5 Benefits of Vermont’s Smart Grid

Editor’s Note: Guido Bartels is the general manager of IBM's Global Energy and Utilities Industry.


There is no question that our state and local leaders are facing bleak budget outlooks. And there is no question they understand the need to innovate in order to remain competitive, lower costs and improve the lives of their citizens. But questions remain: How can states tackle tough problems with limited resources?

With its commitment to build a smarter grid, Vermont is setting an example for the entire nation, demonstrating how resourcefulness and innovation can help achieve goals.

Vermonters earned a reputation for innovation early on, starting nearly 300 years ago when settlers began carving out a living by farming the region’s rocky soil. And it wasn’t easy. The climate can be extreme, with bitter winters and stormy summers – with its forests, fields and streams pulsing to life in between.

Late last summer, flinty Vermonters faced one of their toughest tests yet as Tropical Storm Irene barreled into the state. The storm unleashed a deluge of rain, amplified by Vermont’s hilly topography. Rainfall channeled downhill into valleys, transforming babbling brooks into roaring rapids, washing away roads, cutting off towns, unmooring buildings and slicing power lines.

It was amidst the worst flooding in a century that the state’s early and strong commitment to a smarter grid played a helpful role. Prior to the storm, Vermont was well on its way toward its goal of building the first statewide smart grid in the U.S.

In a large swath of the state, Vermont faced the storm with one of the highest penetrations of smart meters in the country, due to improvements by the Vermont Electric Cooperative (VEC) in 2004.  Like most other smart-grid projects, Vermont’s drive was based on a basket of cost savings and network reliability improvements.

But Irene highlighted an entirely different benefit of the smart grid: rapid disaster recovery.  By the time Irene roared through, VEC had a better view on the status of its grid than ever before. For customers facing the anxiety of blackouts, the upgrade meant speedier repairs and more accurate information about their status. VEC’s website showed who was affected and where.

After his service was restored following a seven hour disruption, a VEC customer blogged about his experience: “Something must have happened downstream from the original break. Without smart meters, the crews probably wouldn't have known about the second break for quite a while.” Just a few years earlier, the outage might’ve lasted days instead of hours. Without smart grid sensors and communications links, downed lines can take utilities days to locate.

It’s little surprise there’s a push to go even further with Vermont’s smart grid. Late last month IBM and the Vermont Electric Power Company, the state’s transmission company that serves all Vermont utilities, announced a collaboration to build the first statewide smart grid in the country.

Spanning 1,000 miles of rugged Vermont terrain, the project will link together the state’s substations via fiber-optic links able to carry large capacities of data.  Substations are critical nodes on the power network, taking in huge volumes of electric power, and channeling it out to smaller side-streams to send to end-users.

Beyond faster disaster recovery proved by Irene, state planners are pointing to other benefits a smarter grid will deliver:

Fewer and shorter blackouts. Parts of the state’s grid that have already been “smartened” are delivering operations gains day-to-day. In areas served by VEC, for instance, software systems have been upgraded to automatically manage outages. In these areas, the frequency of service problems has fallen by half since 2008, and their duration is down by 40 percent.

Jobs and growth. A smarter, more stable grid is a lure to investment. In announcing the statewide initiative, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin said, “This network will … help build the economic development platform necessary to create sustainable jobs.” What’s more, in an era when connectivity is a competitive virtue, upgrading VELCO’s fiber-optic network — providing the backbone for most Vermonters’ high-speed Internet service — will be a boon.

Green building leadership. A smarter grid will accelerate the greening of Vermont’s buildings.  As buildings become more intelligent, with automated systems that watch and minimize their energy use, they benefit by linking to the broader grid, whether by exchanging information about power prices, or responding to utility signals to shut down non-vital gear during peak-demand periods. At its Burlington campus, the University of Vermont recently unveiled an intelligent building, upgraded to use a third of its former energy load. Nearby, IBM’s Center of Excellence for Enterprise Operations is using its own corporate campus as a laboratory for smart grid and green building technologies -- running an installation of more than 30 buildings and 3.5 million square feet of space. The facility uses 5,000 sensors and meters to collect data in real time on equipment loading, usage and trends, and power disturbances. That information is used for engineering analysis, monitoring power quality, load calculations, peak power management, billing, and identifying efficiency and conservation opportunities. As a result, the site's smart grid has helped it effectively reduce electricity usage by 19 percent during a period of increasing production capability.

A greener grid. A smarter grid will lead to more efficient power delivery. For instance, a critical grid link between Vermont and Canada is being upgraded as part of a $20 million refurbishment. The upgrade will install a high-voltage direct-current line, different from the standard alternating current cables that connect most U.S. grids. The next-gen DC links are more efficient than AC links, losing less power over long distances. The new capacity will help bring cleaner, green hydropower from Quebec into Vermont’s grid. Likewise, a more resilient grid is better able to handle variable forms of green power, such as wind and solar, that is popping up in Vermont too.

A hedge against environment change. By making way for more green energy, a smarter grid has growing appeal in a region worried about climate change. Extreme weather events like Irene are predicted to be more frequent in a warmer world.

A smarter grid in Vermont means faster disaster recovery and more secure electric service. It means delivering a greener and more secure tomorrow. And it means that Vermonters are once again proving their mettle is made stronger by a deep green streak. Other states would do well to take note of Vermont’s experience and how they can reap the same benefits.