GE’s new range of electric car charging points.

We are at the start of a smart grid explosion that will revolutionise our energy use, writes Max Pichon.

In 2006, Al Gore coined the term “electranet” in an article for Newsweek magazine, describing a web of networks, microprocessors and digital sensing technologies “that will be as flexible as they are intelligent”. He described in basic terms what we now call smart grids, a concept moving from paper to reality with news of the $100 million Smart Grid, Smart City demonstration project.

Smart grids promise to revolutionise the way we use energy. You’ll be sitting at a work meeting and be able to pick up your iPhone to turn your heater on or off, or roll down the solar panels on your house. Your water heater will automatically switch to heat pump mode at high energy cost periods.

And CSIRO is researching ‘smart fridges’ that can plan ahead and coordinate when they consume energy, smoothing out not just cost peaks but also the intermittent power output from renewable generators. Each fridge is fitted with control technology, allowing them to communicate with each other via a network to share and store the energy.

The grid will enable businesses and households to generate their own energy too, and turn electric cars into mini-power plants by drawing down on their battery power to service peak afternoon energy loads.

The real world driver, said IBM’s Bruce Hemingway, will be “enhanced visibility in pricing”.

“The most exciting thing for consumers is the direct integration of appliances to the cost of power. You can have smart devices to turn off or on and optimise their cycles of operation depending on the optimal cost of power,” he told WME.

Big guns back grid
IBM is part of the heavyweight consortium behind the two-year Smart Grid Smart City trial, including project leader Energy Australia, AGL and GE Energy. It will roll out 50,000 smart meters in five NSW sites, with the main project in Newcastle but also the Sydney CBD, the suburbs of Ku-ring-gai and Newington and regional Scone.

Some 15,000 Newcastle households will become ‘smart homes’ to trial a new breed of in-house displays and websites that track electricity and water use, costs and CO2 emissions.

In Newington, 1,000 households are being connected to a smart grid that will give them a minute-by-minute picture of their energy and water use and remote control of their appliances, plus a neighbourhood competition comparing energy use.

In Scone, houses will become “virtual green power stations in battery storage trials”.

In Sydney’s CBD, trials will see power generated in buildings, while Sydney City Council’s new fleet of 20 electric vehicles will have battery storage and smart charging points in public areas to test how electric cars can be charged from multiple locations on the grid. Get ready for the ride.