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News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Energy Business Daily -- According to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx journalists, a patent by the inventors Forbes, Jr., Joseph W. (Raleigh, NC, US), filed on September 21, 2018, was published online on March 1, 2022.
The assignee for this patent, patent number 11262779, is Causam Enterprises Inc. (Raleigh, North Carolina, United States).
Reporters obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors:
“1. Field of the Invention
“The present invention relates generally to the field of electrical power load control systems, and more particularly, to a method and system and apparatus for actively controlling power load management for customers attached to the electric power grid, and for creating operating reserves for utilities and market participants.
“2. Description of Related Art
“The increased awareness of the impact of carbon emissions from the use of fossil fueled electric generation combined with the increased cost of producing base load, intermediate, and peak power during high load conditions has increased the need for alternative solutions utilizing load control as a mechanism to defer, or in some cases eliminate, the need for the deployment of additional generation capacity by electric utilities, generating utilities, or distributing utilities or any grid operator or market participant whose primary function is to facilitate the production, distribution, operation and sale of electricity to individual consumers. Existing electric utilities are pressed for methods to defer or eliminate the need for construction of fossil-based or macro large scale electricity generation while dealing with the need to integrate new sources of generation such as renewable energy sources or distributed energy resources whose production and integration into the electric grid is problematic.
“Today, a patchwork of systems exist to implement demand response load management programs, whereby various radio subsystems in various frequency bands utilize “one-way” transmit only methods of communication or most recently deployed a plurality of proprietary two-way methods of communications with electric customers or their load consuming device and measurement instruments including, by way of example, “smart meters.” Under these programs, radio frequency (RF)-controlled relay switches are typically attached to a customer’s air conditioner, water heater, or pool pumps, or other individual load consuming devices. A blanket command is sent out to a specific geographic area whereby all receiving units within the range of the transmitting station (e.g., typically a paging network) are turned off during peak hours at the election of the power utility. After a period of time when the peak load has passed, a second blanket command is sent to turn on those devices that have been turned off. This “load shifting” has the undesired effect of occasionally causing “secondary peaks” and generally require consumer incentives for adoption.
“Most recent improvements that follow the same concepts are RF networks that utilize a plurality of mesh based, non-standard communications protocols that utilize IEEE 802.15.4 or its derivatives, or “ZigBee” protocol end devices to include load control switches, programmable thermostats that have pre-determined set points for accomplishing the “off” or “cut” or reduce command simultaneously or pre-loaded in the resident memory of the end device. The programmable thermostats or building control systems (PCTs) move the set point of the HVAC (or affect another inductive or resistive device) or remove a resistive device from the electric grid thus accomplishing the same “load shifting” effect previously described. All of these methods require and rely on statistical estimations for measuring their effectiveness and use historical information that are transmitted via these same “smart meters” to provide after-the-fact evidence that an individual device or consumer complied with the demand response event. Protocols that are employed for these methods include “Smart Energy Profiles Versions 1 & 2” and its derivatives to provide utilities and their consumers an attempt at standardization amongst various OEMs of PCTs, switching, and control systems through a plurality of protocols and interfaces. These methods remain crude and do not include real time, measurement, verification, settlement and other attributes necessary to have their Demand Response effects utilized for effective Operating Reserves with the exception of limited programs for “Emergency” Capacity Programs. Furthermore, for effective settlement and control of mobile storage devices such as Electric Vehicles, these early “Smart Grid” devices are not capable of meeting the requirements of Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) or other standards setting bodies such as the National Institute of Science & Technology (NIST) Smart Grid Roadmap.
“While telemetering has been used for the express purpose of reporting energy usage, no cost effective techniques exist for calculating power consumption, carbon gas emissions, sulfur dioxide (SO2) gas emissions, and/or nitrogen dioxide (NO2) emissions, and reporting the state of a particular device under the control of a two-way positive control load management device or other combinations of load control previously described. In particular, one way wireless communications devices have been utilized to de-activate electrical appliances, such as heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) units, water heaters, pool pumps, and lighting or any inductive or resistive device that is eligible as determined by a utility or market participant for deactivation, from an existing electrical supplier or distribution partner’s network. These devices have typically been used in combination with wireless paging receivers or FM radio carrier data modulation, or a plurality of 2-way proprietary radio frequency (RF) technologies, that receive “on” or “off” commands from a paging transmitter or transmitter device. Additionally, the one-way devices are typically connected to a serving electrical supplier’s control center via landline trunks, or in some cases, microwave transmission to the paging transmitter. The customer subscribing to the load management program receives a discount or some other form of economic incentive, including direct payments for allowing the serving electrical supplier (utility), retail electric provider or any other market participant to connect to their electrical appliances with a one-way load control switch and deactivate those appliances during high energy usage periods. This technique of demand response is used mostly by utilities or any market participant for “peak shifting” where the electric load demand curve is moved from a peak period to a less generation intensive time interval and are favored by rate-based utilities who earn capital returns of new power plants. These methods are previous art and generally no conservation of energy is measured. In many instances, secondary peak periods occur when the cumulative effect of all the resistive and inductive devices are released from the “off” state simultaneously.
