As we described yesterday, one of the hot conversations for GE Energy at this year’s annual meeting of The World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland is the immense benefit that can result from reducing the amount of gas that’s flared from drilling projects. Another critical energy topic at Davos — where more than 2,500 business leaders and officials are meeting in over 200 working sessions — is how to move smart grid efforts from smaller-scale, demonstration phases to mainstream rollouts.
John Krenicki, GE Energy’s president and CEO, is in Davos and one of the points he’s focusing on during his panel discussions is how to drive city-scale deployments of proven smart grid technologies. For example, GE is working with partners in Miami, Florida to deploy more than 1 million advanced wireless “smart meters” — giving the project the potential to be the most comprehensive and holistic smart grid city implementation ever launched in the U.S. While it’s a huge win for Miami’s energy future, for the gains to really move the needle on efficiency and productivity, they need to be replicated at the city level around the world.
Just the beginning: Other pieces of the puzzle being talked about at Davos focus on helping consumers understand that smart meters, although a critically important foundation in smart grids, are just a gateway to a more sustainable and economically competitive future. Regulatory frameworks are also on the agenda, as they need to be adapted so that utilities are rewarded for changing and driving efficiency. Click on the image above to see GE’s vision of a Net Zero Energy Home.
As Bob Gilligan, Vice President, GE Energy — Transmission and Distribution, just wrote in an essay published on arabianbusiness.com: “Smart grid technologies can increase energy efficiencies and improve utilization of the existing electrical infrastructure. Asset optimization technologies can help prolong electrical transformer life. Energy management systems can accommodate the integration of higher percentages of cleaner energy sources into the electrical system.” And smart grid technologies can meet the challenge of renewable energy sources like wind and solar, he writes, by helping to manage the fluctuations that come from these sources. “Smart grid is not a vision of the future,” he says, “but rather a solution to the energy and environmental challenges facing us today.”
Part of the conversation in Davos is the way in which these smart grid efforts can go hand in had with other energy efficiency solutions that are within easy reach. In an article he wrote for the WEF, “Towards a More Energy Efficient World,” John Krenicki says: “Incremental improvements, when multiplied across the scale of the energy sector, can result in huge gains in energy efficiency and carbon reductions.” John writes that his “favorite opportunities” on the supply side start with the substantial quantities of electricity that are lost in the transmission and distribution of power. “For example, in the United States, line losses approach 6 percent of total generation; in India, these losses can reach 25 percent of generation,” he writes. “The technology exists to minimize these line losses.”
His other favorites include utilities investing in technologies that save power by reducing and optimizing voltage and capturing the heat that’s generated when producing electricity to create more power — a technology known as combined heat and power, or “cogeneration.”
Read more about GE Energy on GE Reports in the stories below:
* “Putting flare gas on the firing line at the WEF in Davos”
* “Thinking locally with energy tech at Copenhagen”
* “Google & GE call for home energy info in Copenhagen”
* “Transformers Part 2: Flipping NJ’s smart grid switch”
* “Building smart washers/dryers in KY to create 430 jobs”
* “Getting smarter about the smart grid”
* “Carbon-neutral Masdar City plugs in smart appliances”
* Learn about GE’s smart grid efforts in Florida, Oklahoma and Houston