For many decades most municipalities and their residents knew very little about ‘the grid’, besides the 800 number to call when the power went out. Few knew how or where their electricity was generated, let alone what impacts to the environment their thirst for electricity was having. Electricity 101 is a brief history of the US power industry.

But “the times they are a changin”. Increasing energy demands around the globe suggest that citizens and communities everywhere need to put a ‘lid on the grid’, or at least work toward being energy efficient and less polluting.     

A new era has arrived as local officials throughout the country are beginning to become conversant about Electrons, MegaWatts, Sub-Stations, Transformers, Re-circulators, Renewable Energy, Hydro, Solar, Wind, Climate Change, EV Charging Stations, Micro-grids, Renewable Energy Credits (REC’s) and everything energy. 

Two trends have come together here in Illinois to create a stunning new opportunity for Oak Park. Energy re-regulation and concerns over climate change resulted in a 2007 Illinois law, Community Choice Aggregation PA#96-0176. This law allows Illinois municipalities, beginning in 2009, to pool or “Aggregate” their residential and small commercial energy accounts for bidding in the energy market place. 

On April 5, 2011, 66% of Oak Park voters authorized Village Hall to create the Village of Oak Park Electric Aggregation Plan of Operation and Governance.

The Plan was used to bid out Oak Park’s future energy needs. Under the leadership of our Sustainability Manager, KC Poulos, public input guided the development of the plan. Oak Park’s plan called for two-year bids with pricing for:

• the lowest cost of energy 
• 100% renewable (green) power energy stream via REC’s

The current power rates, established by the Illinois Power Agency, apply to about 95% of our residents. The current rate is 7.753 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh). This includes regional power transmission charges. A kWh is a unit by which residential, and most business customers, are billed for monthly electricity use. It represents the use of one kilowatt of electricity for one hour.

The bid results for Oak Parks power supply for our 52,000 residents, and 2,000 businesses, (20,000 accounts) came back even better than we expected:

Current Rate                Lowest Rate                          100% Renewable

Brown Power            Brown Power-% Savings            Green Power - % Savings

   7.77                           5.73       26.25%                        5.79       25.7% 

Power Mix                    Power Mix                               Power Mix

Nuclear                         50% Nuclear                            92% - 94% Wind    

Coal                               38% Coal                          6% - 8% other non-carbon

Misc.                             Misc.     

The plan, along with market conditions, provided the Village the opportunity to save residents considerable dollars on the supply portion of their energy bills. More importantly, Oak Park’s plan created the option to have Oak Park’s electricity needs to be met by competitively priced, clean, renewable energy over the next two years.  

Based on an average bill of $100 per month, the 25% savings on the energy portion of the bill will result in about a 15% reduction in the average resident and small commercial business overall electricity bills over the next two years. All bills will continue to flow through ComEd.      

With the pricing bids in, the Village Board after analysis and debate, in a bold decision, decided Oak Park will be powered by renewable energy (via the REC’s process) over the next two years beginning in January, 2012. 

The winning bid was provided by Integrys Energy. They will supply 92% to 94% of Oak Park’s power needs through REC’s wind power. The remaining 6% to 8% will come from other renewable, non-carbon sources. Our contract with Integrys will allow us to monitor our power sources.   

I would like to thank the voters of Oak Park who trusted Village Hall enough to empower the Village government to pursue municipal aggregation, and everyone else who helped in this effort including but not limited to:

• Mr. Robert Galvin and John Kelly of the Galvin Electricity Initiative
• Mark Pruitt, former Director of the Illinois Power Agency
• Marin County Energy Authority in San Francisco
• Shawn Marshall, Board member of the Marin County Energy Authority
• Municipal Renewable Energy Committee members Frank Fletcher, Steven Glass, Jeff Riley, Ben Sayda, Matt Speer, and Jeff Wadsworth
• Craig Schuttenberg and Emmet George of Energy Choices
• ComEd for their total cooperation to date

To enjoy the savings and support clean and renewable wind energy residents do not have to do anything. The transition should be seamless.

Bottom line, the plan, process, and the board’s decision will save Oak Parkers $4.5 million off of their collective energy bills over the next two years. Simultaneously we will be promoting the renewable energy industry, helping move energy markets in the right direction, while removing tons of harmful CO2 emissions from the atmosphere.   Our great, great grandchildren just might appreciate the effort!  

