The big future of microgrids

[kristopher]

The big future of microgrids
Published: 10 May 2017, 15:56
By: John Parnell


The terminology might seem diminutive, but there is no doubt that the future for microgrids is anything but small.

In fact, in future, microgrids themselves won’t necessarily be that small physically in their own right either. Misconceptions about the isolation of microgrids also abound.

They don’t have to work in full isolation, they may in fact be made up of several small grids and via the legacy grid, they may well be connected in the future to series of similar microgrids. It’s not easy to find a catch-all term that encompasses all of these characteristics. So with the objective of scaling up the benefits of microgrids to larger and larger systems, is the name misleading?

“Possibly, yes,” says Troy Miller, director of grid solutions at S&C Electric. “We've got some exciting projects in the pipeline that are much larger. People have used the term microgrid generically to mean a system, whatever the size, that can be separated from, islanded from. The overall larger grid is measured in GWs and TWs, microgrids can be tens or hundreds of MW. I haven't heard a name for them as they get bigger but people have coined new terms for them as they got smaller, nano- grids and pico-grids.”

S&C played a key role in the development of an ambitious micro-grid project completed in 2015 for the Texas utility firm Oncor. The site is part of a large Oncor testing facility that had been operating with diesel back-up....
https://www.energy-storage.news/blogs/the-big-future-of-microgrids

[NBachers]

1. Very interesting - thank you for posting this.

[kristopher]

3. You're welcome. nt

[pansypoo53219]

2. this is great. HUGE grids are wasteful + just demand money.

take too much resources & space.

[kristopher]

4. Centralized grids also extract money out of communities...

First let me define a microgrid more clearly than the article in the OP.

People have used the term microgrid generically to mean a system, whatever the size, that can be separated from, islanded from. The overall larger grid is measured in GWs and TWs, microgrids can be tens or hundreds of MW. I haven't heard a name for them as they get bigger but people have coined new terms for them as they got smaller, nano- grids and pico-grids.”

The core of a microgrid isn't related to the size, but the function. It's a system that is able to be "islanded" from the grid, true. But it is also one that enhances its stand alone value by selling services or power to the larger grid that it's a part of. That's where the size of the project came to be a part of the apparent definition. In the past and due to the cost of the components of a microgrid, it was only economically feasible for a stand alone unit to provide services to the grid if it were large enough to justify the cost of something like a gas turbine generator or a large storage system.

However, now that the cost of renewable generation, control systems and storage are dropping to a new range of lows, even a home system with storage and/or an electric vehicle can sell ancillary services to the grid - it's a definite economic win-win scenario that keeps money circulating in the local communities.