Zero Energy Buildings

Plumbing and the Man about the Net Zero House

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Maybe the ongoing attempt to over-domesticate males is a barrier to sustainable energy. Maybe Swedish feminists are simply insensitive to carbon issues. Maybe Gaia just needs a man about the house. Maybe the essential appliance needed for the net zero energy (NZE) house is a urinal.

A report last week from Ohio University describes a catalyst capable of extracting hydrogen from urine. More efficient generation of hydrogen would be a great step to more effective energy storage, one without the major shortcomings of...

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Collaborative Energy—the Smart Grid and the End Node

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A significant goal of the smart grid is to encourage rapid innovation in the end nodes, that is in the commercial buildings, homes, and industrial sites that consume most of the electricity produced. Today’s North American power grid is probably the supreme engineering feat of the twentieth century; it has made possible the greatest life style ever lived. Its reliability, though, is insufficient for the digital world. Every system margin has been pushed too thin. The introduction of any significant portion of intermittent source energy, such as wind and solar, will make things much worse.

It is time to engage the end nodes in supporting system reliability. Today’s buildings have higher requirements for reliability and quality than the grid was ever designed for. Site-based generation and site based storage are part of the solution, but they could make the system even less reliable. It is time to begin the move to collaborative energy...

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Standards Roadmap for the Smart Grid (SGIX) (v2)

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Thanks for all those comments on my earlier post. I have updated the work and am re-posting.

The smart grid is more than improved top down control; it is a grid ready for unreliable energy sources (such as wind, waves, and sun), distributed generation, and Net Zero Energy (NZE) buildings. NZE buildings sometimes buy energy, sometimes sell energy, and energy use balances out over the day, season, or year. The NZE building presents particular problems as it may switch from buying energy one minute, and selling energy the next. Plug-in electric vehicles, whether hybrid or not, present the challenges similar to those of NZE buildings, with the added complexity of mobility. The smart grid requires distributed decision making, distributed responsibility for reliability, and easy interoperability to integrate an ever-changing mix of technologies.

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Why do we need all these smart meters?

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Why do we need all these smart meters – so someone asked over at GreenTechMedia. We can run the grid with far fewer, and it will cost less. Why do we need these complicated protocols when we only need a price and a use? This perspective is correct; it is good engineering unencumbered with vision. These perspective is wrong; we cannot build tomorrow by doing what we day just a little bit better. Without pervasive metering, LEEDs and Green Buildings will remain a sham. Smart utility meters are only the first step.

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