“While one-way devices are generally industry standard and relatively inexpensive to implement, the lack of a return path from the receiver, combined with the lack of information on the actual devices connected to the receiver, make the system highly inefficient and largely inaccurate for measuring the actual load shed to the serving utility or compliant with measurement and verification for presenting a balancing authority or independent system operator for operating reserves. While the differential current draw is measurable on the serving electric utility’s transmission lines and at electrical bus or substations, the actual load shed is approximate and the location of the load deferral is approximated at the control center of the serving utility or other statistical methods are considered to approximate the individual or cumulative effect on an electric utility grid. The aforementioned “two-way” systems are simultaneously defective in addressing real time and near real time telemetry needs that produce generation equivalencies that are now recognized by FERC Orders such as FERC 745 where measurable, verifiable Demand Response “negawatts”, defined as real time or near real time load curtailment where measurement and verification can be provided within the tolerances required under such programs presented by FERC, NERC, or the governing body that regulate grid operations. The aforementioned “smart meters” in combination with their data collection systems commonly referred to as “Advanced Metering Infrastructure” generally collect interval data from meters in HISTORICAL fashion and report this information to the utility, market participant or grid operator AFTER the utility or grid operator has sent notice for curtailment events or “control events” to initiate due to high grid stress that includes lack of adequate operating reserves to meet demand, frequency variations, voltage support and any other grid stabilizing needs as identified by the utility or grid operator and published and governed by FERC, NERC, or other applicable regulations.
“One exemplary telemetering system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,891,838 B1. This patent describes details surrounding a mesh communication of residential devices and the reporting and control of those devices, via WANs, to a computer. The stated design goal in this patent is to facilitate the “monitoring and control of residential automation systems.” This patent does not explain how a serving utility or customer could actively control the devices to facilitate the reduction of electricity. In contrast, this patent discloses techniques that could be utilized for reporting information that is being displayed by the serving utility’s power meter (as do many other prior applications in the field of telemetering).”
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In addition to obtaining background information on this patent, NewsRx editors also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “For applications of electrical power load management, the present invention provides for systems and methods for actively controlling power load management for customers attached to the electric grid and for creating operating reserves for utilities and market participants. The present invention further provides additional tracking of power savings for both the individual customer, broadly defined as any consumer of electrical power whether this is an individual residential consumer, a large commercial/industrial customer or any combination thereof, inclusive of retail electric providers and market participants as well as the overall electric utility whether generating or distributing.
“Accordingly, the present invention is directed to systems for managing power on an electric power grid that is constructed and configured for supplying and receiving power from a multiplicity of sources, where the power flows to a plurality of power consuming devices or is generated by a plurality of power generation and storage solutions that are enabled and disabled by a plurality of controllable devices, wherein the system includes: a server comprising a command processor operable to receive or initiate power control commands and issue power control event messages responsive thereto, at least one of the power control commands requiring a reduction in an amount of electric power consumed by the plurality of power consuming devices; an event manager operable to receive the power control event messages, maintain at least one power management status relating to each client device and issue power control event instructions responsive to the power control event messages that may be initiated from a market participant, a utility, or an electric grid operator; a database for storing, information relating to power consumed by the plurality of power consuming devices and based upon the amount of power to be reduced to each of the power consuming devices, generating a first power supply value (PSV); and a client device manager operably coupled to the event manager and the database, the client device manager selecting from the database, based on the information stored in the database, at least one client device to which to issue a power control message indicating at least one of an amount of electric power to be reduced or increased and identification of at least one controllable device to be instructed to disable a flow of electric power to one or more associated power consuming devices responsive to receipt of a power control event instruction requiring a reduction in a specified amount of electric power; the plurality of controllable device and corresponding device interfaces facilitating communication of power control instructions to the controllable devices, the power control instructions causing the at least one controllable device to selectively enable and disable a flow of power to the power consuming device(s); and a device control manager operably coupled to the controllable device interfaces for issuing a power control instruction to the controllable devices through the controllable device interfaces, responsive to the received power control message, the power control instruction causing the controllable device(s) to disable a flow of electric power to at least one associated power consuming device for reducing consumed power, and based upon the reduction in consumed power, generating a second power supply value (PSV) corresponding to the reduction in consumed power.
