The Smart Grid won't happen without leadership from the utility industry. In this section, you'll get a sense of how some of today's forward-thinking utilities are stepping up to the task.
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An announcement today related to Pennsylvanian demand response has implications far beyond that state. The use of incentives and targeting midsize commercial are just two of the emerging trends we think you'll be interested in.
You may have been thinking it, but Eran Ofir comes right out and says it: The single greatest roadblock to smart grid in the U.S. is regulation.The Convergys GM calls it a classic case of market need and technology outpacing the 'historic residue' of existing regulatory policy. Click to read what he says utilities should do right now to fix things.
Smart cities are about sharing data, and UISOL is working to make it easy for utilities to share data back and forth with a city's emergency responders. It's a perfect illustration of the evolution to smart cities and the role of the smart grid as a necessary foundation for smart cities. Click for a look at how the pieces fit together.
This presentation from Utility Integration Solutions (USIOL) examines how utilities could share data back and forth with a city's emergency responders, part of the evolution to smart cities.
SGN's Jesse Berst attended the annual predictions Webinar hosted by IDC Energy Insights and walked away with nine that he believes in. Did you realize that utility mergers will accelerate? That munis and coops are now in the driver's seat for AMI deployments? That analytics is the Next Big Thing? Click to read the full list.
Utilities around the country will want to keep a close eye on the progress of NV Energy's smart grid project. As a piece of that, the Nevada utility is taking an intriguing approach to encourage customers to enroll in demand response and dynamic pricing. Click inside for more on NV Energy's "big carrot" strategy.
Earlier this week the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rejected a mitigation proposal required for Duke Energy and Progress Energy to proceed with merger plans. Shifra Mincer of AOL Energy explains the FERC ruling and what it means to the merger.
What worked and what didn't work in the smart grid arena in 2011? Who were the superstars - and who deserves a lump of coal this holiday season? Click inside where the SGN team has compiled our list of this year's smart grid winners, losers and fence sitters. (And of course we hope you'll join in with your own picks.)
It is an evolutionary shift for a utility to go from serving all customers the same smart grid message and program to tailoring the message and offering based on customers' needs, wants, habits and practices. Yet some utilities are already doing it successfully. Patty Durand of the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative highlights their strategies.
New research says the world's cities are failing their citizens by failing to capture the full value of infrastructure and data. Although the report's lessons apply to any kind of smart technology, they are directly relevant to the challenges faced by many of today's smart grid efforts – a valuable heads-up for utilities on the new demands and new pressures coming their way. Click inside for details and to download the report.
If the smart grid gets stalled in North America, it may be partly because utility executives are simply too busy with other issues. One of the biggest distractions: new federal regulations on coal-fired power plants. Click to read what's on the mind of industry leaders as they look forward to 2012 and beyond.
Now that it is 98% finished with one of the country's most successful smart meter deployments, San Diego Gas & Electric is shifting its emphasis to moving customers up the engagement curve. SGN Chief Analyst Jesse Berst shares insights from his conversation with the man in charge of making it happen.
Consumers may not be sitting around the table giving thanks for reliable and affordable energy this holiday. But Patty Durand, Executive Director of the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative, is here with the ingredients for successful consumer participation in smart grid programs. Click inside for proven, ground-level messages, incentives and calls-to-action that leading utilities have used. (It's a recipe others may want to borrow.)
A New Jersey electric power executive admits he fell in love with smart grid gadgetry way back when. But now he's lamenting that utilities collectively decided to skip the low-hanging fruit (efficiency) and went to the top of the tree. Find out why.
IDC Energy Insights and Intelligent Utility magazine put out their latest UtiliQ survey of the most intelligent utilities in the U.S. San Diego Gas & Electric topped the list - again. Click inside for the other utilities at the head of the class.
Many thought the stimulus money that went to smart grid projects would establish a firm basis for further progress. There would be enough real-life examples and lessons learned that other utilities could follow along with confidence. But lately we're hearing utilities are growing more cautious, not less. Are you seeing the same thing? That's this week's topic in our discussion forum. Please join in.
As solar photovoltaic panel prices continue to drop, utilities and power companies are increasingly looking for new and creative ways to add solar to their power portfolios. Click inside to read about Dominion Virginia Power's distributed solar experiment.
Kevin Dasso is senior director of smart grid and technology integration at PG&E and a featured speaker at Smart Energy International, which rolls into San Francisco later this month. Click inside for highlights from our recent conversation about his utility's smart grid initiatives and next steps.
No surprise that some of the world's biggest utilities are involved in pretty significant smart grid initiatives. You'd expect that. But what may raise an eyebrow or two are some of the smart grid efforts under way in places we seldom hear about. Like the Flathead Valley in Montana or the island of Mallorca in the Mediterranean Sea. Click inside for a peek at a few lesser-known but mighty interesting projects.
This case study highlights CPS Energy's efforts to improve its distribution operations with an integrated distribution operations platform that includes OMS and advanced DMS network applications. The solution, provided by Ventyx, has improved operational efficiencies for control room and field resources. Shorter outage times has been another benefit.
Over the next year, Long Island Power Authority – the nation's second largest municipal utility -- will deploy an integrated real-time distribution and outage management system (DMS/OMS) supplied by Efacec Advanced Control Systems. Click inside for more on the project.
A Boulder, Colorado citizens' group has kicked off a campaign to "secede" from Xcel Energy and set up a a municipal utility instead. One issue: dissatisfaction over Xcel's landmark SmartGridCity project in Boulder. Another problem: Xcel is not moving fast enough on carbon reduction for some of the city's ultra-green residents. Click inside for details.
If you thought federal funds for smart grid projects came and went with the Recovery Act, check in with the rural electric cooperatives that are on the receiving end of millions in loans from the USDA for smart grid technologies and improvements to generation and transmission facilities. For instance, Ocmulgee Electric Membership Corp. in Georgia is getting $8.9 million to build 238 miles of new distribution line and improve 33 miles of existing line. Click inside to see who else got money and how they plan to spend it.
This summer's record heat sparked record demand for many utilities across the country. So how did you and your colleagues do? What grade would you give your utility's performance? That's this week's Tuesday Topic.
As part of the Recovery Act, the DOE pumped millions into smart grid training programs. Private firms, utilities and associations are also investing in training initiatives. So where are they? What do they look like? Click inside for a peek at some of the programs poised to help fill the labor gap looming in the electric utility industry.
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.