Electric Power Research Institute hired to create

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The has awarded a $1.3 millioj contract to the research nonprofit ina three-phase effort to create a more futuristic smart grid that can accomplish such things as accommodatingb renewable energy, storing extra energy for later use, measuring a customer’as peak electricity consumption and notifyinf a utility of outages, all in real Dozens of technology companiesa are creating, and utilities are now beginning to new devices, meters and producta to connect to the NIST and EPRI, based in Palo Alto, are tasked with writing standards for makingg those products from different companies interoperable with one while helping shield the grid against hacked attacks and natural “You’re going to have more devicea hooked up to the said NIST spokesman Mark Bello.
“You have to make sure with thes e additional connecting pointsthat they’re secure.” NIST said it plansz to use some of the $220 million it was awarded under the federal stimulus package toward the effort, while also tapping $10 million from the Department of Energy’sd stimulus allotment. In all, the stimulus bill sets aside $4.5 billiom for the development of asmart grid. By earlgy fall, NIST expects to releaswe initial standards, ones that have already largely earnexindustry consensus, Bello said.
The agency will hold a summitrin mid-May to hear input from utilities, equipment consumers, standards developers and other After drafting additional, more complicated standardsw that then fill the gaps left by the initia slate, NIST said it will submit the entire standarda proposal to the Federal Energyt Regulation Commission for its review and devise a producyt testing and certification program, both by the end of the Smart grid pilot projects, however, are alreadyu underway. Local companies, such as Arlington-baseds and Germantown-based , are participating in a citywidre smart grid pilotin Boulder, Colo.
Pepc is also working with a California technology contractore and requested regulatory approva l to initiate smart grid pilotsin Bethesda-Chevuy Chase and Fort while testing smart meters in 1,400 D.C. The local utility has said it planw to roll out a smartg grid in Maryland and the Districtby 2013. Othe local companies such as EkaSystemsa Inc. of Germantown and Kore Telematicws Inc. of Reston are working on smart grid-relatex technology. Bello said NIST’s standards-writinb process will not interfere with the commercialpilotg projects, and instead will take into account some of the industry’s alreadg most accepted methods.
“Some of this is a formalizatiomof what’s already in existence,” he said. Thesed pilot tests are “a good proving ground for some of these standards.”