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Why smart grids are the mobile phones of the electricity world
Why smart grids are the mobile phones of the electricity world
WRITTEN BY David J. Unger
08/17/2016
If you want to know how microgrids will transform energy, just look at what cellphones did to communication, says Dr. Mohammad Shahidehpour, the professor and engineer who oversees a microgrid at a university on Chicago’s South Side.
The future of power has a parallel in the recent history of telecommunications: a rapid rise of decentralization, access, and capabilities we once could have never imagined.
In 2008, the Illinois Institute of Technology launched what it calls the Perfect Power Initiative, a $18.5 million project aimed at designing and building “the world’s first self-healing and efficient smart microgrid distribution system.” Across nearly ten years, that vision grew into a 9-megawatt network of gas turbines, large-scale batteries, a wind turbine and numerous smart-efficiency technologies – with more on the way.
IIT’s microgrid can separate completely from the broader grid and, in many cases, supply the campus with all the power it needs. It has helped the university offset $7 million in other infrastructure upgrades, and it saves about $1 million per year through efficiencies, reduced peak demand and other benefits.
The project’s success is one reason ComEd is planning a microgrid of its own right ...
http://midwestenergynews.com/2016/08/17/qa-why-smart-grids-are-the-mobile-phones-of-the-electricity-world/
WRITTEN BY David J. Unger
08/17/2016
PHOTO BY Jonathan Rieke / Creative Commons
Dr. Mohammed Shahidehpour oversees the microgrid at the Illinois Institute of Technology.
If you want to know how microgrids will transform energy, just look at what cellphones did to communication, says Dr. Mohammad Shahidehpour, the professor and engineer who oversees a microgrid at a university on Chicago’s South Side.
The future of power has a parallel in the recent history of telecommunications: a rapid rise of decentralization, access, and capabilities we once could have never imagined.
In 2008, the Illinois Institute of Technology launched what it calls the Perfect Power Initiative, a $18.5 million project aimed at designing and building “the world’s first self-healing and efficient smart microgrid distribution system.” Across nearly ten years, that vision grew into a 9-megawatt network of gas turbines, large-scale batteries, a wind turbine and numerous smart-efficiency technologies – with more on the way.
IIT’s microgrid can separate completely from the broader grid and, in many cases, supply the campus with all the power it needs. It has helped the university offset $7 million in other infrastructure upgrades, and it saves about $1 million per year through efficiencies, reduced peak demand and other benefits.
The project’s success is one reason ComEd is planning a microgrid of its own right ...
