NEWS
‘Smart grid,’ big savings
04/09/2009
By Steny H. Hoyer
April 9, 2009
It’s the principle behind every clearance sale: The less a product is in demand, the less it sells for. So why can’t we extend the same principle to one of the most basic commodities of all - electricity?
The demand for electricity fluctuates every day. It tends to be highest in the afternoon (when people are at work and when lights, computers and heating and cooling are running at full blast) and lowest at night. But most people can’t take full advantage of the lowest-demand hours, because homes can’t "talk back" to utilities. Your home and your utility still have a primitive way of communicating: a meter that can’t do more than spin faster or slower.
Imagine, though, that your home knew the cost of power from second to second. Imagine that it could tell you that power’s source, from a coal-fired plant to a wind farm. Imagine that you could sell electricity back to the grid. Those steps add up to one of the biggest energy innovations on the horizon: the "smart grid," or what author Thomas L. Friedman calls the "Energy Internet."
When energy is combined with real-time communication, you’ll be able to load your dryer and dishwasher before you go to sleep but program them to start only when electricity hits its lowest price. You’ll be able charge your car battery at night and then sell back excess power after work, or you could sell the energy you harvest from your own solar panel. During storms, the sources of power outages will be easier to pinpoint, and your lights will come back on faster. And by selecting the best times to use clean power sources, your utility will be able to shrink its carbon footprint.
These steps could save you hundreds of dollars a year and help us all use energy more efficiently, getting more output from fewer plants and expanding our use of renewable resources.
And these advances are coming sooner than you may think. President Barack Obama and Congress have designed an economic recovery plan that paves the way for future growth by investing in some of our country’s most important long-term priorities. Upgrading our grid is one of the most promising of those investments. That’s why the recovery plan sets aside $4.5 billion, in the form of cost-shared grants, to match smart grid investments by utilities. With many utilities already planning on upgrades, this federal support will reduce the costs they would pass on to consumers.
Creating a smart grid means updating everything from home meters and appliances to transmission and distribution lines and communication systems. It will be a piecemeal process, because America has many regional electric systems, some using the latest technology, and some getting by with infrastructure that dates back to the New Deal.
Parts of Maryland, such as Bethesda and Fort Washington, are ready to upgrade distribution and meters; other regions, such as parts of Southern and Western Maryland, may need line upgrades first. In that respect, we’re a microcosm of America, and we can’t afford to leave either kind of region behind. We can’t install smart meters in some homes while we leave others dependent on decades-old lines. Energy independence and climate change are national challenges, and we can only face them by improving efficiency everywhere.
We know that completing the smart grid will take a sustained commitment, but we also know that it will mean jobs for American workers today, and cheaper energy and a cleaner environment tomorrow.
Rep. Steny H. Hoyer of Southern Maryland is the majority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives.