November 4, 2009

The announcements President Obama and Vice President Biden made last week about the advent of the smart grid lacked a “feeling of excitement that should accompany the early stages of an important national mission,” Bob Herbert, a New York Times op-ed columnist, wrote this week.

          “There were no signals from the White House that something big and important was happening,” Herbert asserted, despite the fact that the White House the night before Obama's announcement held a press briefing to help prepare reporters for coverage of 100 SGIG awards totaling $3.4 billion (SGT, Oct-27).

          BOTTOM LINE: The White House media campaign fell short of Kennedy's “Moon Speech,” for example, but let's be honest, smart meters and grid automation are never going to be quite as sexy as, say, space rockets, even if their value to mankind can give the space program's many deliverables some healthy competition in the long run.

          But look at who Obama is hanging out with.  The president's vision of the energy future is being embraced by some of the biggest emitters of carbon, the electric firms, that see green power and smart grid as ways to tackle problems they face.  His speech was at an electric utility in Florida that was opening a new solar power plant.

          If traditional foes of green power and new technology are lining up in favor of the president's vision, why did his speech focus so much on the pitched battles ahead and predictions of pushback from lobbyists and his political foes? Maybe it was because while Kennedy faced the Soviet Union driving the “space race” forward, Obama faces a Republican minority in Congress that is bent on crippling his programs for political gain.  The Senate committee hearing on the climate bill yesterday saw only one Republican in attendance and he showed up late to deliver the demands of his party mates.

          “The closer we get to this new energy future,” Obama said in his smart grid speech last week, “the harder the opposition is going to fight, the more we're going to hear from special interests and lobbyists in Washington whose interests are contrary to the interests of the American people.  Now, there are those who are also going to suggest that moving towards a clean energy future is going to somehow harm the economy or lead to fewer jobs.  And they're going to argue that we should do nothing, stand pat, do less or delay action yet again.”

          He even went on to say people get nervous about change, “especially utility executives,” to some appreciative laughter from those gathered.  Meanwhile, many utility executives we speak to believe the smart grid-enabled energy future is worth fighting for -- as long as it is delivered without unreasonable financial risk.

          Less Kennedy-like drama from the White House is OK by us as long as the industry's hurdles get crossed -- and maybe the inherent challenges in achieving interoperability standards cooled the administration's jets last week, if indeed Herbert is right -- and we are not saying he is.  Interoperability is still but a dream, though lots of partnerships have been breaking out between firms to try to iron the kinks out of utility projects that just can't wait.

          But anyone's wish for smart grid drama may just be premature.  Too many challenges may need to be crossed before America can stand up and cheer for the smart grid.  Everyone can in some way imagine the adventure of traveling to the moon.  It may take great effort to get across to the public what the smart grid is supposed to do other than cost billions of dollars; fiddle with the price of electricity and maybe even turn thermostats warmer on the hottest days.  But it is so much cooler than that.

          So, with apologies to the late President Kennedy, we borrow for a moment his excitement from four+ decades ago because we believe it could be said about smart grid technologies that we choose to deploy them nationwide and worldwide, “not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone and one which we intend to win.”

          Obama reminded us last week that “this is the nation, after all, that harnessed electricity and the energy contained in an atom, that developed the steamboat and the modern solar cell, that connected a continent with a massive system of highways and railroads and I believe we can blaze such trails again and I commend all of you for being so critical in these early first steps.”