The Pacific Energy Institute Blog
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The Use of Knowledge in the Grid
In 1945, economist F.A. Hayek wrote an article entitled The Use of Knowledge in Society. In it, he described flawed thinking he found to be ...
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This is Better Than “Optimal”
The current discussion around Distributed Energy Resources (DER) and grid modernization often relies upon a magic box called optimization to make everything work. According to ...
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The Fly-by-Wire Grid We Need
The US electric power grid has a remarkably sophisticated and capable control system that has centralized, distributed, and autonomous components and in some regions is ...
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DER and Anti-Gravity
In the discipline of Grid Architecture, we recognize that an architecture is composed of three types of things: structure, back box components, and externally visible ...
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Building the Grid We Need: Incremental Change vs. Core Grid Transformation
Changing the grid to meet 21st Century needs is a serious business, involving hard work at all stages. There is much discussion in the industry ...
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The Electricity Industry’s “Ghost in the Machine”
For as long as civilization has existed, there has been an ongoing question about what the mind is, and how it relates to the body. ...
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Abundance vs Scarcity Thinking
“A source of increasing tension is the difference in mindset between the traditional industry scarcity mindset versus customers and new business entities with an abundance ...
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Large Signals, Small Signals & Grid Fallacies
In the field of electronics, the concepts of small and large signals are well understood. For example, a simple transistor audio amplifier must be designed ...
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This Little Light of Mine
It’s the early evening in the dog days of summer in California on a warm Tuesday night. In the background I can hear the muffled ...
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A Gambit for Grid 2035
The Pacific Energy Institute is pleased to announce the release of its new white paper, “A Gambit for Grid 2035”. This paper by the Institutes’ ...
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Where Have all the Aggregators Gone?
Wonder why non-wires alternative procurements are failing to meet the frothy expectations of five years ago? One reason is that most distributed energy resource (DER) ...
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The Future of Electric Rates
Bob Dylan, that well known electric utility analyst, famously noted that “The times they are a changing…the waters around you have grown…you better start swimmin’ ...
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DERs: Déjà vu all over again
Those of you who worked over the last couple decades in wind and then solar integration may find a familiar scene being played out with ...
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What is Your Path to a High DER Future?
The rapid uptake of distributed generation (DG) has impacts on the distribution system, bulk power system, and utility cost recovery economics, especially with high penetrations ...
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Agile Planning
Planning for the future or the past? Striking the balance between robust and nimble planning Utility planners are facing increasing challenges and it’s tempting to ...
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Future History
Transformation of the electric industry isn’t isolated from the larger societal, customer and technological changes that have impacted other industries. The future history of the ...
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Storage: It’s Not Just for Grid Services Anymore
Energy storage for the grid has generally been viewed as an optional add-on device to bolster reliability of the grid, as a special case reliability ...
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Are We Smart Enough?
The electric industry is changing! This is old news to many of you, but in my 30-year career in the electric utility industry there has ...
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