One of the more pressing concerns facing the US over the coming years and decades is its electrical grid. The aging system was simply built in a different time to address different issues. While some are advocating for construction to remedy issues found in today’s electrical grid dilemma, others are finding market based approaches to deal with the issue. Finding a company that is addressing the electric grid issue today, with an innovative and forward thinking concept, is a solid way to capitalize and become environmentally “green” at the same time.
Energyconnect Inc., an electric power management company, works with subscribing customers to manage power usage for better efficiency, revenue generation and cost savings. The company strives to aid an overloaded and inefficient electrical distribution grid align customer electrical usage with power grid needs and distribution alignment.
The ailing US electric grid has been the subject of increasing concern as the country works to make its power usage and consumption more environmentally friendly and efficient. Many areas of the country have been experiencing rolling “brown-outs” while others are finding increasing power costs limiting. Energyconnect Inc. works to find the balance needed to let the electrical grid work at its most efficient level while letting customers work more efficiently.
An electric “grid” is essentially a zero sum system. Once electric power is generated, it needs to be used by a user or sent to another user somewhere else along the grid. Generally, this requires the producer of the electricity to estimate consumer use of electricity, whether residential, commercial or industrial, because electricity use and generation need to be balanced. If the production and use are not balanced, inefficiency and equipment strain occurs. Energyconnect simply assesses an electricity user’s use patterns and adjusts power “acceptance” in such a way that the user uses only what they actually need so excess electricity can be used elsewhere where there is more demand at a better cost return ratio.
The company’s latest customer is the Ronald Reagan National Airport. The airport authority has signed on to the company’s FlexConnect program with 12 megawatts of electrical load. The program’s direct response system assesses the electrical needs of the airport, electricity pricing, need elsewhere on the electrical grid in question and the parameters that the customer has set forth. It then adjusts the airport’s demand in certain areas of the airport to either save energy and/or balance the electric load of the grid system in general.
Energyconnect is quickly being recognized as a viable concern dealing with energy inefficiency from a market based point of view. Its customer base, now including but not limited to the Sears Tower and Equity Office ( a group committing 38 large scale properties to the program in northern California) only points to continued success and a rising profit as companies come to understand that their electrical use patterns can actually become a revenue stream and a contributor to protecting the environment.
Let us hear your thoughts below: