in coal mines around the world.

Jacob Rethard was a solid, tough family man who was proud to be a coal miner, but it cost him his life. My grandfather, Raymond Rethard, walked away from that disaster that killed his father a changed man, one who saw coal mining as not worth the risk. In the end, he died at a ripe old age surrounded by family---not by darkness and blackdamp.

Perhaps we should pay more attention to the humanity embroiled in the dangers of mining. If renewables become more prevalent, could we save more men in China and in West Virginia and in Illinois from dying in the dark? Years ago I made a definitive choice to never buy diamonds because of the human cost they sometimes require to mine. It was a change in attitude, and I know I’m not alone in that attitude or choice. Perhaps we, as an industry and as a society, also need to consider a change in attitude and adjust our social concepts and technological advances to give the advantage to renewables, even if they are more expensive. We should remember that we sometimes pay a very large, very human price for very cheap power.

And, bottom line, that human price may be much, much less if renewables were given a stronger foothold in power production. It would be a nice change if no man had to fear the dark blackdamp in our smart energy future.

Projects of the Year Award Winners Named

The editors of POWERGRID International magazine (including little ol' me) and PennWell Corp. have announced four winners for the magazine's annual Projects of the Year Awards program.

The winners were selected for four specific categories: Best Energy Efficiency/Demand Response Project, Best Grid Integration of Renewables Project, Best Smart Grid Project and Best Smart Metering Project.

The awards were given out during the keynote presentation at the DistribuTECH 2010 conference in Tampa, Fla.

For more details on these award winners, see the April issue of POWERGRID International magazine.

Best Energy Efficiency/Demand Response Project
The winner of the Energy Efficiency/Demand Response Project of the Year Award is PJM for the organization's Interconnect Demand Response Integration project.

The PJM Interconnection regional transmission organization is the world's largest power grid, serving 51 million people across 13 states and the District of Columbia.

In June 2009, PJM implemented a next-generation software system to expand demand-side resources and improve the operational efficiency of demand-side programs in its wholesale electricity markets. The software, eLRS, based on UISOL's DRBizNet, links and automates wholesale power market transactions that involve PJM, utilities and demand response curtailment service providers. Some 750 users in 200 market participant organizations are using eLRS to enable more than 7,500 MW of demand response in PJM energy, capacity or ancillary services markets.

PJM sought a flexible secure, standards-based system that could cost effectively adapt to meet future needs and market rule changes. It markets over 7,000 MW of demand resources that represent approximately 450,000 end-use customers. The eLRS solution is one of the largest and most sophisticated production deployments of a demand response management system in the world.

Best Grid Integration of Renewables Project
The winner of the Grid Integration of Renewables Project of the Year Award is Gainesville Regional Utilities (GRU) for the GRU Feed-in Tariff project.

In the fall of 2008, The Solar Electric Power Association (SEPA) awarded Ed Regan, Assistant General Manager for Strategic Planning for Gainesville Regional Utilities (GRU), and several utility executives throughout the country a grant to visit Germany and witness first-hand Germany's booming solar industry. The stimulus behind that solar boom is Germany's feed-in tariff, a pay-for-performance policy mechanism designed to encourage the adoption of renewable energy.

On January 15, 2009, the Gainesville City Commission unanimously approved a solar feed-in tariff (FIT) ordinance, thereby making Gainesville Regional Utilities the first entity in the nation to offer such an incentive. The ordinance allows GRU to accept a maximum of four cumulative MW of PV installations into the FIT program per year. GRU treats projects on a first-come-first-serve basis, with a queue available for when the yearly MW allotment fills. GRU began accepting applications on March 1, 2009. Within one month of the program's initiation, the queue filled through 2012. In November of 2009, the queue filled through 2016 and GRU placed a hold on accepting applications.

GRU's FIT model has been replicated throughout the country, with feed-in tariffs now available in states such as California, Vermont, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington.

Best Smart Grid Project
The winner of the Smart Grid Project of the Year Award is the City of Ruston, Louisiana for the City of Ruston Smart Grid Innovation project.

Ruston, located in Lincoln Parish between Shreveport and Monroe in north Louisiana, is home to 20,546 residents. The coverage area is approximately 16 square miles, containing a meter population estimated at 10,600 electric meters and 8,872 water meters.