Good job by all! 

Main Street Communities can lead Prosumer energy revolution

                                                                Photo courtesy of John Schalk

Municipal Leaders Tour ComEd Oak Park Intelligent Sub-Station

 Would you like to reduce the amount of electricity you use to save on your utility bill?  Would you like to see our economy improve? Are you up for helping to reduce the threat of climate change, or experience fewer power outages of shorter duration? Please raise your hand if you would like to someday earn money by safely producing electricity at your home or business?

If you answered yes to one or more of the above questions, you need to support the effort to dramatically upgrade our electricity grid in Oak Park, Chicagoland, and throughout the USA.

We have seen how digital technology has revolutionized the world’s communications infrastructure over the past three decades; creating millions of jobs in doing so. It is now time to apply new digital and energy technologies to the energy grid in order to unleash another wave of innovation that will also improve the economy.

Improving the economy is worth doing for its own sake, but get this, building the smart grid will also help us slow climate change, and lay the groundwork for energy consumers (you and I) to someday soon contemplate producing our own energy, storing it, or selling it back to the grid.

Futurist Alvin Toffler has coined the upcoming energy transformation as the era of the pro-sumer, when citizens can both produce as well as consume electricity – a commodity nearly as vital as air and water to our daily economic lives.

Because of local passion in support of this vital initiative, Oak Park is one of the first communities in Chicagoland to have smart electric meters installed in every home and business in Oak Park. Oak Park is now also home to ComEd’s first intelligent sub-station. Although ComEd has 240 more sub-stations to upgrade, (at $ 5 million + each) intelligent grid sub-stations monitor the grid digitally to help prevent power outages and play a vital role in re-routing power quickly when outages occur, thereby reducing both the number and duration of power outages.

From Mainstreet to the moon, building out the smart grid with a sense or urgency should perhaps be our highest public policy infrastructure priority.

We in Oak Park see and understand the consumer, environmental, and powerful economic benefits of building the smart grid. Governor Quinn, the legislature and ComEd need to work out a compromise and approve a way to finance and move forward with building out the smart grid in Chicagoland.   

It appears for this to happen the media and public needs to start understanding the strategic importance of this issue and sort out fact from fiction.

Senate Bill 1652 Smart Grid Legislation

Governor Quinn’s Veto Letter of SB1652

Policy makers need to get beyond rhetoric and begin to understand this issue and cut through the fog and politics on this vitally important issue. Let’s start thinking and acting as if we really care about the future and lead the revolution.    

you-tube video when it is ready

DPW Superintendent John Wielebnicki planning clean up of the damage left by the storm this morning. The storm brought down, or severely damaged, approximately 40 trees.

The storm, which hit Oak Park about 8 am this morning, came and went within an hour, but not before high winds seriously damaged approximately 40 Oak Park trees and knocked down 12 power lines. Some Oak Park neighborhoods remain without power at mid-day.

This morning’s storm also dropped over a half of inch of rain in our south Oak Park rain gauge, which our gardens no doubt appreciated.

Inspecting a large, fallen tree branch at a south Oak Park home.

Fortunately no injuries occurred as a result of this mornings storm.

However, with several big branches grazing homes and landing on streets and sidewalks, we will use this opportunity as a reminder for citizens to continue to take storm warning messages, and ominous clouds, seriously.

ComEd has advised us that of this Monday afternoon (7-11-11) writing at 3 pm, over 500,000 accounts in the Chicagoland area remain without power. ComEd has called in extra contractors to assist with repairs.

With the ever increasing number of quick, volatile storms we find ourselves paying to clean up after, I’m increasingly convinced climate change is having a steroid type of effect on our weather and juicing up the number and volatility of our storms even faster than the experts are suggesting. Surely somebody must be checking on this.

The US Weather services were spot on with this mornings storm predictions and warning systems. Good job weather people and media for spreading the word.

As of 6:00 pm on July 11 there are 3000 Oak Parker’s without power.

Like most anyone who lives in an older single-family home, I know how to check the circuit breaker box in the basement when the power goes off as my wife blow dries her hair while I am toasting a bagel.

Electricity consumers may be surprised to discover that a ComEd version of their home circuit box – albeit one taking up most of an entire building – is doing pretty much the same thing as the one in their basement, only these are located at ComEd’s substations and they serve large geographical areas, which often traverse municipal boundaries.

