Group items tagged

Aside from impacting or not impacting electricity rates, system loss reduction has the following benefits: Reduction of fuel emissions due to lesser use of fossil-fuel generating plants - this has societal impact as it cover environmental concerns. Utility system capacity savings - decrease in losses provides released extra capacity for the distribution lines and transformers. Promotion of Energy Efficiency - it will be noted that the Distribution Utility (DU) is an energy-efficient electric company as it tries to decrease its system loss. Improvement of system voltage profile - the utility is regulated to supplying a range of voltage level and reduction of losses will produce a marginal system voltage quality that may be acceptable. This will also provide good power quality at the convenience outlets of consumers allowing their electric equipment/appliances to operate without mis-operation or loss of life. Increase Utility Commercial Appeal - a DU aiming at system loss reduction gets an added commercial appeal in the restructured power industry. This is important in the changing environment of the power industry, have you seen MERALCO TV commercials?

The paper discusses the use of a dual energy storage system based on batteries and supercapacitors in hybrid electric vehicles (HEV). The battery has a large energy density, enabling an all-electric driving range of 100 km, while the supercapacitor has a large power density and provides peak power during acceleration and regenerative breaking. The paper discusses the benefits and drawbacks of both storage systems and the specific requirements imposed by the hybrid drive train. Coupling such a HEV to the grid allows interaction between grid and HEV, providing the grid with a controllable load. Depending on the communication between the hybrid fleet and the grid, this load can be controlled by adjusting the electricity price in order to allow a higher penetration of intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind parks in the grid and if the communication allows the transmission system operator to reduce the load imposed on the grid by the hybrid fleet, the hybrid fleet can become part of the secondary frequency control reserve. In case of sudden demand or supply fluctuations, the hybrid fleet can assist in primary control of the grid. Due to the dual energy storage system the HEVs can also provide fast load tracking to keep the voltage in microgrids at the desired set point. An experimental setup with a battery, grid coupling and induction machine proves the feasibility of the concept.

“The Smart Grid: An Introduction ” is a publication sponsored by DOE’s Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability. It is the first book of its kind to explore – in layman’s terms – the nature, challenges, opportunities and necessity of Smart Grid implementation.

This article supercedes an earlier work, "World Energy and Population: Trends to 2100". Compared to that paper this article offers a more comprehensive look at the world's evolving energy picture and confines its projections to the first half of the century. Also unlike that earlier work, this article makes no assumptions about changes in human population due directly to reductions in the world's energy supply. At the end of the article I will briefly examine one highly probable effect the decline in total energy would have on the quality of human life.