August 2
PSEG on Track to Reduce Emissions 80 Percent
Top consumer smart grid news hand-selected and brought to you by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative.
Member News
PSEG is on track to cut carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2046, relative to 2005 levels. The New Jersey utility last Thursday announced a “significant extension” of its Powering Progress strategy, announced last year. PSEG committed to divest all of its remaining coal interests and said it has no plans to “build or acquire new fossil-fueled generation”.
With the opening of their first Smart Neighborhood, Georgia Power and PulteGroup have begun the research phase of a new project to supplement technology-enhanced homes with rooftop solar installations and in-home battery energy storage. This first neighborhood consists of 46 townhomes on Atlanta’s Upper West Side. All will feature advanced energy mechanisms, including things like advanced heating and cooling systems, LED lighting, EV chargers and smart thermostats.
Entergy New Orleans and the city’s Regional Transit Authority have reached agreement on installing solar panels on the roof of the Carrollton Streetcar Barn. The 300-kW system will feed directly into the Energy New Orleans electric distribution grid to benefit all customers. The agreement is part of the utility’s 5 MW commercial-scale rooftop solar project. As part of that, Entergy earlier this year announced it had installed about 2.5 MW of solar capacity on a series of warehouse rooftops near the Inner Harbor Navigation Channel.
AEP Ohio recently submitted its grid modernization expansion plan, which would expand advanced grid technology benefits to all AEP Ohio customers, to PUCO. AEP Ohio plans to invest approximately $700 million over the next 10 years in smart grid technology for the rural parts of its service territory. The average residential customer using 1,000-kilowatt hours of electricity each month would see an average increase of $1.16 per month over the first five years of the plan.
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Industry News
The total number of smart meters around the world is expected to almost double over 2017 levels by 2024, opening up new opportunities for customer-side control and analytics. The global smart meter total will rise from 665.1 million in 2017 to more than 1.2 billion by the end of 2024, according to a new Wood Mackenzie report. Accordingly, the cumulative global expenditure on advanced metering infrastructure will almost double over the same period, rising from $73 billion in 2017 to $145.8 billion in 2024.
Florida will soon expand the infrastructure for electric vehicles in-state with the addition of new charging stations along major thoroughfares under funding from the Volkswagen Settlement. The plan calls for the infrastructure evolution to go hand-in-hand with diesel emissions reductions. In all, the state has been granted $166 million to improve its air quality, though the state is still seeking public comment on how those funds are utilized.
Tesla recently said the deployment of its energy storage systems — Powerwall and Powerpack — grew by 81 percent to a company record of 415 MWh during the second quarter of 2019, compared to Q1. Powerwalls are now installed at more than 50,000 sites, Tesla said in its Q2 earnings statement. The California-based electric vehicle manufacturer and energy company said additional cell supply combined with a new module line led to an increase in energy storage production.
PGE has launched a test pilot program aimed at encouraging customers to be more proactive in monitoring their energy consumption and cultivating good energy use habits. The Smart Grid Test Bed, which integrates smart grid technology with the consumption habits of customers, will take place in three neighborhoods in Oregon. More than 20,000 customers are located within the three neighborhoods of the test bed. The mix consists of more than 19,000 residential meters and 1,200 distinct businesses.
