It has become cliche to refer to energy storage as the holy grail of renewable energy.  Actually, it's not energy storage that we need.  We have that.  What we need is cheap energy storage. 

"Most storage technology is expensive so we spend a lot of time trying to figure out the value."

Those are the words of EPRI's Dan Rastler who spoke on Wednesday night at the monthly Silicon Valley Photovoltaic Society meeting at PARC.

EPRI

Mr. Rastler is the Program Manager for Energy Storage at EPRI.
  
Founded in 1973, EPRI is an "independent" non-profit center for public interest energy and environmental research center that receives about $350 million in funding each year.  "Independent" is an approximate term in this case as EPRI's substantial budget comes in the most part from America's utilities.  And utility agendas don't always map exactly with the public good.  That said, it was an informative talk and Mr. Rastler did not seem too evil.

Smart Grid Defined

Rastler's talk looked at electric energy storage's role in the smart grid, defining the smart grid as "overlaying information control technology over the electric grid for efficiency and reliability,"  adding, "The buzzword is interoperability – how do you make everything connect across the entire domain from bulk generation to the customer?"

He made the distinction between smart grid on the utility side – where utilities are putting sensors and cameras on utility assets, "to where it really gets interesting"– the customer side where the smart grid can influence customer behavior.

Another important point he made was the need for scale – because anything less than 100 megawatts is not really important to a utility.

Industry Pain Points and Market Drivers

• The biggest driver the electrical sector is facing is carbon.  "There is no single technology that is going to get us there."  It's going to take a portfolio of technologies – solar, de-carbonizing, EVs, wind, nuclear, etc.

• Managing increased wind penetration – Texas could have 18 gigawatts of wind by 2015, California could have up to 12 gigawatts of wind by 2012.  The intermittency of renewables like wind and solar need bulk storage to buffer that unpredictability.

• We are going to need $200 billion in transmission and $400 billion in distribution investment in T&D infrastructure over the next 15 years

• Peak is only 400 hours a year – storage and information control can help manage the peak

Advanced Energy Storage Technology

Rastler is a fan of advanced lead acid batteries.  He pointed out a firm called Xtreme Power and declared that, "lead acid is going to re-emerge."  Xtreme Power builds a solid dry cell rated as a 1-megawatt four-hour system for $2 million.

He noted a few other storage technologies nearing commercialization or ready for deployment at reasonable price points:

• A 400 megawatt-10hour CAES (Compressed Air Energy Storage) system
• A 1 megawatt–seven hour NaS system as substation grid support  that costs $3,000 to $3,500 per kilowatt hour
• A 500 kilowatt-four hour ZnBr flow battery system that is meant to be transportable to where the pain point is
• "Lithium ion is getting to megawatt scale," he said citing a 1 megawatt-15 minute Li-ion system.  He adds, "There are as many different Li-ion chemistries as there are California wines."  There are currently early field trials by Altair Nano and A123 using Li-ion at utility scale.
• Redox flow batteries with a number of different electrolyte species

Costs of Storage

According to Rastler, "We need to get below $300 per kilowatt hour installed all in."

CAES is below $100 per kilowatt hour (but does use a fuel source).

Cost of Li-ion ranges from $400 per kilowatt hour to $1,200 per kilowatt hour.

Final Words

Rastler finished in saying that we have to get the cost structure down significantly and we need a smart grid and storage-aware regulatory policy.

He concluded saying that storage is "really an advanced materials play."  The EPRI presentation can be downloaded here.

Intel Capital said it invested in five greentech companies today.

Granted, four are follow-on investments, but this could be the prelude to more activity in energy. Intel Capital does not operate like other VC firms. It seeks a return, but financial return is not the primary goal. Instead, the company hopes to seed new markets, which will then help it sell more chips. Back in the '90s, it invested in media companies and online applications which, indirectly, prompted consumers to upgrade their computers. Investments in China helped buy goodwill and spread the word why computers matter.

So by investing in energy, Intel is trying to help build the market for demand response and smart grid equipment that, ideally, will run on Intel chips. Intel already works with the government of China on smart grid initiatives and other smart grid projects. It even sells chips into wind turbines. Embedded chips for these sort of applications don't sell for nearly the same prices as microprocessors for PCs, but once manufacturers decide on a standard, they can buy the same chip for ten years. Besides, with chips getting smaller, it is always a challenge to keep the fabs filled. (Moving into energy also gives CEO Paul Otellini more to talk about at the World Economic Forum.)

Sometimes these investment efforts work and sometimes they don't. Intel Capital created a fund to invest in Russia – oops – and never got many people to build applications for its Itanium processor through its Itanium fund. But many times it does work. Believe me, I've covered these guys so long I have a complete collection of Intel Developer Forum luggage. The investments are:

•  CPower. Demand response. See earlier story.

• GridNet. The company wants to use WiMax, a broadband technology Intel loves and has promoted for years, to run demand response networks. GridNet will compete against cellular networks and power line networking. (Another potential investment to look for: GainSpan. GainSpan makes WiFi chips for in-home energy networking. Intel loves WiFi and GainSpan is run by a former Intel exec.) Intel invested in GridNet earlier.

