“Interoperability, it’s not just a long word, it’s a long road,” said Bill Rose, Principal, WJR Consulting, Inc.

This may have been one of the more quotable phrases during last week’s Grid-Interop, which attracted more than 500 Smart Grid interoperability experts. While the road is “long”, we have also made a lot of progress, and Grid-Interop has a long history of helping the energy sector set critical Smart Grid benchmarks and achieve them in weeklong collaborative sessions.  

In my last blog entry (“Interoperability – So, what’s in it for me?”), I defined interoperability as the lubricant that enables Smart Grid to function effectively. At Grid-Interop, I heard it referred to as the “glue”, the “pulse”, “the enabler of Smart Grid innovation,” and as “something that – when achieved – is completely invisible to the end user.”  Regardless of how you define it, the progress we’ve made as an industry, and the potential benefits, are undisputed.

We’ve Come a Long Way, Baby

The growth and success of the Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP) is one key indicator of how far this industry has come. SGIP has made rapid progress, garnering the participation of 634 member organizations since the group was formed at Grid-Interop 2009.  “[This week], we’re bringing to fruition the vision of some of the priority action plans (PAPs), with completion of several standards that are important for Smart Grid,” said Erich Gunther, Chief Technology Officer, EnerNex Corporation.

The PAPs coming to completion include PAP 01 for Internet Protocol (IP) and the PAP 11 Electric Vehicle standard. Close behind are the PAP 02 Wireless Guidelines and the PAP 05 Guidelines for Meter Interoperability. SGIP remained focused on more than one dozen different PAPs during the week’s workshops.

“The progress of SGIP has been amazing to date,” said Chris Irwin, Smart Grid Standards and Interoperability Coordinator, U.S. Department of Energy. “It’s an enormous organization, [it] is a thing of value, [it] is something people want to be a part of, and people feel they absolutely have to be here in order to shape the path of the Smart Grid to come.”

The Ultimate Enabler of Innovation

One core message from last week is that interoperability will fuel innovation. Tom Evslin -- author and entrepreneur, Evslin Consulting, and a pioneer of voice over IP (VoIP) technology – discussed innovation in depth and pushed for a grid that’s built upon an open, interoperable, and Internet-based platform for Smart Grid success.  

“Smart Grid has the potential to become the Internet of energy,” he said. “It’s the opportunity for an incredibly exciting wave of innovation – lots will get rich, lots will get poor. We can’t predict what innovation is going to be. But, we can predict the volumes and the excitement.”

In his speech, he predicted some of these potential innovations, including “dispatch-able renewable energy,” made possible by the Internet.

For example, with an Internet-based Smart Grid, solar farms and hydroelectric plants could work together virtually, Evslin suggested. If each could supplement the other, “you wouldn’t have to build any artificial storage because you’ve integrated two supplies using information flow over the Smart Grid.”

Evslin also warned that Smart Grid data volumes will likely be higher than predicted.  “The only way that the bandwidth is going to be available is if communication with customers is over the public Internet,” Evslin said. “Any finite amount of bandwidth in a dedicated network is quickly going to become outstripped or become a choke on innovation.”

Furthermore, he suggested that with Internet-based communications in place, upgrades to the network will be paid for by all Internet applications (not just Smart Grid), and that “utilities won’t need to go back to the PUC for cost recovery.”

Bill Rose, a 25-year veteran of the consumer-electronics industry, also discussed cost benefits of interoperability: “If we had different broadcast standards across the country, TVs would be 10 times as expensive ... It’s that consistency and ability to connect to that consistency that makes it work. Give us that standard interface, and then let us … figure out how best to use it.”

Get it Right, or Go Home

Many Grid-Interop attendees and speakers offered clear messages for how to best move forward, while keeping different stakeholders motivated and engaged.   Anne McKibbin, Policy Director, CNT Energy, said, “You’re never going to be able to sell anything unless the customer wants it.” She encouraged attendees to leverage their spheres of influence, including environmentalists and consumer advocates to help spread the positive message.

Mike Robinson, of the Midwest ISO, encouraged the industry to take an even more open and more collaborative approach to user groups. And while Rick Morgan, from the DC Public Service Commission, told the industry to “keep doing what you’re doing,” he also called for greater collaboration and education. He encouraged SGIP and other standards bodies to make the process more transparent to those stakeholders who “don’t understand the lingo.”

“When you look at interoperability, people want to look at entire picture – end to end interoperability,” said Rose, who encouraged the industry to “break this into manageable pieces. Define boundaries that allow you to roll out sections at a time. Don’t try to make things end to end, by decree.  Don’t force it, define it.”

In a clear poignant message, the DOE’s Chris Irwin may have said it best: “Collaborate, cooperate, establish interoperability, and establish co-existence when they can’t interoperate, or go home.”

To learn more about interoperability from the experts who attended Grid-Interop, watch the Grid-Interop wrap-up video on www.Grid-Interop.com. All presentations from Grid-Interop are now available at www.Grid-Inerop.com.