Part II: will industry focus on new power vision?(NOTES)

An Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) report released in March touts a "holistic" approach to power.

Given that almost every item and entity in the power industry is categorized, separated, compartmentalized and labeled, the "Vision for a Holistic Power Supply and Delivery Chain" report envisions a 180-degree turn from the way the power system is laid out under the choppy, interconnected status quo.

Questions remain whether such a vision is practical and feasible. To get answers to those questions, Utility Automation & Engineering T&D asked Stephen Lee, EPRI project manager and author of that holistic vision. In the first installment of this discussion (May 2008), Lee explained how he crafted this holistic vision and how the power industry's state is divided.

In this installment, Lee explains the holistic vision's distribution pathway, how renewables will tie in and what area needs the most research and development (R&D).

THERMOSTATS

The distribution-enabled pathway in Lee's report on a holistic approach to the power system envisions establishing interoperability standards and implementing AMI, which isn't unusual when discussing the power grid's future. In this vision, however, the smart grid comes about from the thermostat back up the chain rather than a traditional top-down approach. This approach is a fiscal one, Lee said.

"From a simple investment perspective, innovation for the mass market draws the most attention and financial support from our capitalistic society," Lee said. "This explains why devices for electricity customers are easier to introduce into the market than phasor measurement units (PMUs) for the transmission grid, and why new products for energy control centers are even harder to launch than hardware and software for substations and distribution systems."