The telecommunications sector was rocked in the 1990s by cell phones.
MP3s did the same thing to the music industry in the early 2000s.
Some say the country’s electrical grid may be on the verge of a similar game-changing transformation.
Inside Energy reporters Dan Boyce and Jordan Wirfs-Brock wrap up our “Solar Challenge” series looking into the future of our power system.
DAN: Before we step forward, though, Jordan I think a trip to the past is in order.
(SEMPER FIDELIS starts)
JORDAN: The Marine Corps March.
DAN: Semper Fidelis (fuh-day-lus), it was written in the 1880s.
JORDAN: Which is where we’re going.
DAN: Yep, and this particular recording was made by Edison Records.
(SEMPER FIDELIS)
JORDAN: Ah, Thomas Edison the heralded inventor of the phonograph.
DAN: the movie camera.
JORDAN: The electroGRAPHic vote recorder.
DAN: The Magnetic Iron Ore Separator.
JORDAN: And, of course...
(AMBI: PING!)
DAN: The lightbulb. Edison knew a lot about electricity.
JORDAN: He even invented electric power distribution.
DAN: That’s why we’ve gone back in time. Because the debate happening today over rooftop solar-- it’s pretty much happened before.
JORDAN: Back in the 1880s, Edison was locked in a heated battle with engineer George Westinghouse, a battle over how this new invention of electric power should spread across the US.
DAN: Edison wanted a bunch of little power plants all over the place producing electricity for nearby homes and businesses. A de-centralized, distributed model of generation.
JORDAN: Westinghouse, he wanted big, centralized power plants sending out high voltage electricity across a spiderweb of power lines connecting the entire country. And Westinghouse…
DAN: He won!
JORDAN: That’s the system we have today--the grid.
DAN: And that’s what solar power threatens,
Ryan Pletka works with consulting firm Black and Veatch.
He says even though solar is a tiny part of the electrical system right now...
PLETKA: “If you look at Data on the growth rate of solar...it’s almost a flat wall in terms of a spike.”
JORDAN: Solar adoption is through the roof and prices keep falling.
DAN: Many utilities have been saying this new solar trend is a dangerous thing.
They say this Westinghouse-style power system we’ve built over the last 120 years was designed for stability and reliability.
This rooftop solar power is unreliable, it’s intermittent, moving on our lines in the opposite direction of our big power plant electricity.
No, no, no, us utilities, we don’t like this.
JORDAN: And they’ve been fighting it, working the room with lawmakers trying to hold distributed rooftop solar back, to make it more expensive.
DAN: But, the utilities also hire consultants like Ryan Pletka, and he’s saying:
PLETKA: “We feel the utilities are in a unique position in the industry where they can proactively respond to distributed generation, particularly solar PV.”
DAN: Solar PV means photo-voltaic, the rooftop kind.
JORDAN: Black and Veatch is suggesting utilities jump into the solar game, lease panels, sell panels, embrace the change.
DAN: Some companies are doing this.
Kelcey Pegler Junior is the President of NRG Home Solar.
PEGLER: “I wake up every day and focus entirely on getting solar on homes across america.”
NRG is is a power company operating in almost every state from New Jersey to Wyoming.
JORDAN: They’re not a utility but they’re similar in that they have central old-style power plants and sell electricity to consumers.
But they will also sell you rooftop solar panels, they’ll lease them to you.
Whatever you want.
PEGLER: “A power company of choice.”
DAN: They have to compete with other power providers, and a lot of utilities don’t.
That’s part of why they feel more of a need to stay ahead of the curve on distributed solar.
PEGLER: “By the time you recognize that technologies are disrupting, it’s too late.”
JORDAN: To find out what this debate over solar means for the future of the grid, we went out to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory here in Colorado and spoke with Doug Arent. [AIR-ENT]
DAN: He has a pretty long title.
ARENT: “Executive Director of the joint institute for strategic energy analysis.”
JORDAN: And he’s an optimist, he says it doesn’t have to be US, the utility versus THEM the rooftop solar owner.
ARENT: “But, it’s a collective dialog about how do we collectively move that system forward.”
JORDAN: And he thinks this conflict will work itself out in time, that eventually we’ll have a hodge-podge of electricity sources.
We’ll still have the major grid, but towns will also have smaller microgrids they can rely on in emergencies, more homes will have battery storage to back up their rooftop solar panels. And utilities will adapt to all of that.
DAN: Again, he’s an optimist.
(SEMPER FIDELIS)
DAN: For Inside Energy, I’m Dan Boyce.
JORDAN: And I’m Jordan Wirfs-Brock.
