Whats the Buzz on Smart Grids?

Case Study: What's the Buzz on Smart Grids?

1. How do smart grids differ from the current electricity infrastructure in the United

States?

smart grids are different from the existing infrastructure in the united states because it is

much capable to distribute electricity more efficiently and of allowing communications between the

various systems of the grid, and they also provide the consumer the detail of their usage and guide

them how to reduce their consumption because they exist on modern technology. but the other old

existing infrastructure is based on old technology, they have their old distribution plan, line losses and

not able to know the usage of every consumer and the peak hours of usage like the smart grids that's

why the reason smart grids are better than old electricity infrastructure.

2. What management, organization, and technology issues should be considered when

developing a smart grid?

Organizations have budgets and profits that can impact a consumer when it comes to reducing their energy consumption. Along with assistance from the federal government implementation costs can be extremely high. Without proper structure implementation an adverse reaction can grow against energy companies. With technology there are networks and switches for power management. Energy use and distribution trends are tracked by sensors and monitoring devices, which provide energy to suppliers and consumers with data usage and communication systems that relay data along the entire energy supply system. These systems are linked to programmable appliances to run them when energy is least costly. But, all are expensive and time consuming to retrofit into all the homes across the United States.

3. What challenge to the development of smart grids do you think is most likely to hamper their development?

Several factors inhibit the development of smart grids. First, the start up costs for transforming current grids to smart ones can be very high, and the return on investment sufficiently long so. Changing the infrastructure of the entire electric grid across the nation. Installing two-way meters that allow information to flow both to and from homes and businesses. Creating dashboards that are user-friendly. Extremely high costs of retrofitting the entire grid infrastructure, estimated to be as high as $75 billion. Potential intrusiveness of new technology. Perceived and real loss of privacy. Potential economic impact on energy companies

4.