Energy Australia wins bid to create $100M Smart Grid, Smart City demo

Anthony Caruana
Tuesday, 08 June 2010 05:23

Business IT - Technology

If you follow the energy sector, you'd be aware that the word 'smart' gets bandied about quite a lot. Smart meters, smart cities and smart grids are all the rage. New South Wales based retailer and distributor EnergyAustralia has picked up a neat $100M as the winning bidder for the "Smart Grid, Smart City" project.

The main site for Australia's first commercial-scale smart grid project will be in Newcastle with other parts of the trial to be conducted in Scone, Homebush, Ku-ring-gai and the Sydney CBD. The EnergyAustralia consortium includes IBM Australia, AGL, GE Energy, TransGrid, Newcastle City Council and the NSW Government.

According to EnergyAustralia Managing Director George Maltabarow 'This trial will showcase the future of electricity networks in Australia, including self-healing when faults and interruptions occur and greater customer control'.

The Chief Executive of the Energy Networks Association (ENA), Andrew Blyth, added to this saying that 'The Smart Grid, Smart City project is a positive step in helping Australia move towards a smarter and more energy efficient network'.

A key goal of all the so called smart technology being deployed in the electricity network is to drive greater value out of energy system assets and to alter consumer behaviour. By allowing consumers to track their usage more closely, it's hoped that they will alter their usage so that the power system can be operated more efficiently and in a more environmentally responsible way.

As Maltabarow puts it 'Around 15,000 households will become 'smart homes' to trial a new breed of inhouse displays and websites that track electricity and water use, costs and CO2 emissions. These homes will test remote control of appliances including air conditioners and innovative pricing packages to help reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.

'Households in Scone will become virtual green power stations in battery storage trials, allowing them to help power local streets.' There will even be a trial of charging stations for a fleet of electric vehicles.

The rollout of 12,000 smart sensors across EnergyAustralia's electricity network will be fast-tracked to allow earlier fault detection and repair, including self-healing of some faults.

Victorian energy companies have been working on a state-wide smart project over recent years with smart meters deployed to over 15000 homes. However, the Victorian government is under pressure with parts of the project and has deferred the implementation of Time of Use tariffs, where consumers are charged for energy at different rates throughout the day, following concerns from consumer advocacy groups over the potential effects to some parts of the community.