While the centerpiece of Ruston's program is AMI, the planning also includes an integrated MDM system, which will be closely integrated with the AMI system to provide enhanced smart grid/AMI functionality, including: data integration/normalization, aggregation/settlement, load profiling, centralized meter data storage and a loss analysis reporting system (LARS).

LARS will provide a comprehensive view of line loss by systematically reconciling wholesale power purchase records with power purchase sales down to the substation and individual feeder circuit. This allows pinpointing where losses occur and operational corrections can be made to recover revenue and increase the efficiency of the distribution network. Additionally, the system will provide a real-time, multi-layering graphical interface, enabling a view of overall system state-of-the-utility network.

Ruston's leadership in pursuing a holistic smart grid vision is forward-thinking, especially compared to peer-sized utilities across the nation.

Best Smart Metering Project
The winner of the Smart Metering Project of the Year Award is Pulaski Electric for the Lightspeed AMI project.

Pulaski Electric System (PES) provides power to 15,000 homes and businesses in Giles County, Tennessee. As Tennessee's oldest municipal utility and the first in the state to receive power from the Tennessee Valley Authority, PES has a long history of providing top tier service through the use of technologies. Getting full Smart Grid functionality – namely Advanced Metering, Demand Response & Distribution Automation – from a fiber optic network was a logical step for a city-owned utility that prides itself on being one of the most progressive in the state.

PES reasoned that fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) is really an extension of municipal infrastructure and is as important as good roads, schools and other essential services. When attracting a big name provider for a project that involved laying 130 miles of optical fiber to connect a mere 5000 premises in Pulaski city proper became a problem, the utility decided to build its own FTTH network—a decision that gained overwhelming endorsement from residents and unanimous approval from town council. It also put PES on a short list of municipal utilities to own and operate its own FTTH network.

PES leverages the high-speed FTTH network for smart grid functionality, implementing a multi-application hybrid AMI network that offers flexible expansion options using either fiber or RF communications and putting PES ahead of many larger IOUs in the smart metering arena. With the FTTH system in place, PES can move quickly into customer service and monitoring options without delay.

About POWERGRID International
POWERGRID International magazine (formerly Utility Automation & Engineering T&D magazine) celebrates its 15th year as the voice of the electric T&D industry in 2010. More than 35,000 T&D professionals read POWERGRID International magazine for expert coverage of the industry's important news and emerging trends. The magazine and DistribuTECH are owned by PennWell Corp., a worldwide media company based in Tulsa, Okla.

PennWell Corporation is a diversified business-to-business media and information company that provides quality content and integrated marketing solutions for the following industries: oil and gas, electric power, water and wastewater, renewable, electronics, semiconductor, contamination control, optoelectronics, fiberoptics, enterprise storage, converting, nanotechnology, fire, emergency services and dental.

Founded in 1910, PennWell publishes over 100 print and online magazines and newsletters, conducts 60 conferences and exhibitions on six continents, and has an extensive offering of books, maps, web sites, research and database services. In addition to PennWell's headquarters in Tulsa, Oklahoma the Company has major offices in Nashua, New Hampshire; Houston, Texas; London, England; Mountain View, California; Fairlawn, New Jersey, Moscow, Russia, and Hong Kong, China. In 2010, PennWell celebrates 100 years in business.

Live from DistribuTECH: The Word on the Floor

Yesterday, Tuesday, marked the first day of DistribuTECH in Tampa, Florida. I had a lot of meetings and, by the end of the day, very sore feet. But, I loved getting the buzz from industry insiders on what's happening, what's new, what's the future of the T&D side of our industry.

Perhaps my favorite statement came from a vendor who was chatting about the wave of smart grid buzz, how smart grid was "the next big thing" not because of its fabulous awesomeness---though it does, of course, offer fabulous awesomeness---but because it gives a lot of government green, a good hefty ton of bucks.

"A lot of utilities were already putting in smarter meters and communications systems before smart grid terminology came along," he said. "But, utilities are like hound dogs. They sniffed out that cash. So, many of them put a halt on their programs, waited for the funding and then restarted with the government paying for half."

Very savvy, really. Super good utility finance planning, but it rather pops the bubble of smart grid as the next big thing because of a wave of progress and government intervention. It was creeping in all along, according to our vendor informant.

Other places on the floor I heard a number of new buzzwords that have tangential dealings with smart grid, but that also seemed to be starting a new trend. First and foremost: Interoperability.

