Smart grid

Pacific Gas & Electric will offer customers an option to turn off the radio on its smart meters, an effort to address health concerns about the two-way utility meters.

The opt-out option, announced yesterday, will come at a cost because PG&E will no longer to be able to remotely read meters. In a filing, PG&E proposed that customers pay $270 up front and a $14 monthly charge--or $135 up front and a $20 monthly charge, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

PG&E's smart-meter program has drawn national attention first because customers complained of … Read more

SustainX announced today it's received $14.4 million in funding from GE subsidiary GE Energy Financial Services, Cadent Energy Partners, Polaris Ventures, and Rockport Capital.

The New Hampshire-based company is a start-up that grew out of the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College in 2007, and has been developing a compressed-air energy storage unit intended for integration with smart grids.

Simply put, its innovative storage unit uses compressed air to store, then generate electricity. But unlike other compressed-air storage units, which use a compressor to store air underground, SustainX stores the air in a standard tank located above … Read more

Progress Energy is moving forward with its plan to spend $500 million to upgrade two of its electric utilities in Florida and the Carolinas to a smart-grid system.

Together the two utilities provide electricity service to over 3.1 million customers. The Raleigh,N.C.-based company is paying for the upgrade in part with a $200 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). The grant came out of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and is part of the high-profile push by the Obama administration and many state leaders to upgrade U.S. electric grids.… Read more

Building systems management giant Johnson Controls announced yesterday it has signed an agreement to acquire the EnergyConnect Group. EnergyConnect, based in Campbell, Calif., announced that this will be a cash deal totaling $32.3 million.

The demand response technology company EnergyConnect is best known for GridConnect, its software platform for enhancing electrical-grid efficiency, especially in the cases of regional shortages or peak pricing changes.

The system includes real-time monitoring of energy markets, as well as energy information.

"The $0.2253 per share acquisition price represents a significant cash premium of approximately 73 percent over the previous closing share price … Read more

The future, we are told, is smart homes able to remotely control appliances, secure us from intruders, and use energy superefficiently. As I sit here with a box full of barely used equipment, I feel like an unconvinced Luddite.

A few months ago, a representative from the Z-Wave Alliance offered to loan me some wireless home automation equipment to check out. Given that CNET has a tech-savvy audience, I've written extensively about home energy management systems designed to give consumers more control over how and when they use energy. I've been giving it a try in fits and … Read more

Four-year-old start-up Transphorm is tackling a problem as old as the electricity distribution grid: the energy lost in converting between AC and DC.

The Goleta, Calif.-based company today disclosed its product plans and said that it has raised a $20 million round of funding led by Google Ventures. Other investors include Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, Foundation Capital, and Lux Capital. It has raised $38 million in three rounds of venture funding and received a Department of Energy ARPA-E grant last July for about $2.95 million.

Transphorm has designed electronics to more efficiently convert between the alternating current--the … Read more

Deep offshore wind could produce energy for 8-10 cents per kilowatt within 10 years, according to a report released today from the University of Maine and DeepCWind.org.

The extensive 557-page report (PDF) represents a collaboration between the Advanced Structures and Composites Center at the University of Maine, and the James W. Sewall Company, but was funded with a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy.

The report includes input from several members of DeepCWind.org, a consortium of companies, manufacturers, environmentalist groups, and academic institutions related to the offshore wind industry.

More interesting than how inexpensive … Read more

With millions of smart meters projected to be installed, opponents have raised concerns over the health impact from the radios inside these two-way meters.

Industry group the Electric Power Research Institute today released the results of tests that show the radio frequency emissions of one smart meter fall well below the federal safety threshold. It measured the radio frequency energy coming from commonly used Itron smart meters, part of a few tests it's doing in response to public health concerns.

In some places, such as Northern California, there is fierce opposition to smart meters because of concerns around privacy … Read more

The IKEA Group will soon have its own wind farm in Dalarna County, Sweden.

The Swedish furniture retail giant announced today it's partnered with Stockholm-based O2 to oversee the construction and maintenance of a nine-turbine wind farm slated to be completed in 2012.

At full capacity the wind farm is expected to generate enough electricity to power the equivalent of 17 IKEA stores in Sweden.

Owning a wind farm in Sweden will enable IKEA to further its ultimate goal of running on 100 percent renewable energy to power, heat, and cool its facilities in Sweden, the company said in … Read more