CONNECTIVITYWEEK, DAY 2: DEMAND RESPONSE AND THE ELECTRON CONSUMER

Energy producers see energy as natural forces and natural resources. The utilities that deliver the energy see it as flowing electrons. The average electricity customer’s attitude is “Just keep the lights and the TV on and the food fresh in the refrigerator.”

At ConnectivityWeek, some bright, visionary folks are talking about how to better deliver more awareness and more control to that electricity customer. How successful they are and how that customer responds may very well determine the longterm effects of the growing energy crunch and maybe even the ultimate impact of global climate change.

How do these folks think they’re doing so far? ConnectivityWeek is in the heart of Silicon Valley and a lot of these people come from the Information Technology (IT) world, so they’re trying to decide whether to call their progress Connectivity 1.5 or Connectivity 2.0. The general inclination seems to be toward 1.5, with momentum. A lot of collaboration and research is still necessary to get to the second generation of Smart Grid technology.

In Demand Response (DR), a major part of Smart Grid development, the focus is mostly about 2 major areas: (1) Developing more capabilities for DR systems and (2) getting customers involved. In other words, it’s tracking the larger discussion about the Smart Grid. Makes sense - DR is the roots of Smart Grid.

With burgeoning technology, DR systems can respond to peaking electricity demand by talking with more and more precision to thermostats and heating/cooling systems. Some utility companies have experimental programs that can talk to some DR systems. The thinkers in the field are calling for more collaboration. More collaboration. More collaboration. Large-scale impacts on energy consumption at times of high demand can’t happen until even the most ingenious proprietary technology offers a standardized, collaborative pathway by which the utilities and the consuming systems can interact.

Brock LaPorte, SunPower Corp.: “There are many different industries that need to come together to make all this data-driven energy distribution happen in the coming years and there’s a huge amount of investment…they’re estimating something like $11 trillion of energy infrastrucutrue over the next twenty-five years…”

With the new generation of IT tools becoming available, customers could give controllers at utilities the ability to vary all sorts of smaller things like hot water heaters, swimming pool pumps and entertainment center switches. (The customers retain override controllers.) Cumulatively, that is where energy waste can be really eliminated.

Steve Widergren, Pacific Northwest National Lab: “We’re hopefully articulating a plan for the future that incorporates all the designs of the Smart Grid but we can’t do it alone and so we really need that participation from the vendor community, from the standards bodies, from the manufacturers…We’ve talked about Smart Grid now for many, many years but frankly we are on the cusp of this enormous implementation cycle that we haven’t witnessed in the past…a wave of new technology is about to arrive…”

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One solution being proposed to facilitate collaboration is a rewriting of building codes. Another is to get the players to collaborate on creating industry standards. Establishing such standards is what the visionary Zigbee Alliance is about. When the Smart Grid is as established as the Internet (maybe 10 years), the Zigbee Alliance label may be as widely known and respected as the Energy Star label.

The idea is to make Smart Grid technology and Demand Response computer chips universal and easy to use, just like a computer USB port can manage add-on tools, devices and memory sticks. But the USB port requires a 900-page set of standards.

How complicated and expensive will it be to standardize and universalize the chip-managed tools every home, office, warehouse and manufacturing plant will eventually use to talk to their occupants, to show them how and where energy is being used, how much it costs and how adjustments can be made or must be made?

The technology is only half of the equation. The other half is the people the technology will be talking to. Ultimately, it all comes back to the customer. Nobody can be sure of where the customer is.

Tom Burke, OPC Foundation: “One of the key things here is evolution versus revolution…the technology is changing so fast…in order to be successful not only do we have to bridge the gap back to the existing systems…I had the opportunity to be in Berlin, for example, and I noticed that although the Berlin Wall was down there were still a lot of people that perceived that it was still there…there are still people who have VCRs out there that don’t know how to program them…At the same time, you’ve got to have very fast evolutionary technology…”

In a keynote address, Kurt Yeager of Galvin Electricity Initiative expressed confidence that the time has come “…to covert a 19th century institution into one that is suited for the 21st…”

Yeager not only believes it will happen but he knows why: “As important as electricity has been to the 20th century, electricity will be even moreso to the 21st…” So important, Yeager argued, that when global climate change and rising energy demand force the hidden costs of electricity into the price, enlightened self-interest will drive a search for more efficient ways to deliver and use it. “It is time for the consumer to be the consumer, not for some intermediary to block that path. Technology can empower consumers on all levels to control their electricity and total energy destiny and that message in the face of rising costs is going to become much more clear to consumers.”

