The Nation's Utility Challenges

There are many challenges that the utility industry is facing today. First there is a pervasive recession which puts pressures on those in this industry because the customers are under pressure. Then there are political and regulatory pressures from the government. For instance, the utilities companies need to develop smart grid and intelligent utility features. These companies have been working on developing smart grids for the past 20 years, but the progress has been slow. Finally, there is the AMI Advanced Metering Infrastructure that is being put in place.

The American Recover and Reinvestment Act ARRA is providing stimulus funding for projects like smart grid development, demand response methodologies, energy efficiency engineering, renewable development, clean-coal development, and retrofitting homes and businesses with new technologies. Its important to note that there is no national grid. The US currently only has regional grids which are loosely connected with one another.

These are not easy requirements to address. Some CIOs report that these requirements needed many months of preparation. But there is nearly $47M of stimulus funding going to eight projects in seven States. Almost $12M are going to Massachusetts-based superconductor projects. And an additional $615M is going to smart grid demonstrations.

The bright side is that 84% of companies say that they already have a plan to develop smart grids, though many companies have difficulty differentiating a new smart grid from a glorified version of their old grid. The development plan inevitably involves integration of varied and variant data types and data feeding solutions. Integration is arguably the most challenging thing to do.

Northwestern Energy says that the benefits of executing the plan include improving asset utilization, eliminating operating reserves, reducing operating costs, improving reliability of metrics, increasing customer confidence and convenience, and conserving energy. Courtesy of Warren Causey, Sierra Energy Group.