A major challenge for adopting larger scale renewable energy production the United States is our aging infrastructure's difficulty in accommodating the variable nature of demand and supply. Utility operators, energy management firms like EnerNOC, and individual consumers are working to help reduce consumption to help their bottom line, there seems to be less effort into more directly lowering the dollar cost of energy for domestic energy consumers. As a consequence of the extremely variable nature of domestic energy demand the average household will spend 11.62 cents/kWhr while commercial consumer's spend 9.82 cents/kWhr and industrial users spend an average of 6.54 cents/kWhr. While net-metering approaches have started to help home owners in some states reduce their monthly power bill there are major limiting factors in adoption rates, until very recently residents in Hawaii and California were limited in how much generating capacity could be installed in a given neighborhood. Improvements in policy will help increase the utilization of distributed energy, new technology will play a major roll. Micro-grids have gained a greater degree of prominence as the various underlying technologies have shown how much more efficient power production and consumption can be made by more closely matching supply with demand. The Department of Defense has already started to develop a strong push for implementing micro-grids as a means of improving the safety of the warfighter as well as offset the operational costs of larger facilities.
What I would like to propose is a plug and play micro-grid platform intended to work within the energy demands of traditional American neighborhoods. This system would be designed to be plugged into the primary distribution line for a given service area and through use of batteries and control systems, surplus power from the local and larger grids would be stored for later use. By creating a packaged system meant for entire neighborhoods the number of man hours required to make regions energy smart should be drastically reduced. This local energy storage capacity would allow for a much smoother power demand curve, aiding in utilities operating generating facilities at optimal efficiency.
Neighborhoods that install this technology could begin to negotiate for prices closer to those of commercial consumers (This may not be guaranteed to be correct, this is more theoretical than anything else) . Alternatively utility operators may work with neighborhoods to implement localized micro-grids to improve overall power availability without adding new power lines or plants. Another potential draw for packaged micro-grids, even if consumer energy prices are unaffected, could be disaster preparedness. After Super Storm Sandy, large swaths of the East Coast lost power as a result of downed power lines. Having micro-grids attached to neighborhoods with small scale generating capacity would mean that freezers could keep operational and maybe at least one or more houses in a neighborhood would have enough power for all of the modern conveniences.
For this platform to succeed from a design standpoint it must achieve some rather critical properties (I'm going to be vague here because I know far too little of the minutia to give hard and fast numbers). The system must have minimal maintenance costs and ideally be as forgettable as possible for those using the technology, this means the installations must be effectively invisible to consumers. Where-ever the system is installed consumers cannot see their energy costs go up as a direct result (there are a range of external variables and indirect costs that might eventually cause a rate hike, so only direct costs can honestly be factored in) Have an ROI that is less than 10 years, depending on how a technology like this is marketed that timeline may need to be shorter, longer might be feasible for really solid market matches (this is doubtful to make financial sense for the company making the micro grid box.) Personal experience in talking to small energy producers indicates that if the utility is paying for a technology an ROI less than 4 or 5 years is generally necessary.
Some features that could be considered for the micro-grid plug and play box. Warm water production, as there will invariably be at least some degree of waste heat produced, why not heat up water and pipe that to nearby buildings, while this would require a more complex installation it might make sense for getting people on board.
Fuel cell integration, either natural gas or Hydrogen, as the platform has the potential to be treated as a back up generator for an area adding this capability could make sense, the hydrogen fuel cell suggestion would likely make sense as a 3rd tier energy storage mechanismm after the system's flywheel and/or capacitors and secondary power storage mechanisms have reached maximum stored energy but there is still extra electricity coming from a local renewable source. I should back track on the fuel cell comment for a moment and quickly explain the 3rd tier comment. As I understand the technologies involved in energy storage batteries are rarely a good idea for extremely variable energy loads, where they must rapidly switch from storing to supplying power and vice-versa. Fly-wheels and ultra-capacitors are solutions with properties that make them an excellent option for rapidly charging and dis-charging, the trade off for this ability is the reduced energy storage capacity, relative to both mass and overall cost. For periods of less variability batteries will serve extremely well. The reason fuel cells are put in the 3rd tier category (at this time) is the fact that they have some kind of additional fuel cost and a high upfront cost for a unit of generating capacity. In the case of market available fuel cells there is the initial hardware investment and cost of fuel during operation (natural gas is most cases), making it an acceptable solution for emergency needs or extreme peaks in grid demand. Hydrogen fuel-cells have the challenge of costing more per-watt of listed generating capacity and there is still the energy required to produce 1kg of Hydrogen from water, which is currently about 48kWhrs (while the system is technically using surplus power it is still worth considering) of that 48 kWhrs/kg of fuel, only 25% of that energy would be returned to energy users (sorry for using wikipedia on that, the primary source is being updated) It should be noted that the 25% figure only accounts for electrical output with respect to electrical input (for every watt of power you're getting out of the generator you would need to spend 4 watts breaking the water). If the fuel-cell is also being used with a waste heat generator the efficiency grows to closer to 85%.
