Another year has passed and it seems that we are still seeing the same Smart Grid headlines. The first consumer shock over smart meters has past. Cisco and other large tech firms have announced their interest and involvement in the smart grid. Many new websites dedicated to helping bring to light the great potential of the smart grid have shown up on the internet.

However, it feels like we are still waiting for the big news or at least some news that propels us forward… We still do not have any set standards, we do not have the word from the major utilities that they will allow third party involvement and an open source approach towards the new smart grid. And possibly most of all we do not have a good solution for the potential cyber security risks that a recklessly designed smart grid may introduce. Without these answers and more we cannot expect many new companies to jump in head over heels. A smart grid run as todays grid is will mean complete domination by a few major players. They will make the rules and right the standards. The money will exchange only a few hands and the big players will maintain control of their grid. If this happens the smart grid will never evolve into a new way to use power. Instead it will just be more sales of more advanced equipment by the big players who are already involved.

Only time will tell, and who knows I may be writing a similar article to this one in twelve short months!

Not everyone thinks of energy storage when they think of the smart grid. Thoughts of meters and automated SCADA controlled switches mostly come to mind. However, the smart grid has a main goal of reducing our overall carbon footprint and allowing the utilities to better incorporate alternative energy sources into the grid. There are many types of alternative energy. Most rely on a resource that is not always consistent. For example it is not always windy for wind mills and it is not always sunny for solar. On the other hand typical fossil fuels like coal burning can be done anytime of the day no matter what the outside weather, in most cases. So how is this downfall of many alternative energy sourced remedied? Simple, we store the energy when it is abundant. For example it may be really windy late at night, electrical demand is low and the windmills are generating a surplus of power. In this case we can stare the surplus for use when the demand is there and perhaps the wind is not. Sounds easy… However there are many barriers for energy storage. Batteries are very expensive and can be dangerous in some cases, flywheels are huge, expensive and require closely controlled surroundings to run. I keep my fingers crossed that the great minds in the industry can quickly come up with more efficient safer and cheaper solutions to help us better store energy. Someday energy storage systems will play a huge part in the smart grid.

“Reduce our carbon footprint”, I keep hearing this over and over. What does this mean? Carbon footprint refers to “the total set of greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions caused by an organization, event or product” as stated at CarbonTrust.co.uk. It is often expressed by a measure of carbon dioxide.

When we think about the major carbon offenders we get pictures of large coal, natural gas, and oil burning generation plants or maybe over sized SUV’s with 1 passenger in each of them on a crowded highway on a 90 degree day. We seldom think about people, animals, plants or anything else with a natural life cycle on this earth that produces carbon dioxide. We do not usually think about the carbon heavy hot springs bubbling away below the snow covered volcanic peak with plumes of smoke rising, both of which are producing carbon dioxide. Basically, the more people, the more carbon dioxide… I do not see us anytime soon rushing to cut back on the population to reduce our carbon footprint or doing away with the rest of the life on this planet. And even if we could, which we cannot, we would not rush to stop the natural cycle of the earth’s plates shifting and volcanoes erupting, this may be catastrophic to the evolution of our planet.

The idea that the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by man made functions may be causing global warming may someday be proven invalid. Or on the other hand, the earth may actually become noticably warmer in the next 100 – 10000 years, the ice caps will melt and the coasts of the continents will flood. Scholars will ponder whether the additional carbon from man made processes created this disaster or if the natural cycle of the earth is just that way.

So how does this whole rant tie into the smart grid? First off let me clarify and say that I am a fan of reducing our reliance on fossil fuels and cutting back on unnecessary spewing of carbon into the earth’s atmosphere. I also like the idea of incorporating more renewables and energy storage systems into our existing electrical grid. These are part of the overall smart grid initiative. The smart grid will also allow us to become more aware of our real time usage and cut back on the use of electrical devices and appliances during high demand times when the fossil fuel generators are running full steam.

It seems that it has been a while since any new standards have been released by the NIST. For the future of the smart grid standards are extremely important. The proper standards, open source hopefully, will allow the smart grid to grow much faster. Third party applications, better solutions, and more intuitive ideas will come to reality with open source. The interaction between devices, meters, appliances, etc need to be defined and laid out so that we can understand where the boundaries are between utility control and privacy and open communications and HAN’s.

Stay posted and check out the NIST website for info on the smart grid standards.