A report presented to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) Smart Grid Forum by visiting UK energy analyst has clearly stated that leadership will be needed to guide the country through the challenges ahead.
Lessons from the British Smart Grid Forum were shared with industry leaders here by John Scott, of Chiltern Power Ltd, an independent consultancy. Mr Scott advised that the trend was toward electricity distributors providing not just electricity, as under the current model, but to provide energy systems platforms which enable consumer-led technologies such as solar and storage to integrate with a new market including peer-to-peer trading, community energy systems, EV’s, demand response management, and other related services.
The key to success, Mr Scott said, was to allow innovation and the market to flourish in early stages to allow innovation and provide a testing ground for new products, but that before tipping points were reached that government needed to set a clear direction to enable business confidence and ensure “the seamless integration of numerous smart systems, under differing ownerships and with new third party players”.
Tipping points that threaten security of supply need not be nationwide in scale, but can be created locally by clustering effects and common-mode behaviours (called herding effects). Taking the EV charging example, clustering may arise where neighbours in a street follow a social trend for electric vehicles, and herding could arise where the charging of EVs is linked to time of use tariffs, resulting in simultaneous charging when prices hit an attractive level.
The warning is that” if uncoordinated, could result in at best, lack of inter-operability, product lock-in, piecemeal growth, and stalled investment; at worst, ‘system crashes’ that disrupt services and threaten power system or data security”.
Mr Scott uses the Apple iPhone to provide an example of “interoperability” where different providers and different services are all able to be accessed via the shared platform of the phone. “This is an interesting example of 'System Architecture' that is closely managed by Apple who cannot risk jeopardising the reliability and reputation of their iPhone platform, but wants to allow third parties to interact with their core platform software and user interface style”.
SEANZ is working within the industry to help build a grid fit for the 21st Century which we hope will be open, sharing and provide consumers what they want, whilst allowing the system operators to continue to do what they do best.