The target of smart grid communications, particularly in collaborative
energy space, should always be the microgrid. Some microgrids may contain a single home, or commercial building, or and industrial site—those are irrelevant details. Microgrids have a number of systems inside them that must work within the economic environment of that microgrid—and I am thinking of old economics, before the distinction of economics and ecosystem arose. Some microgrids may have a single entity inside, say a legacy BAS (Building Automation System), but the unitary microgrid is merely an artifact of...
Read MoreZero Energy Buildings
Scheduling our Things, Scheduling our Lives
The best restaurants are seasonal, and know where ingredients come from.
Locavory is dedicated to the proposition that the best food is not only
seasonal, but local, served at its absolute freshest. Energy, too has its
seasons, and they can be tied to the way we live our lives, and they can bind
our things to our pursuits. One of the most intriguing agreements in the
standards development organization (SDO) smart grid conference last month, may
change how we coordinate our lives and our things.
Read MoreCollaborative Energy: Smart Grids and Intelligent Buildings together
Intelligent energy use acquires energy at the right time at the right price for the right reason. Intelligent buildings provide customer amenities and customer services at the right time. Collaborative energy works with the smart grid to minimize the incompatibilities of these two problem sets. Systems on the grid and in the building need to do a better job of sharing information to improve the performance of these functions.
Smart buildings are more important than smart grids
Smart operations in transmission and distribution won’t help us much. An upgrade for utility operations is long overdue, especially if energy distribution gets over its severe case of not-invented-here. This upgrade may be absolutely necessary for the grid to support more dynamic energy markets, ones that will balance electricity supply and demand. The most important smart interactions will come from the grid’s end nodes: industry, commercial buildings and homes. To get the benefits of the smart grid, we must have smart load...