March 11
JCP&L to Install 1.1 Million Smart Meters
Top consumer smart energy news hand-selected and brought to you by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative.
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Jersey Central Power & Light (JCP&L), a subsidiary of FirstEnergy, plans to install 1.1 million smart meters for its customers, starting in 2023. The plan, approved last week by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, calls for the installation of more than 1.1 million smart meters over three years. Approximately one-third of the smart meters are expected to be installed each year.
Honeywell and Duke Energy Sustainable Solutions (DESS) agreed to jointly develop and deliver energy resiliency solutions to targeted U.S. markets. The service is intended to focus on communities with pressing resiliency needs such as those that suffer frequent power outages and other grid disruptions related to climate change, said the companies.
D. E. Shaw Renewable Investments and California’s Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) recently announced the signing of SMUD's first combined solar and battery storage system renewable power purchase agreement sized at 200 MW/400 MWh. The project is the largest combined solar and battery energy storage system generation facility announced in northern California under PPA contract at this time.
Xcel Energy is offering its New Mexico customers a fast and easy way to charge electric vehicles at home during off-peak periods for the equivalent of about $1 per gallon of gasoline through a suite of innovative programs aimed at increasing the number of EVs on the road. Xcel Energy has a bold vision to power 1.5 million EVs in the eight states the company serves by 2030.
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Industry News
Connecticut environmental officials are pushing for legislation that would grant condo owners and renters the right to install their own car chargers, part of a broader effort to dramatically expand the state’s EV charging infrastructure. The so-called right-to-charge legislation would prevent condominium and homeowners’ associations, as well as landlords, from prohibiting or “unreasonably” restricting residents who have a designated parking space from installing charging equipment.
NorthWestern Energy last week became the latest energy company to announce a net-zero carbon emissions goal, pledging to neutral out its emissions production by 2050, though cautioning it would need policy and regulatory support to achieve this. The company also pledged to invest in and deploy at greater scale a mix of energy storage, microgrids, advanced controls and solar generation pilot projects as part of its rural reliability program.
Pacific Gas & Electric and General Motors on Tuesday announced a pilot aimed at using EVs as on-demand home power sources in the utility's Northern California service area. The two companies plan to test bidirectional charging technology – which would allow customers to send power from their vehicles to, for instance, a home – thereby enabling EVs to power essential home needs, while also contributing to electric reliability in PG&E's footprint.
Packetized Energy has developed a novel approach for getting millions of remote-controllable thermostats, water heaters, pool pumps and electric vehicle chargers to help balance the power grid: make the whole thing work a lot less like a traditional top-down utility command-and-control system — and a lot more like the internet.
