Observers of the electrical utility market suggested that the need to manage an increasingly large percentage of intermittent power generation from renewable sources, along with increased risks from events like Sandy, will require a much “smarter” grid — a grid that makes use of new information technology and automated computer controls to respond dynamically to changing conditions.

For their part, major utilities have mostly responded to the increased threat of Sandy-like events by touting their efforts to maintain service by investing heavily in storm protection infrastructure.

But last Tuesday at Columbia University, a panel of experts discussed a very different approach–one that has the potential to entirely transform how electrical power is delivered in both the developed and the developing world.

Strictly speaking, microgrids are not new. As panelist Mohommed Shahidehpour explained, a microgrid is essentially nothing more than an electrical grid that can operate from its own power without a long-distance transmission system or connection to a broader grid. Power on airplanes and ships are common examples of systems that operate as microgrids.

According to Shahidehpour, what makes the new generation of microgrid applications worth paying attention to is that that the elements of a modern microgrid have themselves gotten smart, to the point where they can easily shift loads based on different needs and desired outcomes. “The customer decides when he wants to use power, how much he wants to use.” In this way, a smart microgrid “empowers smart users.”

Shahidehpour knows what he’s talking about: as the Director of theRobert W. Galvin Center for Electricity Initiative at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT),  he lead the installation of a campus-wide microgrid project that for the university that reduced campus baseload energy consumption by 20 percent and peak load consumption by more than 50 percent. The project incorporates on-site solar and wind generation, backup generators and an advanced system controller that communicates with building controllers, meters and smart switches and uses real-time price signals and weather reports to automatically manage demand. The IIT project is the flagship “Perfect Power System” of the Initiative, a project that envisions a transformation of the national grid by prototyping smart grid approaches though a series of microgrid projects.

Pareto Energy takes a similar approach, by designing, building and operating peer-to-peer microgrid networks. Panelist Matthew Fairy, Pareto’s director of sales, described a vision in which the national grid is gradually replaced over time by clusters of interconnected microgrids. This is the only way, he said, that we will be able to move to a smarter grid system. “The move to the smart grid is impossible to achieve in one big operational mass,” he explained, “Breaking it into bite-sized pieces — this is the future of the microgrid market.” Fairy described the shift to microgrids as analogous to the move from land lines to cellular phones — a shift that will “make the end product much more versatile and user friendly.”

Josh Milberg, a smart grid expert with Willdan energy consultants, explained that the biggest advantage of a microgrids is the ability of a large facility to optimize energy use “based on what is most important to you as a customer. You have the opportunity to optimize for reliability, for cost, for sustainability, or some combination. That is the really exciting opportunity. You have the opportunity to making decision for your own facility rather than being at the mercy of the larger grid operator, who is really making decisions to make sure that the entire grid is as stable as possible.”

Applications for smart grids are of course not limited to the industrialized world. According to the Earth Institute’s Vijay Modi, it’s worth remembering that under normal circumstances some 200 million people in India have no access to electric power at all. Combined with some 500 million people in Africa and another 200 million in other places, this means that as much as one sixth of the worlds population still does not have access to electricity.

Like Fairy and Shahidehpour, Modi and his team believe that the application of smart microgrid technology might be part of the solution, but from the opposite direction. Rather than finding ways to scale down break up giant grids into smaller pieces, he is looking for opportunities for small scale, local investment to create microgrids with local power generation and storage for communities in the developing world that aren’t yet served by utilities. He believes such systems, built in bite-sized pieces, could eventually be connected to the larger grid.

So what is preventing faster adoption? Modi suggested that the problem was that until now, migrogrid projects have been one-offs — each requiring custom engineering and individual permitting. If, however, there were a way to simultaneously permit microgrid systems for 100 blocks of similar buildings in New York, he said, it could “break the bottleneck.”

However, Modi pointed out that from the utility’s perspective, any time a customer reduces consumption or ads local generation — even if it’s form a solar panel on the roof — the utility loses revenue, while not really lowering its fixed costs, which in New York account for 3/4 of expenditures. David Roberts of Grist made a similar point recently, pointing to the utilities own research suggesting that “solar power and other distributed renewable energy technologies could lay waste to U.S. power utilities and burn the utility business model.”

Fixed costs notwithstanding, Shahidehpour says, the increase in reliability and efficiency offered by widespread deployments of microgrids can only benefit utilities, which in many places spend millions of dollars each year to respond to a few hours of peak demand. And, Fairy added, there is no reason utilities couldn’t own and operate microgrids themselves; it’s just a different business model.

Of course, those who are in favor of microgrid adoption have every reason to try to placate utilities, without whose cooperation they are unlikely to get much done. But as Roberts of Grist put it, “these utilities are not Google or Facebook. They are not accustomed to a state of constant market turmoil and reinvention … A friggin’ century, more or less without innovation, and now they’re supposed to scramble and be all hip and new-age?”

