Smart Grid Update

I would like to personally welcome you to the Smart Grid Update blog that I will be writing to discuss industry issues and to share smart grid perspectives and activities from across the industry. I am counting on help from other colleagues at ABB, so you’ll see the occasional guest post from time to time..

Discussions continue on what smart grid is, what the drivers are, and how we create value. Enrique Santacana, President and CEO, ABB Inc. and ABB Region Manager of North America, recently summarized the smart grid drivers that we see in a Views from the Top article in the June 2011 issue of NEMA electroindustry. He focused on capacity, reliability, efficiency, sustainability, and customer engagement and then identified grid interoperability as the key issue underlying smart grid solutions .

Locally, we have been working to promote the regional smart grid hub that has formed in Research Triangle area and across the state of North Carolina. A ”cleantech cluster” has been formed with a strong focus on the smart grid industry. I’ll be providing more information in future blogs on this initiative. Part of our involvement is the new Distribution Automation Center of Excellence that we will open in the fall and our collaboration with the NSF FREEDM Center – we are co-located on the NC State Centennial Campus making it easy for our centers to work together.

Some upcoming events that we are supporting – I’m at the Smart Grid Road Show in Montreal this week and will be at GridWeek in Washington DC in September.
For more information about what ABB is doing in smart grid, visit our smart grid web portal at www.abb.com/smartgrids.