Sustainability: business, life, environment

Historically, America’s electricity grid has had a single mission: keeping the lights on.  More modern consumer concerns include: energy efficiency, environmental impacts, and consumer choice.  A proposed solution to address these modern concerns is the concept of Smart Grid.

But what exactly is Smart Grid? 

The Department of Energy has a publication out called, “The Smart Grid: An Introduction”.  It describes the Smart Grid as a transformation from a centralized, producer-controlled network to one that is less centralized and more consumer-interactive.  It is a changing the industry’s entire business model and its relationship with all stakeholders, involving and affecting utilities, regulators, energy service providers, technology and automation vendors, as well as all consumers of electric power.

According to the professional consulting firm Deloitte, Smart Grid companies in 2009 may represent the biggest and fastest growing sector in the GreenTech space and possibly even the entire technology market. 

Transforming our nation’s grid has been compared in significance with building the interstate highway system or the development of the internet.  It is a large undertaking with even bigger long-term proposed benefits to all consumers:

•    Reliability to degrees never before possible.
•    Maintaining electricity affordability.
•    Fully accommodating renewable and traditional energy sources.
•    Potentially reducing our carbon footprint.
•    Introducing advancements and efficiencies yet to be envisioned.

Proposed as an automated, widely distributed energy delivery network, the Smart Grid will be characterized by a two-way flow of electricity and information and will be capable of monitoring everything from power plants to customer preferences to individual appliances.  There are currently pilots underway.

•    National Grid has proposed a 15,000 customer design in Worcester, Mass.  A spokesman comments, “The two-year pilot is the first step toward creating a more efficient, higher reliability and environmentally responsible modern grid.  Smart Grid will provide customers with energy use information, automation, and the ability to control how they use energy.”

•    Xcel Energy is helping Boulder, Colorado, to become the world’s first Smart Grid city by the end of 2009.

As an energy consultant working with individuals and small businesses, Taiga Company is intrigued by the sustainable benefits of a Smart Grid.  The pursuit of business sustainability or a more desired sustainable lifestyle includes the ability to make smarter choices.  Smart Grid will potentially enable consumers to make decisions that are right for them.