Incentives in Canada have resulted in so much solar energy that only a move to smart grid can use it all.
So claims National Instruments (NI), which is to provide monitoring and control equipment.
"To promote conservation and efficiency, the federal and provincial governments provide rebates to households and businesses for renewable energy installations," said NI. "In some areas, the boom in solar panels and wind turbines actually generate more power than the existing infrastructure can handle, resulting in valuable electricity being wasted."
Part-funded by a government grant, electricity company Toronto Hydro has commissioned an energy management system from Prolucid LocalGrid Technologies partnered with NI.
The project takes advantage of distributed intelligence to manage renewable energy generated by the community onto the power grid.
In addition the integrated platform can improve reliability and efficiency across the electric power system, said NI.
“The electrical grid will be radically transformed over the next 10 years, moving from a centralised model of power generation and distribution to a less capital-intensive local or micro-grid model,” said LocalGrid CEO Bob Leigh. “This is driven in part by the introduction of distributed renewable sources of generation. Our technology allows renewables that are currently blocked to come online without costly infrastructure investment.”
LocalGrid’s software uses NI CompactRIO devices installed on the grid to control and monitor community generation sources.