Doug Voda with ABB discussed the company's interoperability work at length when I sat down with him, along discussions with their partnerships with speciality vendors to help them expand their offerings. Cooperation and integration were two items I heard repeatedly yesterday. But, Doug started that ball rolling, and I loved that he spoke of the end of the battle between DNP 3 and IEC 61850.

"With interoperability truly in the game, with plug and play technology actually available right now, that war is over, that battle is good and dead," he said.

Today marks the second day of DistribuTECH 2010, the 20th anniversary of the show. I wonder if the talk about interoperability and vendor partnerships will continue.

Transmission: The Smart Grid's Ugly Stepsister

I spoke on the phone today to a consultant doing research into transmission issues. My first statement to him was, "That must be hard info to find." He chuckled and replied, "It's all about the smart grid these days, isn't it?"

Indeed it is. And the smart grid is, let's face it, all about distribution. All those communication technologies, gadgets and gizmos mostly lie at the end of those lines: in substations and in family homes. Relative to the size of our very vast, very large power grid, the smart grid evolution is happening in small little urban pockets, leaving vast stretches of archaic and aging transmission lines to, once again, carry a heavier load---if you'll pardon the pun I just couldn't resist.

Now, there is some smart grid on the transmission side of things, mostly when we discuss linking up large-scale renewables, but the bulk of the smart grid---and the bulk of the technology that adds up to all that smart grid money and marketing---well, that stuff is on the downstream end of electricity.

Transmission has always been the workhorse in the power equation: It does most of the hard labor, goes the farthest distance, doesn't shirk too much of the weight and gets the job done. Of course, until the smart grid came along, distribution was pretty much pulling on the same yoke. But, these days, the smart grid is a sexy cultural buzzword, a virtual power Cinderella, and transmission is still the ugly stepsister---unattractive and mostly forgotten.

Granted, transmission is necessary. You can't have distribution without it. But, that doesn't mean transmission will get the attention or the investment it really deserves. It's basic human nature to be dazzled by the Cindys and not the sisters. When we eat a banana, do we think about the fellow who picked it or the company that shipped it or the stocker that placed it on the store table? When we watch movies, we get dazzled by the stars but never wonder about the computer techs, the animators, the writers or the sound technicians involved. Or, here on our series of PennWell websites, we might enjoy the information and details available but not think about the editors who hunt, gather and post it daily. (Go Jeff Postelwait, our fabulous online editor for POWERGRID International and Electric Light and Power magazines. Here's a shout out to you.)

Perhaps we should all learn to follow the flow backwards a bit better, to think farther up the value chain than we do and give credit to the workhorses that enable all the shiny, sexy bits we're dazzled by. In our industry, this means more mulling of transmission and all it brings us. Let's ponder.

DistribuTECH's Right Around the Corner

Running March 23-25, 2010 at the Tampa Convention Center, DistribuTECH covers the smart grid from end to end. As I write this, my schedule for the three-day event is almost full. Thank goodness I finally had the good sense to block off some time for lunches, or exhibitors may find me stealing all their good candy---candy they usually like to sit out for potential clients. But, what's a starving editor to do?

Celebrating 20 years, DistribuTECH knew the grid before it was smart, and it continues to lead the way in information exchange and utility education. I'm rather proud of the "We knew the grid before it was smart" angle, since that was my tagline idea. Beyond the awesome tagline though, from instructional Utility University courses to experts delivering the latest industry details, DistribuTECH is bringing a lot of experience to Florida in March.

DistribuTECH 2010 will officially kick off with an opening keynote session on Tuesday, March 23, 2010 at 8:30 a.m. The keynote will feature Gordon Gillette, president of DistribuTECH host utility Tampa Electric Co., and Dave Barry, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist. And, the newest edition to the keynote is grid guru Katherine Hamilton.

Katherine Hamilton is president of the GridWise Alliance. She joined GridWise after being the policy advisor for Good Energies, Inc., a private investment company with a current portfolio in clean energy technologies of more than $6 billion. Hamilton was previously co-director of the American Bioenergy Association where, in addition to advocating for clean uses of biomass for power and fuels, she advised the Governor of New Jersey on the biomass components for a state renewable portfolio standard.

After the keynote, the conference itself opens for business with a bevy of learning opportunities. Sessions are broken down into related tracks, including: advanced metering, customer service, demand response, distribution automation, enterprise information and asset management, mobile and geospatial solutions, renewables and the grid, SCADA, substation automation, engineering and the transmission track. (The renewables and the grid track is new this year to DistribuTECH, and we look forward to it become a staple of the DistribuTECH conference line-up.)

