Smart grid technology has been making headlines recently, but not everyone is familiar with how a “smarter” power grid works. There are many pros – along with some limitations – to smart grid technology.
Our current power grid is believed to be inefficient. There are thousands of power plants pumping energy into the system, and yet we have no real control over the flow of electricity. Power pumped into the system, after it is stepped up, can find itself powering homes on the other side of the country. In addition, the existing backbone is old and outdated. It doesn’t have precise control over frequency fluctuations, something that is increasingly important with modern gadgets like computers. There is also little information available about where power is being demanded beyond a regional scale. [1] An example of the problem: A typical American experiences four hours of power outages per year. Comparatively, a citizen of Japan could expect seven. [4] The use of smart grid technology helps defeat the problems associated with a traditional power grid. The idea is that the power grid will have a distributed set of sensors and switches to allow for the most efficient routing of power at any given time. With the existing system, power companies turn on backup power stations that operate at greater cost when demand increases, changing the cost of power. With a smart grid, the cost of power will be easily accessible, as the entire system will know what stations are up and where the electricity is flowing from. With some basic home automation technology, you can schedule energy-intensive operations like laundry for cheap hours and save other tasks that use less energy for the more expensive hours. [2] This would basically cut demand at peak times, and theoretically level the demand over time, which lets power companies predict demand better. Less fluctuation in price means less uncertainty, and less uncertainty means a lower price. Beyond basic cost concerns, a smart grid is designed to prevent power outages like the one that happened on the East Coast in 2003. [3] Smart grid technology would let the power plants know which stations were overloaded and which were fine, and let operators reroute electricity away from a single substation, preventing the chain reaction that knocked off the lights in 2003. [2] Smart grid technologies are expensive. Installing them means renovating the entire U.S. power network, including much of the cabling. There are thousands of substations to be replaced, new lines to be installed, and entire sections of the network remodeled. That’s not to even mention the legal hurdles that a smart grid would have to jump through. And since the average U.S. citizen doesn’t even know what a smart grid is, [5] politicians most likely won’t spend much time working toward that goal. Despite the cons of smart grid technology, many believe that smart grids are our future and that they will come in one form or another. It may come down to how many failures of the existing network will need to happen before smart grid technology is fully implemented. Sources: 1. http://www.nema.org/gov/energy/smartgrid/whatissmartgrid.cfmHow the Smart Grid Differs
Why We Don’t Have One Yet
2. http://www.oe.energy.gov/smartgrid.htm
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/northeast_blackout_of_2003
4. http://energybusinessdaily.com/power/why-we-need-a-smart-grid-what-it-takes/
5. http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/smart-takes/majority-of-americans-don-8217t-understand-smart-grid-study-says/15146
