Microgrids and Distrib...

Ready for the BSI

I want to get back to buildings soon. Smart grids are engaging, but I think our goals for the future will be met by buildings. For months, all my writing has been about smart grids. More particularly, for November, it has all been about smart grid standards. As I write this, the essential market interfaces of the grid are in review. A common communication of schedule and interval, suitable for sharing schedules between grid and enterprise and building and finance...
Read More

Coming to Terms with EMIX

Another of the essential inter-domain standards for smart energy is being released for formal public review this week. Schedule, price & product descriptions, market interactions, and usage reporting are the standards to enable arms-length interactions between participants in smart energy. When these are stable, products that need them can come out of the labs, accelerated by common communication standards across the country. The miracle of software, silicon, and scale can begin to work its magic to balance energy supply and demand, in a world where. . .

Read More

What buildings have to say to smart grids

The challenges of smart energy are well known. How can we as a society based on cheap plentiful always available energy, adapt to shortages, intermittent availability, and a continuing shortage of capacity to move energy from where we make it to where we want to use it. Local shortages and outages will become the norm, although local surpluses might create greater challenges. Most importantly, how can we adapt without abandoning the life-styles that we enjoy, and that we hope our grandchildren can as well.

The national Priority Action Plans (PAPs) for smart grids and smart energy aim to . . .

Read More