Despite all the great options for education, DistribuTECH is not all learning and no play. There are plenty of social opportunities to just sit and visit with colleagues, acquaintances and new friends. An opening reception will be held on the floor on Tuesday, March 23, 2010 from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. A second exhibit floor reception follows on Wednesday, March 24, 2010. That reception, called "It's 5 O'Clock Somewhere," will run from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. at the sponsors' booths right before DistribuTECH throws a bash to celebrate its 20th anniversary from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m.

If attendees would like to mix networking with a bit of learning, DistribuTECH offers a number of breakfast roundtables, as well as a breakfast keynote. These roundtable discussions provide an excellent opportunity to network with peers and meet industry experts while taking in a hearty meal. Roundtables with specific industry topics will be moderated by leading professionals in each field. Well, one year a roundtable was hosted by me, but we won't hold that against all the other pros who chat up the breakfast roundtables.

Besides the fabulous conference sessions and networking opportunities at DistribuTECH, attendees also have the change to visit the show's large exhibit floor, which featured over 300 exhibitors in 2009. Plus, one popular part of the show and exhibit floor attendance at DistribuTECH is the car giveaway, which will be continued in 2010. This year, someone will drive away in a new Chevrolet Camaro. Sadly, I am not eligible to win the Camaro, which is awfully sad. I was hoping to live out my old 1980s TV Simon and Simon fantasies. (Remember, the cute one on Simon and Simon drove a couple of Camaros. Am I dating myself here? Probably. Good show, though.)

Back to the important show stuff: DistribuTECH 2009 in San Diego brought a record number of people to the bayside conference center in San Diego with nearly 5,800 attendees and more than 300 exhibiting companies. In 2010, DistribuTECH is expected to break that record with nearly 6,200 professionals expected to grace the halls of the Tampa Convention Center. With such a wide range of conference sessions, exposition and networking opportunities and even the change to win a Camaro (and pretend to be the cute one from Simon and Simon), DistribuTECH 2010 promises to brighten up Tampa with a number of powerful, interesting options for attendees this March.

I hope to see you there.

Smart Grid? Where? What? Huh?

Apparently, we're a clueless bunch of cocoanuts. A recent Harris poll boldly announced that 68 percent of Americans have never even heard of the smart grid.

My first reaction to that statement: "Really?" According to the results: 57 percent of U.S. adults in the survey watch their power consumption and 67 percent say they would reduce their usage if they had visibility to it. But most still have no concept of the smart grid that would help them do that.

Want to know more about the Harris poll? Click here.

When I say we're a clueless bunch, I don't mean the average American in that Harris poll, I mean those of us inside the power industry. We've been talking amongst ourselves, amongst politicians, amongst vendors for years about smart grid. We've dissected it, analyzed it, spent money on it, marketed it, given it lip service, heralded it as the next big thing, and built it a very tall and cushy pedestal. But, how much have we spent, as a group, in time and money, to inform the average consumer about the benefits of a smart grid?

Want more info on the smart grid? Click here.

On the upside of this poll, those familiar with the concept of a smart grid seemed to, mostly, see it as a good thing, although over half believed their cost of power would increase once all the technology is in place.

I can support that with a little story of my own, actually. Since I work in this industry, my family is a lot more aware of industry insider trading: talk about meters, smart grid, etc. So, my mother is always super excited to have something to contribute, rather than just listening. On the phone on Sunday, she did the classic urban legend "friend of a friend of a friend" got a smart meter tale. And, guess what happened? Their bill just, like, doubled. Or tripled. Or quadrupled. Or skyrocketed. It really depends on the version that you hear.

Now, I am sure that some people, when getting a new and shiny meter to replace their older one, will notice a change. And, if that old meter is favoring them, it will not be a positive change in their eyes. However, for most, smart grids and smart meters make it all work better, faster, more efficiently. But, isn't it interesting that we don't hear anything about smart grids and smart meters bringing us savings from the consumer side of things? We do hear that mantra from vendors, of course. But, the stories passed inside to me from my mother and other outside sources is always how expensive this technology will be to the customer.

Perhaps this Harris poll is giving us a shining light, a path to follow. The people we need to most convince about the positives of the smart grid aren't industry insiders, vendors, utilities or renewables advocates. Nope. It's the people who control that light switch at the dead end of this business. About smart grids, it seems, they are still primarily in the dark.