Nonetheless, faced with an aging grid, growing infrastructure risk, volatile energy prices and depleting energy reserves, it seems likely utilities will be forced to adapt or face their own extinction.

A more interesting question is whether microgrid technology can truly begin to enable local communities and institutions to take charge of their own energy consumption– and finally return power to the people.

19 Comments on "The Microgrid Solution"

DC on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 6:35 pm 



Why are these morons so infatuated with ‘smart-grids’ anyhow? Smart grid is nothing more than a wireless,hackable, way for centralized utilities to turn off your fridge at the tap of keyboard if they deem it necessary.All those crappy, poorly built buildings with no resilience what-so-ever, are the problem, along with car dependant urban sprawl and design. THOSE are the culprits. A ‘smart-grid’ wont do anything to change that. The US utilities already have plenty of computers and computing power-more wont change anything.

Of coruse, no one wants to discuss forcing manufactures to stop making vampire devices and appliances, and they definately dont want to tear down poorly considered cities and there endless car sprawl like NY, and start over from scratch(the only thing that will work). But a a smart-grid *sounds* like it will keep the cable TV on and amerikans distracted by it when the next super-storm rolls in….

Plantagenet on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 6:46 pm 



Microgrids are intrinsically intermittent. Solar cells don’t work at night, and wind doesn’t always blow.

Even with a microgrid, you need a conventional grid anyway.

Anthony McCarthy on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 7:53 pm 



As the manager of a “Microgrid” for over 30 years. ( Chief Engineer of a Passenger Ship ) I can assure you that microgrids are not intrinsically intermittent. In fact if we got more than one or two interruptions in electrical power each year it would be very unusual and this typically with only four electrical generators. The more independent sources of power you have the more robust your system. We actively used the idea of ” non-essential consumers” to control the load on the grid in times of power shortages. Most large grids do this as well. It is true that solar cells do not work at night but most people do not work at night also! I was 15 years old when we got connected to the electrical grid. So surprise, surprise people can survive very well without having practically unlimited electrical power available all the time.

Others on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 10:01 pm 



Well said Anthony

1st we will build Electric Vehicle charging stations

2nd we will install batteries to charge them, those can also be used in case of peak power or emergency

3rd we will install solar panels and wind mills to charge them.

This will create whole new industry and also reduce need for fossil fuels.

Norm on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 11:25 pm 



what DC said

Arthur on Sat, 15th Jun 2013 11:29 pm 



You can always clip a LED lighting of 3 Watt to your book if you want to read before to go to sleep. But if you want to spend 1 kWh to use your washing machine, it could happen that you have to wait a day or two, until the wind starts blowing again.

So where is the civilizational breakdown, I am asking you?

Others on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 3:15 am 



Micro grid should have a grid back up and when ever grid needs more micro grid will supply.

What is outrageous is have the centralized heating/cooling system where the whole house is cooled even though people sleep only in the bedroom.

If each bedroom could have some portable Air conditioner just for that bedroom and they can turn off the centralized cooler, this could save a lot of electricity.

LED on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 3:16 am 



LED lights are becoming very popular and we seem their prices slowly dropping every month. May be in a year or two it could go below $5 and there will be a widespread usage. But in any case, incandescent bulbs should be phased out.

BillT on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 5:24 am 



Well, dreams are just that. Micro grids are just more intricate systems that, by definition, are more suseptable to failure, or in this case, hacking.

A Cruise ship is not a city. Not be any stretch of the imagination. Nor is wind and solar an answer to keep civilization, as we know it, going.

Ans electric cars are also NOT going to happen. GM has cut $9,000 from their Volt price and still cannot sell them.

We are stuck with the current antique system until it crashes and is not patchable. Then it will be too late for ‘alternatives’.

And, Arthur, washing machines are NOT a necessity. They were done by hand prior to the electric machine in the early 1900s. And will be done that way again before you die. Wait and see.

Plantagenet on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 6:44 am 



Anthony is spouting BS. There is no passenger ship that has run its power system solely on solar energy for the last 30 years. Anthony is confusing the diesel powered engines that generate the electrical power on passenger ships with solar power—and try as you like diesel just ain’t solar.

Arthur on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 11:03 am 



Bill, you are right, washing machines are not a necessity, but they are very handy. I do not expect (western) society to break down to such an extent that all accomplishments of the past need to be abandoned and that we will return to a ‘hunter and gatherer’ society. It is perfectly possible to at least avoid a total breakdown of domestic electricity consumption, provided by wind and solar, albeit intermittent and some form of rationing will be unavoidable. The real ‘victims’ of the coming energy crunch are going to be mass transport and unrestricted domestic climate control (heating and cooling). But technology exists to make that transition bearable (IT and electric underwear.lol) There will be enough renewable energy available to switch on your washing machine once a week and ‘waste’ 1 kwh on that exercise. Remember that 1 kwh represents 1 manday of hard work. We do not want to go back to the 19th century if we do not have to.

