News

http://www.sustainablebusinessoregon.com/articles/2010/07/oregon_group_takes_lead_on_smart_grid.html

Smart Grid Oregon is filing the paperwork and building out its board of directors with the aim of taking a leadership role on policies that will enable a smart grid both in Oregon and across the nation.

It may be the first statewide group to form around such a mission.

"We're not aware of any others," said Phil Keisling, former Oregon Secretary of State who has agreed to lead the group as chairman of its board of directors until January.

The main goals of the organization are first and foremost policy direction and secondarily to provide a place for networking and the exchange of expertise.

"We're bringing together people who are policy savvy, business savvy and tech savvy," said Keisling, who this month took the job as director for the Center for Public Service at Portland State University's Hatfield School of Government. "We want to identify the initiatives we should take on as a state to make sure that the smart grid is part of our energy future."

So far, the board has about 15 members, Keisling said. The group's first official event in June attracted a standing-room-only crowd.

Smart Grid Oregon grew out of a program at the Software Association of Oregon focusing on the smart grid.

Michael Jung, the Portland-based policy director for Silicon Valley smart grid technology company Silver Spring Networks and a member of the Smart Grid Oregon board, said part of the challenge of working on smart grid policy is wrangling its definition.

"It's a similar question to asking what is the Internet?" said Jung at the Expanding and Modernizing the Electrical Grid conference in Portland Wednesday. "The smart grid is an Internet of things, things that generate and use electricity."

A smarter grid, one that would allow two-way signaling between energy consumers and energy providers, would allow for better tools to promote energy efficiency, micro-targeting of energy-efficiency investment, distributed generation (think roof-top solar panels and backyard wind turbines), and distributed energy storage and peak pricing, where power costs more during peak times and less during non-peak hours.

The proliferation of electric vehicles, an area where Oregon is poised to be a national leader, has important implications for the smart grid, Keisling said, as car-charging loads are poised to challenge the grid.