Distributed Generation? Try Distributed Storage.

One of the hot topics in renewable energy is "distributed generation." If every home and business would install some solar panels or small wind turbines to generate their own electricity, then any excess electricity could be sold back to the grid. Build enough small solar photovoltaic systems and windmills, the theory goes, and we won't have to build as many coal-fired power plants.

Those who support this concept make analogies to the internet, where the computing power and brainpower of numerous individuals and their personal computers can be harnessed via distributed computing and wikis and social networks into something really big and powerful.

Will the same concept work with “distributed generation” of electricity?

Not exactly.

Asa an energy efficiency measure, putting solar panels and wind turbines on individual facilities is a very good idea. It will reduce the need for that facility to draw power from the grid. But for large scale production of electricity and selling back to the grid, distributed generation does not provide the quality control and economies of scale necessary for the efficient generation and distribution of electricity. Let’s look at those two issues:

Power Quality. The internet works by allowing everyone to post whatever information they want, without any initial filter on quality. That won't work on the electric grid.

An efficient power distribution system requires that power quality (voltage, harmonics, etc.) be maintained at all times. That is difficult enough to accomplish with highly variable generation sources such as wind and solar. Every time the wind dies down or clouds start to cover the solar panels in one geographic area, the grid would have to find power elsewhere to maintain adequate voltage levels. That is a very difficult and complicated task when you are dealing with large wind and solar farms. It is even more difficult when the wind and solar power is being supplied by thousands, or tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of different sources, each with its own variations in power quality.

Economies of Scale. Building small windmills and solar photovoltaic arrays is not very cost efficient. The number of workers required per megawatt -- and the gasoline they will use going from one site to another -- makes this a very inefficient process. And what about maintenance? Can we really afford a renewable energy system that requires maintenance crews to take care of generation capacity that is located at hundreds or thousands of different locations?

Does that mean our electric power systems will continue to be centralized? Yes, but only on the generation side. On the storage side, distributed networks may offer an excellent solution to the problem of matching generation with demand.

The biggest inefficiency in our current electric power system is caused by the need to build excess generation capacity to meet peak demand. Many electric utilities have generators that are used less than 40% of the time. They exist solely to provide extra power when it is needed -- like from 7 am to 7 pm when every office building has its lights, computers, fax machines and HVAC systems turned on. And on that very hot August day when everyone turns on their incredibly inefficient window air-conditioning units at the same time.

Power companies must build enough generating capacity to handle the highest possible peak demand for electricity. When we operate substantially below peak capacity (like, almost every night of the year), that peak capacity goes wasted.

The real problem is not generation, but storage. If we could use that generating capacity at night and store the electricity for the next day, then we would have a truly efficient system.

Fran Lamparello, my good friend and business partner, sees the future of energy storage by looking at the past. Fran has spent his entire working life in different aspects of the energy industry, from designing building controls systems to running a home heating oil distribution business. He envisions a time in the near future when the electric utilities will address energy storage the same way the home heating oil industry did. At the customer's home or business.

By putting storage tanks at each customer's home or business, the oil companies turned their customers into a "distributed storage" network. It was a very efficient system. The distributor could buy home heating fuel during the off season when prices were low, and then store it until the winter. The distributor did not have to pay for storage of large fuel inventories because it could store that inventory at the customer's home or business. Properly sized, an oil tank at the home or business also reduced the number of trips that had to be made to deliver fuel to the customer.

Fran and I predict that you will see the same type of distributed storage system with electricity. As the efficiency and cost of fuel cells and other storage mechanisms for electricity improve, you will see utilities offering to put that storage mechanism on site at the customer's location. It may be in the form of electric cars as Tom Friedman predicts in his book "Hot, Flat, and Crowded," or it may be in the form of fuel cells.

The real value of the internet model for electricity is not “distributed generation.” It is “distributed storage.” Do not put a solar panel on every roof. Put a hydrogen fuel cell in every backyard or basement! Or an electric car in every garage!

John Howley
Manila, Philippines

Free Cooling?

