First-Ever Smart Grid Delegation Makes Moves at Copenhagen

With the focus on Copenhagen and climate change, my coverage of the smart grid has taken a back seat. The two, however, are far from mutually exclusive. Rather, the smart grid is now being billed as a key solution to fighting climate change, on par with scaling renewable energy and creating an international carbon trading mechanism.

A delegation drawing attention to smart grid as a weapon in the fight against climate change was in attendance at Copenhagen. The Demand Response Smart Grid (DRSG) Coalition and the Smart Grid Green Initiative, led by Executive Director Dan Delurey, is the first smart grid non-governmental organization to participate in a meeting of the Conference of Parties (COP) on climate change. The representatives from DRSG met with the U.S. House of Representatives to COP-15, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). After the meeting, Pelosi said,

We in the Congress believe that developing the smart grid is indeed an option that can provide multiple dividends to U.S. businesses and consumers…It can lower costs, create jobs and make our nation more competitive in the international marketplace.  As we discussed today, it also is important to climate change and we think it ought to be part of the climate change debate, both here in Copenhagen and back home.

Analysis has shown that upgrading our electrical grid by bringing digital technology to the power equation can have a fairly significant effect on decreasing carbon emissions in the U.S. The smart grid will enable energy to be generated and used more efficiently. In addition, it will help the grid better balance the intermittency of renewable energy. By sending delegates to Copenhagen to represent the smart grid industry and educate world leaders on the need for fixing our electrical grid, the international community added a new weapon to the growing arsenal of solutions to fight climate change.