What I would like to propose is a plug and play micro-grid platform intended to work within the energy demands of traditional American neighborhoods. This system would be designed to be plugged into the primary distribution line for a given service area and through use of batteries and control systems, surplus power from the local and larger grids would be stored for later use. By creating a packaged system meant for entire neighborhoods the number of man hours required to make regions energy smart should be drastically reduced. This local energy storage capacity would allow for a much smoother power demand curve, aiding in utilities operating generating facilities at optimal efficiency.
Neighborhoods that install this technology could begin to negotiate for prices closer to those of commercial consumers (This may not be guaranteed to be correct, this is more theoretical than anything else) . Alternatively utility operators may work with neighborhoods to implement localized micro-grids to improve overall power availability without adding new power lines or plants. Another potential draw for packaged micro-grids, even if consumer energy prices are unaffected, could be disaster preparedness. After Super Storm Sandy, large swaths of the East Coast lost power as a result of downed power lines. Having micro-grids attached to neighborhoods with small scale generating capacity would mean that freezers could keep operational and maybe at least one or more houses in a neighborhood would have enough power for all of the modern conveniences.
For this platform to succeed from a design standpoint it must achieve some rather critical properties (I'm going to be vague here because I know far too little of the minutia to give hard and fast numbers). The system must have minimal maintenance costs and ideally be as forgettable as possible for those using the technology, this means the installations must be effectively invisible to consumers. Where-ever the system is installed consumers cannot see their energy costs go up as a direct result (there are a range of external variables and indirect costs that might eventually cause a rate hike, so only direct costs can honestly be factored in) Have an ROI that is less than 10 years, depending on how a technology like this is marketed that timeline may need to be shorter, longer might be feasible for really solid market matches (this is doubtful to make financial sense for the company making the micro grid box.) Personal experience in talking to small energy producers indicates that if the utility is paying for a technology an ROI less than 4 or 5 years is generally necessary.
Some features that could be considered for the micro-grid plug and play box. Warm water production, as there will invariably be at least some degree of waste heat produced, why not heat up water and pipe that to nearby buildings, while this would require a more complex installation it might make sense for getting people on board.
Fuel cell integration, either natural gas or Hydrogen, as the platform has the potential to be treated as a back up generator for an area adding this capability could make sense, the hydrogen fuel cell suggestion would likely make sense as a 3rd tier energy storage mechanismm after the system's flywheel and/or capacitors and secondary power storage mechanisms have reached maximum stored energy but there is still extra electricity coming from a local renewable source. I should back track on the fuel cell comment for a moment and quickly explain the 3rd tier comment. As I understand the technologies involved in energy storage batteries are rarely a good idea for extremely variable energy loads, where they must rapidly switch from storing to supplying power and vice-versa. Fly-wheels and ultra-capacitors are solutions with properties that make them an excellent option for rapidly charging and dis-charging, the trade off for this ability is the reduced energy storage capacity, relative to both mass and overall cost. For periods of less variability batteries will serve extremely well. The reason fuel cells are put in the 3rd tier category (at this time) is the fact that they have some kind of additional fuel cost and a high upfront cost for a unit of generating capacity. In the case of market available fuel cells there is the initial hardware investment and cost of fuel during operation (natural gas is most cases), making it an acceptable solution for emergency needs or extreme peaks in grid demand. Hydrogen fuel-cells have the challenge of costing more per-watt of listed generating capacity and there is still the energy required to produce 1kg of Hydrogen from water, which is currently about 48kWhrs (while the system is technically using surplus power it is still worth considering) of that 48 kWhrs/kg of fuel, only 25% of that energy would be returned to energy users (sorry for using wikipedia on that, the primary source is being updated) It should be noted that the 25% figure only accounts for electrical output with respect to electrical input (for every watt of power you're getting out of the generator you would need to spend 4 watts breaking the water). If the fuel-cell is also being used with a waste heat generator the efficiency grows to closer to 85%.
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