Grid Interop 2007 - I2G Forum

Dave — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 20:43:00 GMT

With all the activity that is swirling around residential smart metering and building control systems, it’s easy to overlook industrial facilities. But not at Grid Interop 2007! A very diverse group of experienced professionals gathered together to discuss how industry can play an even larger role on the grid than it does today and how improving interoperability can help pave the way forward. Discussion quickly focused on the opportunity for captive industrial generation to be integrated with grid operations as remote “dispatchable” resources, not just as base-load distributed generation. These remote generators could essentially create a virtual power-plant if they could be actively controlled by grid operations in real-time as standby resources. Existing on-site generators could run on bio-diesel and new capacity could leverage renewables such as solar and wind farms. All in support of grid reliability by providing power when needed the most. Well, as good as this idea is, it isn’t exactly new. Mark Osborn, Distributed Standby Generation Program Manager at Portland General Electric, has already been actively and successfully building a business based on this concept! (http://www.portlandgeneral.com/business/large_industrial/dispatchable_generation.asp) Mark’s Grid Interop presentation “Virtual Peaking Networks” is available at http://www.sessionview.com/data/postevent/GI-07/Mark-Osborn-25837712.pdf. But this is only the beginning. The barriers to entry need to be lowered so that virtual power-plants can be built and operated throughout the grid. One of these barriers is the cost and effort to integrate remote generation control systems with dispatching systems. Improved industrial-to-grid (I2G) interoperability is needed and the path-of-least-resistance is to leverage and adapt the open Ethernet-based communication protocols that are already being utilized within industrial manufacturing. To these protocols we need to add equipment identification standards and common information models. But why stop there? These protocols could also provide an integrated information pipeline for real-time pricing and demand response signals from the grid to an industrial plant for active, on-site power management. Reaching this goal will require collaboration between grid operators, industrial-standards organizations such as Open O&M, ISA and the OPC Foundation and automation vendors such as Invensys and ABB. All were well represented at Grid Interop 2007.

To further this effort, an “Industrial to Grid Summit” is being tentatively planned for mid-2008. The intent is to pull together grid operators, standards organizations and other key stakeholders for the purpose of developing a plan to move I2G interoperability beyond just a good idea to one that is real, tangible and interoperable.

Software,Energy,Agents

Grid Interop 2007 - I2G Forum