  But while each of the circuit breakers at my home is controlling power to just a few outlets, each of the two dozen or so giant breakers in ComEd’s largest Oak Park substation controls power to as many as 1,000 customers spread across nine nearby communities.

Village officials were recently invited to tour the substation to see how Oak Park is in the vanguard of a digital revolution in how electricity flow is monitored and managed. We are a test site for another step in the process of moving closer to the promise of a smart grid and the holy grail of uninterrupted electricity service.

As we donned coveralls, hard hats, and safety glasses before entering the nondescript compound near the main Oak Park Fire Station, our ComEd hosts said no photos once inside, which immediately had me imagining a dazzling array of Star Wars technology awaiting just beyond the heavy, gray steel doors.

I understood the clear direction to not touch anything, but I have to admit I was a little puzzled by the no-photo request as we went inside. Perhaps an experienced electrical engineer would have seen groundbreaking innovation. But to a layperson such as myself gazing down the rows of large, industrial gray metal cabinets, little I saw hinted at the technological advancements that had been incorporated into these fairly simple devices. That’s until our tour guide, ComEd’s Manager of Smart Grid Technology, Richard Gordus, and his geek team began explaining how the new system works.

Each of the cabinets still contained what was essentially a circuit breaker. But they had been outfitted with the latest digital technology that could not only shut down a circuit quickly if a problem arose, but anticipate a coming problem and instantly alert repair crews to what and where a problem had arisen.  This giant leap forward, combined with other grid technology, promises to improve reliability and reduce power outages dramatically.  Wide, cascading area outages from downed wires or downed poles or squirrel mischief can begin to be minimized and repairs made much faster.   

While the old mechanical breakers were, like those in my home, either on or off, these digital ones constantly monitor and communicate the flow of power and provide ComEd with detailed information about the state of their electricity distribution system, or grid. These digital devices can even alert ComEd repair crews to an issue via an app on a smart phone.   The current grid requires that outages be called in by customers that have outages.  Crews are than dispatched to locate and eventually repair the problem.   A pre-digital era system which has been in place since the inventions of electricity, the rotary telephone and Model T. 

Our host was quick to point out that what we were observing was a pilot program and an expensive one at that when you consider the size of the ComEd service area. The Oak Park substation is the first of 270 in the Chicagoland ComEd service area that need smart grid upgrades. But it was evident from the enthusiasm of the ComEd crew that they clearly recognized the potential this pilot project has for helping keep the power flowing through the delivery system and improving our economic competitiveness in the power hungry, perfect power demanding digital age.

Modernization of the grid should mean that both the company and consumers benefit when there are fewer outages that are much shorter in duration, which is exactly what the pilot program underway right here in Oak Park has the potential to do. By providing ComEd with the data necessary to head off some problems before they arise, and more quickly fix those that do, these digital devices will dramatically change how the electricity infrastructure is managed and maintained.   Some compare the transformation that is underway in the energy world, to that which has recently occurred in the communications world, i.e. from land line phones we used for many decades to the incredible revolutionary communication devices most of us carry around in our pockets and purses.

And that is the promise of the smart grid – everything monitored and managed by computers that rely on digital devices capable of identifying problems as they arise and fixing them before end users are affected. Digital smart meters, like the ones now installed on every electric service point in Oak Park, were the first step. These digital circuit monitors in a local substation are the second.

As analog equipment eventually gives way to digital, the electricity grid can become a dynamic system with each of its many components constantly providing real-time data to computers that manage power flow based on conditions. Such a smart grid then will be able to reroute power around problem areas, thereby limiting the number of those affected and dispatching repair crews right to the cause.   Eventually homes that create or store power will also be able to feed it back or sell it back to the grid.

Innovations tend to erupt on the scene via an aggressive news media with a voracious appetite for anything new, unusual and presumably better. Dig deeper, however, and one tends to find the real work had been underway for some time.  

One significant obstacle remains however, and that is an archiac, wires and poles regulatory system, as old as the grid itself.   Although well intended, the current regulatory system is hampering the implementation of the Chicagoland smart grid. Reform and flexibility is needed if our region really wants to be economically competitive and a leader in this job creating, climate repair movement.