Yeager offered another reason why there is urgent need for a new grid: “The ability to incorporate distributed generation…if we really are serious about renewable energy…it will take a smart power system, one that is able to operate at the same speed of light, in terms of its control, as the flow of energy…We have a power system today that is equivalent to a railroad that would take 10 days to open or close a switch…and gives you no control over where the trains go…”

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To verify his belief in the technological capability, Yeager described a $12 million experimental Smart Grid/Demand Response project built by his Galvin Electricity Initiative on the campus of the Illinois School of Technology that serves a much larger section of Chicago and paid for itself in 3 years.

In a second keynote speech, Gordon Holness of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) offered a striking definition: “It’s sustainable if it meets the needs of the present without compromising future generations’ ability to meet their own needs.” He went on to insist sustainability is not only possible but urgent, backing his remarks up with statistics.

Ahmad Faruqui, of the Brattle Group, Inc., ended the keynote addresses with a raft of statistical evidence from pilot projects around the U.S. and around the world proving the consumer is more than ready to take advantage of price incentives and make the choices that will cut energy use, eliminate energy waste and, ultimately, turn the whole excessive emissions story around. Much depends on the nature of the price incentives, but the most effective price incentive structures can obtain nearly 50% participation in High Tech, Smart Grid efficiency programs.

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Faruqui closed his presentation by quoting Arthur C. Clarke’s brilliant formulation of how breakthrough ideas are usually received. “New ideas,” Faruqui quoted Clarke, “pass through three periods: (1) It can’t be done; (2) It probably can be done but it isn’t worth it; (3) I knew it was a good idea all along.”

What’s strikingly appropriate about citing the quote at this moment for the folks at ConnectivityWeek is that they are so obviously, excitingly, on the verge of moving from (2) to (3). And they are going to bring the rest of the world along.

ConnectivityWeek
May 20-22, 2008 (Clasma Events, Inc.)

WHO
Connectivity “Mega” Panel: Glen Allmendinger, Harbor Research, Inc.; Mary Ann Piette, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab; Terry Mohn, Sempra Energy Utilities; Tom Burke, OPC Foundation; Brock LaPorte, SunPower Corp.; Steve Widergren, Pacific Northwest National Lab; Tom Shircliff, Intelligent Buildings
Keynotes: Ahmad Faruqui, The Brattle Group, Inc.; Gordon Holness, American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE); Kurt Yeager, Galvin Electricity Initiative

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WHAT
Connectivity, the glue that holds it all together; Demand Response, the management of efficiency.

WHEN
- Day 2 of ConnectivityWeek, May 21, 2008.
- When the flow of electrons is all connected, it can be managed. When it can be managed, it can be made efficient.

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WHERE
- Connectivity is the key to binding together the utilities, where the perspective is about tera-giga-mega-electron management, to the commercial, industrial and residential level where the perspective is about dollars and cents. Demand Response is what connectivity is for.
- ConnectivityWeek is in the heart Silicon Valley at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, California

WHY
- Global climate change, rising world energy demand, compromised supplies and skyrocketing prices make the Smart Grid urgent.
- ConnectivityWeek Key Topics: (1) connectivity in smart energy efficient, (2) how to retool the design, building, owning and managing of the built environment, (3) implementing effective management of energy supply-demand, (4) the security implications of energy and smart devices, (5) new business models (6) new opportunities with smart connectivity, (7) bringing out new service-oriented business opportunities, and (8) how the U.S. can take a lead role in the Energy Revolution
- BuilConn covers IT in building systems.
- HomeConn covers Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI)
- GridWise is about smart grid technology and the billions that will come from it because of the 2007 Energy Act.
- Sections also cover business opportunities (ZigBee Expo), industrial IT (IndConn), Demand Response (DR-Expo) and machine to machine connections (M2M).
-40% or more of energy consumption is from buildings. More than 20% of that energy is wasted.

Nice to meet you. (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
- Gordon Holness, American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE): “Residential and commercial buildings already account for a vast amount of total primary energy, roughly 40%…A strong case can be made for building sustainable buildings…in schools they’ve resulted in 20% better performance by school kids…in offices, 2 to 16% increase in productivity, in factories increased production, in hospitals earlier discharge and in retail, greater sales per square foot…”
- Terry Mohn, Sempra Energy Utilities: “I probably wouldn’t care about ship building but in the last fire storm aircraft carriers put power into [the San Diego] grid so maybe I do care about ship builders…