Tom Raftery no es un nombre demasiado conocido, aunque no para de dar conferencias por diversas partes del mundo, desde Berlín hasta Nueva York.
Su última parada ha sido Sevilla para debatir en el EBE (Evento Blog España) de un concepto relativamente nuevo, el GRID 2.0 (red de segunda generación), una idea nada fácil de definir, pero que podría traducirse como la redistribución de la energía eléctrica gracias a la tecnología, de un modo similar al que utiliza Internet para distribuir el conocimiento. Una especie de Electranet.
I have been talking to a lot of Smart Meter and utility companies in the last few weeks and it has been fascinating. I have learned a huge amount about some of the challenges and opportunities involved in rolling our Smart Grids.
The first thing to say is that Smart Grids are coming. None of the utilities I have spoken to have given me feedback to indicate that they are rolling back on their Smart Grid projects - and they all have Smart Grid projects at some level, whether it is in planning, in trial or in roll out.
One of the questions I have asked and not received a satisfactory answer to yet is “What happens if I decide to change utility co.? Does my existing utility come along, take the Smart Meter off my wall and my new utility then needs to send an engineer to install their Smart Meter?” Unfortunately, so far the answer to this appears to be “Yes”!
In reality, this will probably be solved with some kind of cost or asset transfer solution.
As an electricity consumer (be that industrial or residential), ideally what I want is either an ‘unlocked’ Smart Meter, or one which is owned by the grid management company, as opposed to one which is locked into a particular utilitity.
In fact, for me the ultimate solution would be a neutral Smart Meter which can go out at all times, find the cheapest electricity at that time and pull from that utility!
I was speaking at the EventoBlog España conference on Saturday and I made the comment that electricity’s carbon footprint tends to increase as it becomes more expensive.
In follow-up questions, I failed to explain well what I meant so I will attempt to do so here.
Electricity pricing (on the wholesale market) is a function of supply and demand. When demand is high, electricity is expensive, when demand is low, electricity is typically cheap.
For weather based renewables (wind, solar, wave) - they produce power completely independently of the price of electricity, so they produce the same amount whether electricity is cheap or expensive.
Since weather based renewables are on average a constant percentage then they tend to have a higher slice of the market when electricity is in low demand/cheaper.
In other words, weather based renewables are independent of demand, therefore at times of low demand, they have a higher share of the market. This is even more so the case for wind which tends to blow more at night when demand is lower.
As there is a definite correlation between low demand and low price, it can be said by extension that the cheaper the electricity, the lower its carbon footprint!
This year is now the only hurricane season on record in the Atlantic that has featured major hurricanes in five separate months. The only year to feature major hurricanes in four separate months was 2005, and many years have had major hurricanes in three separate months
Greenmonk is a new line of business for RedMonk, the first open source analyst company.
GreenMonk offers advisory services to help a range of organisations better understand how sustainability issues will affect them.
@ciscoDC Certainly seems that way. I went through the cancellation process and discovered 5 months later that $49/mo was being taken from me
about 2 hours ago from twhirl
Still trying to get hundreds of $s they gouged from my account back months later - my opinion of Cisco right now is extremely low
about 2 hours ago from twhirl
Cisco's Webex trial process is little better than a Nigerian 419 scam. Cisco should be ashamed to be associated with such shady practices.
about 2 hours ago from twhirl
The Energy Star program is in trouble, it is failing the American public and, without serious intervention, will collapse http://url.ie/x3x
about 3 hours ago from twhirl
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