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Xcel Energy’s Smart Grid

By Robert Safuto on May 10, 2008 in Education, Video

After spending the last two days at a Smart Grid conference I’ve had the next generation of our electric system on the brain. Xcel Energy is the leading United States utility company when it comes to Smart Grid technology. Xcel has a very ambitious strategy that aims to convert the city of Boulder, Colorado into the first Smart Grid city in the nation.

In conjunction with their plan for Boulder, Xcel energy has created this video that explains their vision for the Smart Grid. I recommend that you take a few minutes to view the video below if you want to get a better picture of the future of electricity in the home. You can find out more about Xcel’s Smart Grid initiative and on their website which contains several other interesting items including a white paper and some graphics showing a Smart Grid city and home.

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  • There are several components to a successful smart grid strategy in my opinion. You need the right hardware at the customer. You need a strong communications network. You need robust data centers and software. You need transparent pricing that rewards a shift of load to the off-peak hours.

    If Xcel doesn't move to dynamic pricing right away they can always do so later. The really big investment comes in building out the meter and communications network. So Xcel will still be out in front of many utilities who are considering making investments in baseload generation as opposed to demand response resources.
  • The only problem is that Xcel assumes that a better understanding of real-time electricity usage will be enough to encourage businesses and residential customers to voluntarily cut back on their power consumption, particularly during peak hours when the grid in many cities operates at close to maximum capacity.

    In fact, though, there’s good reason to think that most people won’t change their consumption patterns unless they have an economic incentive to lower their bills by avoiding peak hours. Unfortunately for Boulder, Xcel plans to keep charging a flat rate for electricity instead of instituting “dynamic pricing” that would provide such incentives.

    http://industry.bnet.com/energy/2008/05/20/how-...
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