Beacon Power Brings FlyWheel to The Grid

Beacon Power (Nasdaq:BCON), a Massachusetts-based company focused on deploying flywheelenergy storage technologies for enhancing the grid’s frequencyregulation services, will begin construction on the nation’s firstfull-scale 20-megawatt (MW) flywheel frequency regulation plant in inStephentown, New York before the end of November Frequency regulation is an essential grid service that is performedby maintaining a tight balance between electricity supply and demand.Beacon’s [...]

One Block Off The Grid Introduces New San Diego Program

One Block Off the Grid (1BOG), a solar buying collective, has launcheda San Diego solar community buying campaign designed to make itaffordable for San Diego homeowners to purchase solar energy at a groupdiscount rate. 1BOG says program participants can receive solarpower systems at $5.29 per watt from the 1BOG selected installerpartner, HelioPower. 1BOG’s first San [...]

Will Cities Drive Smart Grid Development?

San Francisco is working to convert the city’s entire transportation systemto cleaner fuels and electricity, and to build an urban infrastructurefor electric vehicles. Boulder, Colorado has already become thenation’s first “Smart Grid City.” And Austin, Texas has undertaken the “Pecan Street Project”to “develop, test and implement the urban power system of the future”and establish the [...]

How ‘Smart’ Is the Smart Grid?

In July, Joseph McClelland, director of the Office of ElectricReliability Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, testifiedon cybersecurity and the U.S. power gird before the U.S. House ofRepresentatives’ Committee on Homeland Security. His comments, whichfollow in italics, cut against the grain of common thinking about theso-called ’smart grid.’ “The need for vigilance may increase as new technologies areadded to the bulk power system. For example, [...]

Farms in Oregon Going Off-Grid

The state of Oregon has had a long-standing reputation forgreen-mindedness, so perhaps it was only a matter of time before newssurfaced of its farmers employing renewable energy to power theircrops. This Associated Pressstory from yesterday highlights the increasing frequency with whichagriculturalists in the Beaver State have been tapping into cleantechnologies such as solar or hydroelectric [...]

Will Solar Crash the Smart Grid?

For the smart grid, the weather is going to be murder. The proliferation of solar panels will effectively transformcommercial districts and neighborhoods into small, localized powerplants. While that will allow utilities to cut back on coal, theunpredictable, varying nature of solar power will force grid operatorsto dispatch or throttle power rapidly. Solar-balancing smart gridsystems now [...]

Winners In DOE’s $3.4B Smart Grid Grant Program

The Department of Energy on Tuesday named 100 smart grid projects as winners of $3.4 billion in stimulus grants – and it looks like the smart meter industry is going to be happy. That’s because a lot of that money is going to deploy two-way communicating electricity meters to customers, according to the list of [...]

DOE announces $3.4 Billion upgrade for Smart Grid

The Department of Energy is announcing today a $3.5 billion investmentin grants to “spur the nation’s transition to a smarter, stronger, moreefficient and reliable electric system,” according to a press releaseby the DOE. The funds will come from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act,and will be matched by industry for a total of approximately $8billion, [...]

MINILUX Concept Car Serves the Grid When Parked

.Designed by Jukka Rautiainen,MINILUX is a concept vehicle targeted for urban dwellers who, use theirown car mainly for leisure purposes and rely on other forms oftransport in their daily mobility. Due to its nature as a leisurevehicle it spends long periods of time unused. When parked outside, thevehicle uses high-efficiency photovoltaic panels to harvest solarenergy. [...]

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