June 24, 2010

NATIONAL TOWN MEETING ON DR AND SMART GRID

ARRA created a strong foundation for smart grid, Patricia Hoffman, DOE's assistant secretary for electricity delivery and reliability, told people attending a policymaking talk at an industry conference in Washington, DC, yesterday.

          Hoffman, who was confirmed to her position by the US Senate Tuesday, expressed a preference for more federal funding for smart grid demo projects – when Demand Response Coordinating Committee (DRCC) Executive Director Dan Delurey asked what she would want ideally.  DOE wants to gather more information about customer behavior surrounding AMI and TOU and about the most effective business models for deploying smart grid, she explained.

          There is a slim chance Congress will pass a “stimulus II” bill or provide more funding for smart grid grants, John Jimison, senior counsel for the US House Energy and Commerce Committee, said in response to Hoffman's wish for more federal spending on demo projects.

          Through the Smart Grid Regional Demonstration Grant (SGRDG) program, DOE divvied up $620 million among 32 awardees in November.

          The demo grants will do much more to advance the smart grid than the far larger $3.4 billion DOE SGIG program, Galvin Electricity Initiative Executive Director Kurt Yeager told us in December (SGT, Dec-02).  The SGRDG program has given at least 26 of the awardees limited access to funds and one awardee unrestricted access, DOE told us this month (SGT, Jun-09).

          Smart grid and DR do not represent contentious issues in Congress, given the bipartisan support both have seen in recent legislation, Jimison said.  Most recently, the Grid Reliability & Infrastructure Defense (Grid) Act, passed the US House of Representatives in a unanimous voice vote (SGT, Jun-16), he reminded.

          Smart grid “is all about computerizing electricity systems,” and the Grid Act would force the US to pay closer attention to vulnerabilities by giving FERC greater authority to protect the bulk power system, said Jimison.

          There is “a great deal of bipartisan support” for smart grid technology and its evolution, he said, noting these are not the big policy debates facing Congress.  Of course, the broader issues of climate change and energy security are controversial and relevant to the build-out of the smart grid, he said.  “You can't integrate clean energy without smart grid,” he added.