July 8, 2009

Municipal utilities in southern California are working together to apply for DOE smart grid matching grants, Burbank Water & Power Assistant General Manager Fredric Fletcher told us yesterday.  “While we are all separate, we are developing our strategies coherently,” he added.

          “We've formed a group of managers who meet weekly -- and for some hours -- to coordinate our efforts.” That's been going on for a month.

          Each muni is developing its own DOE grant application but they will send them to DOE together, probably in about 10 days, Fletcher reported.

          The munis are hiring the consultancy KEMA to put the finishing touches on their applications.  The deadline is Aug 6 for filing the first round of applications seeking Smart Grid Investment Grant (SGIG) program funds (SGT, Jun-26).

          The munis in the Southern California plan are following roughly the same grant application path, depending on whom they serve, noted Fletcher.  Those with loads that are predominantly residential -- Azusa, Banning and Colton -- are more focused on customer information systems.  Munis with heavy C&I loads -- Burbank and Vernon -- tend to zero in on distribution automation and improving reliability.  The latter includes tying together different circuits in a distribution system with automated switches that can be used to isolate faults and feed the system from an alternate power source.

          Munis with a more even mix -- Anaheim, Glendale, Pasadena and Riverside -- are also taking part in the smart grid application plans Fletcher is helping to lead.

          Burbank hired engineers who designed Staten Island's smart grid system, Fletcher said, and he called Staten Island one of the most reliable utilities in the US, in part because “they looped the system together with switches.

          “We're setting our outage management, customer information, ability to take care of plug-in electric hybrids and to do thermal storage, distribution automation and a smart grid energy control center.” He believes those can be accomplished in three years under the SGIG.

          Solar is not as big part of the muni application plans as one might guess, he added.  “We have solar projects we're developing on the power supply side but as far as the smart grid program, not so much -- because [DOE grant makers] really want things done in three years.  It's hard to get significant solar done in three years in most of municipals,” Fletcher said, noting that Southern California Edison (SCE) and the Los Angeles Dept of Water & Power (LADWP) are doing more PV.

          In terms of DOE smart grid demonstration projects, Burbank is leading the municipals in a “rather sophisticated” exploration of a plug-in electric vehicles project that involves SCE and LADWP.

          The deadline for filing demo grant applications is Aug 26.

          “Electric vehicles is an area that's so important to do on a regional basis” since it constitutes laying a foundation for future collaboration, Fletcher said.  “Once you've set the basis to work between utilities on something that's relatively complicated, you can use that same approach to do other [joint] projects” that will involve coordinating “other storage and renewable power exchanges” between utilities.

          Solar energy isn't nearly as complicated since PV panels stay in one place.

          “If we do a car, it could very likely spend the evening in a house that Southern California Edison serves and in the daytime be here at Warner Bros, which Burbank serves.  We would both be providing energy to that car to recharge it,” Fletcher said.  “So we want to make sure we do a good job to take care of this because by getting those cars so they're not using gasoline, we're reducing greenhouse gases and the total emissions in the [Los Angeles] basin.”

          Utilities need to be thinking now about gathering such environmental-impact data, Fletcher urged.

          New regulations involving greenhouse gas emissions are in the works and will be enforceable as of Jan 1, 2012, he noted.

          Fletcher has been working on Burbank's plans since February.  The total cost for its project is about $35 million.

          Distribution automation is especially “cool,” Fletcher said, since it will help cut outage times -- often in Burbank caused by Mylar balloons touching power lines.

          “Right now it takes us about an hour to restore power” when the metal-coated plastic balloons trip a circuit breaker -- once about every six-eight weeks, he added, the utility's main source of outages.  If they could just be outlawed, Fletcher estimated, Burbank would likely experience power outages once every four or five months.

          In any event, distribution automation will let the firm restart service much quicker, he said, noting that engineers are now calculating how much faster.

          Fletcher does not believe Burbank has an inordinately large number of Mylar balloons floating around.  “I don't think we have any more balloons than anybody else does,” he added.  “When we talk to other utilities, they have about the same amount per year as we do.”