| Sumario: | The article discusses the need for an energy internet. The real test of any network's resilience is how quickly and intelligently it can handle disruptions. Think, for example, of the internet's ability to re-route packets of data swiftly and efficiently when a network link fails. The analogy is not lost on the energy industry. Energy visionaries imagine a "self-healing" grid with real-time sensors and "plug and play" software that can allow scattered generators or energy-storage devices to attach to it. The Electric Power Research Institute reckons that building an energy internet could cost over $200 billion in America alone. The technology exists to enable a radical overhaul of the way in which energy is generated, distributed and consumed--an overhaul whose impact on the energy industry could match the internet's impact on communications. The good news is that technologies are now being developed in four areas that point the way towards the smart grid of the future. First, utilities are experimenting with ways to measure the behaviour of the grid in real time. Second, they are looking for ways to use that information to control the flow of power fast enough to avoid blackouts. Third, they are upgrading their networks in order to pump more juice through the grid safely. Finally, they are looking for ways to produce and store power close to consumers, to reduce the need to send so much power down those ageing transmission lines in the first place.
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