BillT on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 11:25 am 



Arthur, keep in mind the planned obsolescence of most appliances today. A refrigerator used to last 20-30 years when I was a kid. Today they may last 7-10 if they are not moved after in place. Ditto for all other appliances. They will not last and will not be replaceable. The factories that make them by the millions today will not exist then. The resources to make the parts will be scattered all over the world not in one country.

I hope you are more correct than I am, but I don’t see that happening. We have built a technology web that will not be possible with expensive, scarce energy to move stuff around the world. You live in a small country that things can be moved around easily by horse cart if necessary but you are not self-sufficient in most things.

How many things in your house can you walk to the local hardware store and buy parts to repair them when they die? I bet there are few to none. If parts are even sold, you have to order and have them delivered. That is the world we built and is going to crumble when the collapse comes.

Arthur on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 11:59 am 



My German made Vaillant gas central heating + hot tap water system is 40+ years old and still works without problems, maintenance merely the yearly 125 euro cleaning in May. My mother had a high end German Miele washing machine of 25 years old, still works fine, I have it now. I still have the fridge I bought when I got my house 27 years ago. Only the little light does not work anymore, but I do not bother to repair it. My parents had their first Dutch Philips black & white TV in ca. 1965 and replaced it with a Philips color TV in the early eighties, because they wanted color, not because the old one broke down.

The standard procedure generally is to bring fully functioning stuff to the waste dump, because something better came to the market, not because the old stuff broke down. In general 7-10 years life span is too pessimistic for appliances, unless of course you buy cheap crappy Chinese stuff at Walmart or similar European outlets.

Kenz300 on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 2:56 pm 



Seems like micro grids are a another way to diversify our energy sources and types.

The old saying “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket” still holds true.

Competition and choice are good things.

BillT on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 3:41 pm 



Arthur, buy a new one and see how long it lasts. “…40+ years old…” I bet 10-15 years max without a lot of maintenance and repairs equal to the cost of a new one. They all pre-date the obsolescence plan. Ant the appliances I am talking about are US made pre-China/Japan. I have 50 years of appliance buying experience, how many years do you have/

DC on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 4:23 pm 



Well, to Arthur, most European goods, are in fact better built than what have access to here in Carmerica. Im sure Europeans have there shoddy goods too, like most places, but on balance, things are definitely better made there.

In BillTs defence, hes exactly right. If anything, 7-10 for major appliances is even a little optimistic IME. N.A. stuff is plastic, tin, needless microchips and veneer. Even ‘new’ stuff now starts to break almost right off. I see it in the garbage bin condo we live in now. The appliances are nothing to write home about. Pieces started falling off them within a year, light bulbs that are screwed in so tight they are hazard to try to change once they burn out(which is quickly of course).The condo of course, wasnt ‘cheap’ in dollar terms by any stretch-but shoddy is how we roll here in N.A. Im not at all impressed with N.A.s ‘durable’ goods, and would happily replace them something that actually didn’t start to break almost on day one.

Except, you cant really find anything like that in Trashmerica.

I think living in N.A. for a year or so would quickly cure Arthur of the persistent feeling I get from him that he thinks N.A. ‘stuff’ is lot a better than it actually is. A year of living here, and having to replace or repair all the ‘new’ crud we consume would quickly cure him of any lingering illusions he still harbours.

Arthur on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 8:43 pm 



Nah, all of my American software still works after all these years.

I mean, after it crashes every now and then, I merely have to close the windows and reboot. Does not work with European cars 😉

Arthur on Sun, 16th Jun 2013 11:59 pm 



http://www.infowars.com/britain-prepared-for-war-in-syria-two-years-before-the-crisis-flared-up-frances-former-fm-says/

Whoops…

“Former French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas said that Britain had been preparing gunmen to invade Syria two years before the crisis there flared up in 2011.

During a TV show, Dumas said ”I was in Britain two years ago, and I met British officials, some my friends…they admitted that they were up to something in Syria.”

”They even asked me to join them in my capacity as a foreign minister, but I declined,” he added.

He indicated that the plan of striking Syria had been prepared in advance long before the 2011 events, adding that the goal was to overthrow the Syrian government that considers Israel an enemy.”
.
Where is the ‘Shi’ite-Sunni’ conflict? Maybe it was some ‘color coded revolution’ after all.

Arthur on Mon, 17th Jun 2013 12:00 am 



Sorry, last post was posted in the wrong thread.