• Powervation. Power control in computers. Intel invested in an earlier round too.

• Convey Computing. A compiler for scientific computers. A follow-on investment.

• iControl. In home energy control. Also a follow-on.

CPower raised $10.68 million in April and today the company said it got an additional infusion of cash from Intel Capital.

The amount from Intel was undisclosed. CPower will be part of Intel's Open Energy Initiative.

CPower, which was founded as ConsumerPowerline in 2001 and changed its name in 2008, has gathered a portfolio of about 2,200 megawatts under management. Earlier this year it landed a 200-megawatt demand response contract with Maryland utilities Allegheny Power, Delmarva Power and Light Company and Potomac Electric Power Company (PEPCO).

That puts it in a roster of demand response competitors including EnerNoc (NSDQ:ENOC), Comverge (NSDQ:COMV), EnergyConnect and Constellation NewEnergy in terms of power under management. These companies help customers take part in utility or grid operator programs that pay for the promise to cut energy use when they're facing peak loads.

That makes demand response aggregators providers of "negawatts" that help utilities avoid the need to build coal- or gas-fired "peaker" plants (see EnerNoc Harvests Power in Maryland). Most demand response companies work with commercial and industrial clients, though a few like Comverge also participate in residential demand response programs (see Demand Response: The Home vs. C&I Debate).

When you predict something that turns out to be true in journalism, there's only one thing to do.

Flog it mercilessly.

Back in March, we predicted that Comcast, the cable network partly responsible the creation of Rachel Ray, would get into home energy management. The company, after all, already maintains a network inside your home and it would only be a small step to add energy management services to it. For a few dollars a month, the company could provide you with information about energy consumption and control air conditioners and other devices to help you lower your power bill.

Carriers like AT&T and Verizon were already moving in that direction.

Today, iControl, which makes energy management tools for the home, said it raised $23 million in a third round. One of the investors is Comcast Interactive Capital. Call me Nostradamus.

Comcast hasn't fully jumped into the market. And also predicted that Comcast might buy Lucid Design Group because that start-up has a real interesting energy management portal that looks great on big screen TVs.

But it is a matter of time. Other predictions to look out for:

• Cisco Systems will buy Verdiem.

• Carbonetworks will get bought because, among other reasons, they have a cool name.

• Konarka will raise $12 million in a Series Q round of funding.

Two years ago, National Semiconductor started to push into solar. Now it wants to get into smart grid too.

The company, which turned 50 this year, is looking at ways to provide things like power management chips and microcontrollers to companies that will make smart appliances and technologies for controlling power inside the home, said CEO Brian Halla during an interview. (We visited him as part of a buildup to Intersolar U.S. taking place next year.).

Halla also expressed quite a bit of interest in controllers for streetlights and LEDs.

It makes sense. National essentially makes chips that control some of these functions in computers. One very interesting idea he suggested: the DC home. Right now, Energy from solar panels needs to be converted (via the inverter) from DC to AC so it can be used in the home. It then often gets re-converted into DC. Those conversions cause power losses. Eliminating the double conversion could thus lower power bill.

National, though, will likely concentrate on the home. It won't likely (at least initially) try to provide technology for the components for the wide grid. Why? Utilities will control how and when the grid upgrades occur. Selling to utilities can be demanding and time consuming. Energy efficiency will likely move a lot faster inside the home.

Could the Department of Energy's rules for spending its $4.5 billion in smart grid grants be coming out today?

That's what Suedeen Kelly, commissioner with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, said Thursday morning.

"A lot of us are waiting to see what the DOE is doing — and some of the scuttlebutt is that we’ll find out today," Kelly told an audience at the Edison Electric Institute's annual convention in San Francisco. 

It isn't the first time that the DOE has been predicted to come out with the rules, only to disappoint the utilities and smart grid companies waiting for a piece of the pie — a similar expectation that the DOE was just about to release its rules last week passed without a peep from the department (see Green Light post). 

Still, several sources at the convention this week seem pretty positive that DOE may be ready to move this time around. 

There are lots of questions about how the DOE will manage the 50-50 grants for smart grid projects established by the stimulus package signed into law in February.

Most recently, utilities and companies that want to use the grants to do more expensive projects were cheered when the DOE lifted the caps it had previously proposed for investment-scale projects from $20 million apiece to $200 million (see DOE Lifts Smart Grid Stimulus Cap to $200M). 

But many questions — including much confusion about how the issue of standards for the smart grid will be dealt with in the department's rules for what it wants to see out of applying projects — remain to be worked out. 

Energy Secretary Steven Chu is set to address the conference some time this afternoon. That may be a speech to pay attention to... stay tuned.

I haven't confirmed this yet, but I've heard that Steve Chu is going to open his big bag of money again tomorrow. This time, it's $3.4 billion for grants in smart grid.

It is likely that the money that will be released will come from the previously announced smart grid funds. And, of course, it could always be delayed. Who knows. Maybe he has a commencement speech or something else on the agenda. But if you're in smart grid, the big dollars seem to be coming soon.

So stay tuned.