Pondering what we saw and heard during the tour of ComEd’s Oak Park smart substation, I can’t help but think we had a glimpse of the next wave of true innovation, but still in its early, formative stages. Someday, perhaps we will be able to say that Chicagolands energy transformation started to be truly implemented right here in Oak Park, inside a little compound tucked away by the railroad tracks near a fire station.

Touring the GE Appliance Reliability Lab with David McCalpin, General Manager of Home Energy Management

Louisville, Kentucky - This past Thursday morning, as things were heating up in Egypt and the mid-west remained in a deep freeze, Sustainability Manager KC Poulous and I headed to General Electric’s Appliance Park in Louisville Kentucky. The purpose of our trip was to explore public/private collaborations related to community based energy and environmental sustainability initiatives.

KC’s flight was sponsored by the Galvin Initiative. My flight was covered by fees I earned for the Village last fall by teaching a local government course to Chinese government officials visiting Chicagoland.

As a result of our trip we hope to see a few Electric Vehicle charging stations installed in public parking bays in Oak Park this summer. Nearly all automakers plan on bringing electric vehicles to market over the next few years, so it is strategically important that early and potential Electric Vehicle users know that public recharging stations will be available when necessary in between home recharges.  Just last week Oak Park processed our first application from an EV owner to qualify for free EV parking in Oak Park throughout 2011 and 2012.

For EV’s to succeed this time, we need to start creating the EV infrastructure now, particularly in urban areas. EV’s need to succeed because they will reduce green house gas emissions into the atmosphere, lessen our dependence on volatile and diminishing oil supplies,  stimulate American research & development, and strengthen our manufacturing base.

As energy costs rise and the reality of climate change takes hold, in home energy management coupled with energy saving appliances will also become mainstream on mainstreet.

Since Oak Park now has smart electric meters in all of our homes, we are also hoping Oak Park, GE, ComEd, Galvin, and perhaps other partners can collaborate on a pilot project in Oak Park to test in-home energy management strategies. The new generation of smart appliances will be able to reduce or defer an appliances energy use during periods of peak or critical energy demand. These advancements can help lessen peak pressure on the energy grid, save customers on their energy bills, and reduce green house gas emissions.

All good things.

Touring the GE Test Kitchen, learning more about induction cooking with GE’s J. Thompson; K.C. Poulous, VOP Sustainability Manager; GE’s Dave McCalpin and myself.

As important as the sustainability movement is, the other story unfolding at GE in Louisville is just as interesting to a former Detroiter like myself. GE manufacturing will be hiring again!

The back story is GE’s massive, 1.5 square mile industrial park called Appliance Park was built in the 1950’s. The park is so big and employed so many people at its peak that it has its own traffic control signals. At one time over 25,000 people were employed in manufacturing at Appliance Park. We know the story, the confluence of globalization, increased competition, adversarial labor-management relations and other factors transformed a once busting complex into a shadow of its former self as employment at Appliance Park plummeted from a high of 25,000 to a low of 5,000. A snap shot of the recent American manufacturing economy.

In Louisville we learned GE is bringing back some appliance manufacturing lines from other countries and expects to create 2,000 new jobs at Appliance Park. Over the next year employment at Appliance Park will head back up toward 8,000 jobs. Labor-management relations have evolved and all are striving to work together. American built quality and productivity can now overcome the advantages of lowest cost production when long distance product shipping costs and quality are factored in.   Of course, it will also help if Americans try to buy products built in America whenever reasonably possible.  

What we may be seeing, or perhaps hoping, is that the global, lowest cost manufacturer economy (or race to the bottom as my UAW relatives might say)  that has cost our country millions of manufacturing jobs may be giving way to a smarter, more rational, loosely knit, regionally based, albeit global economy. This would be a good thing. Regions would be wise to start planning for it.

ComEd’s in-home reader to track electric usage in real time.

Through a company called Mad Dash Field Services, ComEd has begun deploying and testing in-home electricity use readers.   25 Oak Park Early Adopter’s have volunteered to test the in-home readers to help Village Government and local sustainability leaders understand the potential of smart meters and the role of the community in promoting energy conservation.

In this phase of the Smart Meter pilot project, two types of in-home readers are being tested. The basic unit can simply be plugged in and receives a signal from the smart meter to inform the consumer of their real time energy usage.

