The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued today at its April open meeting an inquiry into the ability of existing broadband networks to withstand significant damage or severe overloads as a result of natural disasters, terrorist attacks, pandemics or other major public emergencies (press release PDF). This examination of the resiliency and reliability of broadband networks was contemplated in the FCC's National Broadband Plan (NBP) issued last month.

The Commission asks a series of key questions that are crucial to utilities as they consider various communications options, particularly in light of the NBP's recommendation that commercial carriers should serve more mission-critical and wide-area utility communications needs. Specifically, the FCC wants to know the location of failure points in broadband networks and how carriers plan to ensure the survivability of cell sites for first responders, among other key issues. Read more »

(Washington, DC) UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit wrapped up here today with two panels that centered on the ultimate factor shaping the future of the smart grid: the consumer. Nothing will happen until consumers learn about the smart grid and how it might help them.

"Education, education, education of consumers," New York Public Service Commissioner Maureen Harris said. "It's all of our responsibility to simplify what we can do for consumers." Read more »

(Washington, DC) As smart grid technologies take hold, two key technical challenges, maintaining consumer privacy and network security, will require constant diligence by utilities, experts told attendees today at UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit. "I've told people to focus on what is unique to the smart grid," National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Senior Cyber Security Strategist Annabelle Lee said. NIST is charged with developing cyber security requirements that will be adopted as industry requirements by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

"The difference with the smart grid is the granularity of the information," she said. "The functionality will not change with the smart grid. We'll still get electricity and a bill every month." Read more »

(Washington, DC) Whether utilities like it or not, mandatory interoperability and cybersecurity standards are on their way and the industry should start preparing for a new era of requirements. Speaking at UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit here today, the government official in charge of the coming wave of Congressionally mandated standards provided an overview of the how these standards are progressing and how they could prove beneficial to utilities.

"Standards are the secret sauce of the Internet," Dr. George Arnold, National Coordinator of Smart Grid Interoperability, National Institute for Standards and Technology said. Given that prototype of success, it's no surprise that some people refer to the Smart Grid as the energy Internet or the Enernet, Arnold said. Read more »

(Washington, DC) UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit got down to brass tacks during its closing panel today, with industry and government speakers taking on the core questions dogging utilities for decades: will utilities gain access to dedicated spectrum and when? John Holt, President and Business Manager, Local 1900 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, underscored the importance of spectrum to utilities by walking through the confusion that can reign among utility workers using cobbled–together communications systems during emergency response situations.

Using the recent record-breaking snowstorm in Washington as a backdrop, Holt said that main and auxiliary field workers looking to restore service "are using Nextel [land mobile radios] talking to each other and quite frankly they're walking all over each other. Then we bring in foreign [other utilities'] crews and they're probably on a different network. So we take [our] crews who know what they're doing and we split them up to go with the foreign crews.

At the same time we're all talking to each other on the cell phones. In Washington there are intentional dead zones where they scramble the signal so I got a guy in the White House and I can’t talk to him." Read more »

(Washington, DC) The economic and efficiency benefits of the smart grid could prove a boon to the local communities across America, especially if broadband networks expand to reach into rural areas and the costs of the smart grid are carefully weighed by regulators, according to experts on community development speaking at UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit here today.

"We have never seen anything like smart grid," Glenn Steiger, General Manager, Glendale Water and Power said. Despite a string of benefits that smart grid technology deliver to the utility, the community is the biggest winner. "We're very excited to help the rest of our city in partnership. This is not just a utility program but a citywide program," he said. Read more »

(Washington, DC) The utility industry is poised at the intersection of energy and broadband as it builds smart grids, a key Administration technology official said today here at UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit. "This is ground zero," Andrew McLaughlin, Deputy U.S. Chief Technology Officer, Executive Office of the President told Summit attendees.

"The fusion of information flows with the electrical system is one of the great transformations that we will see over the next several decades," McLaughlin said. Government should avoid a top-down approach when it comes to smart grid, he advised. "The strength of the U.S. system is decentralized processes." Read more »

(Washington, DC) Smart grids are about to bring forth a technological revolution that could eclipse those generated by the divestiture of AT&T or even the advent of the Internet, government leaders said here today at UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit.

"Brace yourselves," Philip Moeller, Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioner, said. The smart grid could be even more transformative than the break-up of AT&T twenty-five years ago, he contended. "That was kind of like unleashing the hounds of hell. The system was broken and people hated it. They hated having choices. They hated having one bill. But they got over it." Read more »

(Washington, DC) Smart grids will drive our national energy policy but policy makers agree that federal and state regulators need to collaborate not only with one another but also with the utility industry to ensure energy savings and efficiencies are realized from smart grid deployments. Kicking off UTC's Smart Grid Policy Summit here today, UTC CEO Bill Moroney noted that "too many of us were talking past one another and not with one another."

Keynote speaker Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioner John Norris emphasized that coordination of efforts among all energy players is needed to lay the foundation for smart grid evolution. "There needs to be a sequence of development in terms of smart grid technologies. We need to coordinate the roll out of technologies to ensure that consumers see the benefit," Norris said. Read more »

(Washington, DC) While energy companies and tech suppliers concentrate on constructing smart grids, consumers will ultimately determine the success of next-generation utility networks, top government and business leaders agreed here today at "Power in Numbers: Unleashing Innovation in Home Energy Use," a conference hosted by Google in partnership with The Climate Group.

"We're really a consumer services company" Jason Few, President of Houston, TX-based electric utility Reliant Energy said. "Consumers are making power purchase decisions without any information. We don’t believe that is a good experience." To address the problem, Reliant is working with energy management tech provider Tendril Networks to empower consumers, Few said, offering homes that have advanced meters technological tools for managing energy consumption, including an in-home monitor that displays real-time information. Reliant Energy is focused on consumer innovation because it is a competitive energy provider but few utilities are motivated to enhance consumer capabilities because they don't face competition, according to Tendril Networks CEO Adrian Tuck. "If we don't solve that problem, then the [smart grid] technology will flounder," Tuck said. Read more »