75 Years of T&D World: How Smart Grid Technology is Shaping the Future of Power Transmission

It’s the 75th anniversary of T&D World and it has been an amazing ride chronicling the technological history, trends, and transitions that got us here. Twenty-five years ago we marked the occasion with our 50th anniversary of T&D World. The first 50 years was an amazing time with some advancements in technology that changed our industry. The next 25 years are equally interesting. There are so many technological advancements that took place between the 50th and the 75th issues. It’s impossible to list them all, so why not look at something that continues shaking things up and will influence the next 25 years?

Surprisingly, there are quite a few technologies that make the cut, but space is limited. Let’s concentrate on “Smart Grid” tech. How did smart grid advance so far in such a short time? Author Ray Kurzweil said in his latest book “The Singularity Is Nearer,” that computing power and information technologies (IT) are exponentially getting cheaper with time. This is illustrated in a price-performance graph he provided using a constant 2023 dollar baseline. It shows that the last decade was a good time for applications needing computing power.

The section of the curve running from 2005 to 2023 is significant both to Kurzweil and this discussion. He points out that this section shows that a 2023 dollar, adjusted for inflation, buys about 11,200 times as much computing power as it did in 2005. For Kurzweil this portion represents the time between his first book in his singularity series and this one. It’s a period where computer power changed rapidly, and it anchors the smart grid tech’s development nicely.

That section of the graph gives a unique perspective of the rapid cost drop of computing power, and it shows the dramatic increase of computation speeds for the same period. There were other gains, but this demonstrates the point. It’s also important because the tech began being called smart grid in 2005, and by 2023, smart grid’s evolution was unbelievable. It’s not slowing down, which ties in with Kurzweil’s example.

Technology Transition  

It’s hard to believe that smart grid tech has developed to the point it has in such a short period of time. Initially it had a niche market, but that’s no longer the case. Smart grid tech went mainstream, by adding intelligence to the power grid. Business models changed, and bidirectional power flows became a reality. It’s hasn’t stopped and there’s no end in sight. The next twenty-five years are going to be amazing.

On a more tangible level, smart grid’s components have gotten more compact with a smaller footprint than traditional equipment. That led to more efficient use of space like rights-of-way and site requirements for facilities. Most importantly smart grid has improved the electrical and mechanical ratings of components and increased their operating characteristics.

This is illustrated by the 21st century’s bulk transmission systems need for more capacity. The customary method of adding more wire in the air is challenged by many obstacles. Smart grid tech addresses this with dynamic line rating (DLR) technology. The technology can be added to new or an existing transmission lines quickly and economically. Overall, the reports from utilities using the DLR technology are very positive. DLR installations have increased the capacities of existing transmission line between 25% to 40%, but it came with a price, big-data.

Connectivity Transformation 

As the amount of the smart grid’s big-data grew, it became apparent that wireless communication systems were needed to move it. 5G networking is another digital-base technology benefiting from lowering computing power pricing. Its ability to upload and download large data blocks quickly is needed by those dealing with big-data, but that was only part of it. 5G’s wireless feature is perfect for an industry with assets scattered over miles of city and rural landscapes.

When 5G was integrated into the power grid, it took smart grid tech’s abilities to another level. Power grid equipment and personnel finally had direct access to state-of-the art communications, but that wasn’t only the benefit. 5G networking also provided the virtual link needed throughout the enterprise. It connected the office, field personnel, fellow workers, digital files, and many other work related applications making possible a variety of digital-based operations, and it didn’t stop within the enterprise.

Boundaries like the grid’s edge and behind-the-meter were no longer an obstacle. The IoT (internet of things), IIoT (industrial internet of things), and UIoT (utility internet of things) provided seamless connectivity. Some experts say this has added more awareness of the power grid’s health and what is taking place across the entire power delivery network. More importantly, it provides two-way interconnectivity between the intelligent assets of the power network, the management platforms and the customers.

Real-time Dynamics 

Let’s look at the nuts and bolts side of the power grid (i.e., the physical portion) too. During the past 25 years, the components have become smarter and more complex, but at the same time more user-friendly. In a nutshell, these elements have been transformed into intelligent electronic devices (IEDs). IEDs integrated with Wi-Fi or 5G networking has led to power equipment capable of two-way communications between each other, control systems, and management platforms.

These IEDs produce real-time data and moved intelligence into the substation yard. It has been an immense lift for digital substation technology and has turned the control building into a mini data center. This improves the performance of the devices and the management of the assets. In addition, it upgrades the overall operating efficiency of the power grid itself. IEDs provided the link needed for operating technology (OT) to interconnect the enterprise with its critical assets.

Advancements in equipment, communications and computing power have led to something that seemed impossible at one time, the IT/OT convergence. The convergence merges the virtual worlds of IT and OT into one domain. It’s redefines the idea of remote assets, since they are no longer remote. According to Virtue Market Research IT/OT convergence was valued at US$ 51.9 billion in 2023 and is projected to reach about US$ 134 billion by 2030, so it’s definitely a technological force that will easily extend into the next 25 years.

Adding to that value is an interesting innovation taking place within IT/OT tech. It’s the integration of artificial intelligence (AI). AI’s strong point is handling the massive amounts of big-data and pattern recognition, but that’s only a starting point. The AI proponents say we have barely begun to understand the possibilities that IT/OT applications augmented with AI represents.

Digital twin technology was one of the earliest achievements from the IT/OT convergence to hit the industrial world. This tech has been called the digital bridge between the real world and the virtual world, More accurately it’s a digital copy of physical assets using software to represent not only those assets, but the processes that predict, understand, and optimize the performance of the assets. Let’s look at a couple of smart grid applications that have been augmented by digital twin tech reinforced with AI.

Smart Grid Gets Smarter

When computerized transmission modeling met LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) surveying, and both were blended with vegetation management, it was digital twin tech that made sense of it all. It came about when NERC encouraging utilities to survey their high-voltage transmission systems using LiDAR. Most utilities had detailed computer models of their transmission lines, but many were missing accurate field data, which is LiDAR’s strongpoint.

The LiDAR provided that detailed field data of not only the lines, but everything the LiDAR equipment saw during the survey. It proved to be a challenge, but digital twin tech provided a perspective of the power grid never seen before. The AI enhanced digital twin application did a fantastic job of data-mining that resulted in a comprehensive virtual eco-system, which took transmission line asset management to another level.

Distributed energy resources (DERs) and decentralized energy generation are also benefiting from digital twin tech as it’s applied to the virtual power plant (VPP). DERs can have a wide variety of energy sources ranging from rooftop solar to electric vehicles, but it’s a challenge getting them to work collectively. Bringing AI, VPP, and DER together is proving to be a boost for the goal of decentralized energy generation among other things. There have been successful pilot projects, which are encouraging more VPP development.

It's been an exciting 25 years, and we only scratched the surface. For the next 25 years, it’s a good bet that cloud connectivity, increasing computing power, big-data analytics, AI enhancements, advanced asset management systems, and performance platforms, will continue to move smart grid tech forward. The transition to a self-aware and self-managed power delivery system is evolving much faster than anyone expected. It’s almost like that proverbial perfect storm where all the technological pieces fall in place and are working together. Sure it’s uncomfortable and in some cases disruptive, but it’s exciting too!