The advanced in-home reader, made by OPEN PEAK, is a sleek table top unit that has more features than the basic unit. Once plugged in and linked to the internet, the advanced reader receives its electricity usage information from the smart meter via the internet.  The smart meter will be communicating to my home’s wireless internet network which will instantly relay the electricity usage information to the OpenFrame 7E in-home reader now sitting next to my reading chair.

When not being used to analyze electricity information, the reader also has several free applications that can be accessed via the touch screen, including weather forecasts, news, sports, stock updates, and You Tube videos. When idle the unit defaults to serve as a digital clock.

In this first wave of setting up in-home readers ComEd has experienced a few glitches. At several pilot homes, including mine, the smart meter had not been enabled to communicate with our in-home equipment.  I guess that is why pilot projects are pilot projects, to work the bugs out.

As of this writing I can watch You Tube video’s, check the forecast or March Madness basketball scores, but not view my electricity usage.  Billy from Mad Dash says this will be corrected within a few days as ComEd has to turn on or enable the chip in the smart meter to communicate to my in-home equipment.  Billy was not sure if ComEd could activate the smart meter communication chip remotely or if they would have to physically visit the meter.

First reports from the folks who have the new in-home readers, which are functioning with the smart meters, are “wow”, “great”, “fun”, “educational” and “I never realized how much juice certain devices used”. The best one has been, “my family cut our electricity use by 40% last week”.

We are building a list of Oak Parkers who would like to obtain in-home readers and will contact them as soon as ComEd works out the deployment bugs and agrees to increased use of in-home readers.

Even though the novelty will wear off on these devices I believe they will play a big role in ushering in a new era of consumer energy usage awareness. They will serve as a powerful tool for helping manage household budgets and help those who care about climate change to shrink their households carbon footprint by the more informed and prudent use of electricity.   A very nice and timely win-win combo.

If Oak Parkers would like to be contacted when in-home readers become more available please call or email KC Poulous, at kpoulous@oak-park.us, or 708.358.5778.

SMART METER UPDATE – 2/24/10

Please check out this short VOP TV clip which shows Oak Park’s first look at an in-home reader. The in-home reader tells residents how much electricity they are using, as they are using it. The clip features Mike Radziewicz, a project manager and ComEd’s chief liason to the village, on the smart meter pilot project.

The Village will continue to advocate for real time energy information being made availalbe to the customer. Real time information will become a fundamental tool as we move into the energy conservation era. Energy use information being made avaiable to interested residents on a 24 hour delay basis, via the internet, is a good step forward, however studies show real time information is the difference maker. In-home energy reading equipment is currently available. The Village Smart Customer Team will be recruiting up to 500 households to begin using in-home energy readers in June to measure their energy reduction experience against homes not equipped with in-home readers.

Oak Park leaders have worked “energetically” over the past several months to be included in the Commonwealth Edison – State of Illinois AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) Smart Meter pilot project, which is currently being rolled out in Chicago and West Cook County. We are thankful and excited to have been included.

For those who may not be up on it, Smart Meters are a fundamental building block for the smart grid, which should help the electric utility operate more efficiently and minimize power outages. More importantly, it will empower the consumer to make wise power use decisions.

ComEd began installing Smart Electric meters in Oak Park this week. The installation took about five minutes at my south Oak Park home and thanks to advanced notice and the installer knocking on our door my wife Peg was able to shut down our home computers.

The knock on the door to warn Peg about the short power interruption while the meter was being changed was a small thing but very appreciated. The new digital smart meter, which includes a Zigbee communications chip, now occupies the same space of the old Thomas Edison era meter.

Outside of California, the 130,000 Chicagoland smart meter pilot project is one of the largest smart meter projects in America. The project gives interested citizens, communities, and organizations a great opportunity to collaborate to advance our region’s potential in the effort to conserve energy and reduce the amount of green house gasses, which emanate from our homes, industries, and businesses.

The smart meter creates the potential for near instant ‘time energy usage’ and ‘energy cost’ communications between the smart meter, the energy consumer, and eventually smart appliances.

The ComEd piece of the project will be managed out of the ComEd Maywood service office in Maywood, Illinois. Ann Pramaggiore is the Chief Executive of ComEd and appears as enthusiastic as Oak Parkers are over the potential of smart meters.

The pilot project will occur in an area which features a wide range of income and geographic groups, including urban, suburban, and rural areas and I hope to keep you updated on our progress.