A data center that requires no air-conditioning?

Google has figured out a way to do it. And it is so simple. Locate your data center in a place like Belgium where you can use outside air as “free cooling.”

The concept of “free cooling” – bringing in outside air to cool the inside of a building -- is not new. Building managers in the US and elsewhere have been doing it for decades. By controlling dampers to balance the mix of inside and outside air, building managers can use the “free” outside air to better control temperature, humidity, and air pressure inside buildings without spending money on electricity.

Actually, all of us have done this at one time or another. Like on a Fall day when the sun hitting our windows makes it a little too warm inside, even though the air outside is cool. Instead of turning on the air-conditioning, we just open the window a little. Same concept. “Free” cooling.

All Google has done is take this very basic principle of facility energy management and apply it to complex data centers by adding a dash of information technology and off-shoring. The equipment in data centers generate a lot of heat. By locating them in a cooler climate and carefully managing the amount of cool fresh air coming into the building, Google can control the temperature without needing electricity to generate air-conditioning.

Belgium does have a few days per year (maybe about 7) when the outside air temperature is not cold enough to cool a data center. Google will monitor the weather and outside temperatures. If it gets too warm in Belgium, Google will simply shut down some equipment there (which will reduce the amount of heat being generated inside the data center) and shift some of the work load to other data centers around the world until the weather in Belgium returns to normal.

Now, in complex buildings like data centers, the cooling is not entirely "free." First, you need a building management system to monitor operating conditions inside the building and external data such as weather. Then you need to use the brainpower of facilities engineers to manage the system. But that little bit of data analysis and brainpower leads to tremendous reductions in both energy costs and carbon emissions.

Pretty good results for essentially opening windows.

John Howley
Manila, Philippines

Energy Efficient Business Attire

One hot August day, I organized a luncheon in New York City where the President of the Philippines gave a speech to about 150 bankers and business leaders. When I say it was hot, it was a day that defined sweltering. You could see the heat waves rising from the asphalt.

Arriving early to make sure everything was ready, I found that the luncheon hall had been refrigerated (air-conditioned would be a gross understatement) to feel like a walk-in freezer. The manager explained that he had turned the air-conditioning on full blast two hours earlier to get the room so cold. He said this was his standard practice during the summer months because people are pretty hot after walking a few city blocks wearing wool suits. "Don't worry," he assured me. "They'll be so hot when they get here that the room will warm up to a reasonable temperature very quickly."

Sure enough, as 150 over-heated people in business suits started offsetting the deep freeze of air-conditioning, the room temperature reached a very comfortable equilibrium.

Precisely at the appointed hour, the President of the Philippines walked in wearing a Barong Tagalog, the official formal wear of the Philippines, over crisply pressed black pants and black dress shoes shined to military perfection. Made of pina cloth that had been hand loomed from fibers of pineapple plant leaves, the President's formal Barong Tagalog was suitable for a groom at his wedding or, more appropriately, a President's State of the Union address to the Philippine nation. At the same time, the garment's sheer, loosely fitting fabric made the President one of the most comfortably dressed people in New York City that day.

As the President gave his speech on economic policy in the Philippines, I noticed more than a few men in suits tugging at their collars or patting their brows with handkerchiefs. Apparently, they were still a bit warm despite the heavy refrigeration in the room. The President, however, looked cool and comfortable as he spoke for almost an hour and took questions from the audience.

Sometime during the speech, my thoughts turned to the role of the Barong Tagolog in energy conservation. Why do we still wear wool business suits and ties in August? Or July? Or any other time when the temperature exceeds 80 degrees? Frankly, the President looked much more formal than anyone else in the room. He was also by far the most comfortable person there. And if we had all dressed as appropriately for the weather as he did, the facility manager could have cut his air-conditioning bill at least in half that day.

Think about it. Would we turn up our thermostats so we could wear shorts and t-shirts when it is freezing outside? Then why do we continue to wear inappropriate clothing that requires us to over-cool our buildings when it is hot outside?

John Howley
Woodbridge, New Jersey