October 6, 2010, Gaithersburg, MD: The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) hosted the first Smart Grid Communications Conference this week, sponsor by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). UTC is attending this first a kind meeting for IEEE. The IEEE collected over 255 submission for papers and the format for the three day meeting is that each accepted paper's author will be given 20 minutes to review their paper. Each paper was provided to the attendees and UTC can provide information on specific topics as appropriate. UTC’s Brett Kilbourne authored a paper on the need for spectrum for the smart grid and presented this paper to the group. Read more »

UTC and Verizon will officially announce tomorrow a joint study of the communications needs of utilities. This timely and innovative analysis will identify the unique communications requirements of the utility industry to ensure safe, reliable and cost-effective energy grids for the 21st Century.

The study, which will kick off next week in Washington with a focus group of UTC member company representatives, is designed to encompass a wide range of factors that should be considered when designing and delivering the critical communications that will fuel the nation's smart grids. UTC members should find the study to be useful in not only articulating their own detailed communications requirements for internal purposes but also in communicating these requirements to technology partners. Read more »