“Also, the present invention is directed to method for managing power on an electric power grid that is constructed and configured for supplying and receiving power from a multiplicity of sources, where the power flows to a plurality of power consuming devices or is generated by a plurality of power generation and storage solutions that are enabled and disabled by a plurality of controllable devices, the method steps including: initiating power control commands by a server including a command processor operable to receive or initiate power control commands and issue power control event messages responsive thereto, at least one of the power control commands requiring a reduction in an amount of electric power consumed by the plurality of power consuming devices; an event manager receiving the power control event messages, maintain at least one power management status relating to each client device and issuing power control event instructions responsive to the power control event messages that may be initiated from a market participant, a utility, or an electric grid operator; storing in a database, information relating to power consumed by the plurality of power consuming devices and based upon the amount of power to be reduced to each of the power consuming devices, generating a first power supply value (PSV); and a client device manager selecting from the database, based on the information stored in the database, at least one client device to which to issue a power control message indicating at least one of an amount of electric power to be reduced or increased and identification of at least one controllable device to be instructed to disable a flow of electric power to one or more associated power consuming devices responsive to receipt of a power control event instruction requiring a reduction in a specified amount of electric power; wherein the plurality of controllable device and corresponding device interfaces facilitating communication of power control instructions to the controllable devices, the power control instructions causing the at least one controllable device to selectively enable and disable a flow of power to the power consuming device(s); and a device control manager issuing a power control instruction to the controllable devices through the controllable device interfaces, responsive to the received power control message, the power control instruction causing the controllable device(s) to disable a flow of electric power to at least one associated power consuming device for reducing consumed power, and based upon the reduction in consumed power, generating a second power supply value (PSV) corresponding to the reduction in consumed power.
“These and other aspects of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art after a reading of the following description of the preferred embodiment when considered with the drawings, as they support the claimed invention.”
The claims supplied by the inventors are:
“1. A system for managing an electric power grid, comprising: a server, including a processor and a memory, wherein the server receives a power control command requiring a reduction of an amount of power consumed by at least one power consuming device; wherein the server determines an amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device based on a baseline historical load for the at least one power consuming device, an estimation based on a load profile of the at least one power consuming device, and/or real-time or near real-time measurement of the power consumption of the at least one power consuming device; wherein the server issues a power control message in response to the power control command; wherein the power control message causes a reduction of a flow of power to the at least one power consuming device based on the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device; wherein the amount of the flow of power reduced to the at least one power consuming device is confirmed by measurement and verification; and wherein the measurement and verification is transmitted to the server.
“2. The system of claim 1, further comprising a database for storing information including the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device and/or an amount of power to be reduced to the at least one power consuming device.
“3. The system of claim 1, wherein the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device is determined based on weather or climate information for a location where the at least one power consuming device is located.
“4. The system of claim 1, wherein the measurement and verification is used to generate a projected load curve for the at least one power consuming device.
“5. The system of claim 1, wherein the power control message is received by a controller, and wherein the controller transmits at least one Internet Protocol (IP)-based initiation message to the at least one power consuming device to initiate the reduction of the flow of power to the at least one power consuming device.
“6. The system of claim 1, wherein the measurement and verification is performed by a smart meter, and wherein the smart meter transmits the measurement and verification to the server in near real-time.
“7. The system of claim 1, wherein the power control message includes information relating to a change of state for the at least one power consuming device, an alert relating to the at least one power consuming device, and/or a status for the at least one power consuming device.
“8. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one power consuming device includes at least one electric vehicle.
“9. A system for managing an electric power grid, comprising: a server, including a processor and a memory, wherein the server receives a power control command requiring a reduction of an amount of power consumed by a plurality of power consuming devices, each associated with one of a plurality of individual consumer profiles; wherein the server aggregates the plurality of individual consumer profiles to generate at least one multi-user consumer profile; wherein the server determines an amount of power available for each of the plurality of power consuming devices; wherein the server issues a power control message in response to the power control command; wherein the power control message causes a reduction of a flow of power to at least one of the plurality of power consuming devices based on the amount of power available for each of the plurality of power consuming devices; wherein the amount of the flow of power reduced to the at least one of the plurality of power consuming devices is confirmed by measurement and verification; and wherein the measurement and verification is transmitted to the server.
“10. The system of claim 9, further comprising a database for storing information including the amount of power available for each of the plurality of power consuming devices and/or an amount of power to be reduced to the plurality of power consuming devices.
“11. The system of claim 9, wherein the amount of power available for each of the plurality of power consuming devices is based on a baseline historical load for the plurality of power consuming devices, an estimation based on load profiles of the plurality of power consuming devices, and/or real-time or near real-time measurement of the power consumption of the plurality of power consuming.
“12. The system of claim 9, wherein the measurement and verification is performed by a smart meter, and wherein the smart meter transmits the measurement and verification to the server in near real-time.
“13. The system of claim 9, wherein the power control message is received by a controller, and wherein the controller transmits at least one Internet Protocol (IP)-based initiation message to the plurality of power consuming devices to initiate the reduction of the flow of power to the at least one of the plurality of power consuming devices.
“14. The system of claim 9, wherein the power control message includes information relating to a change of state for the plurality of power consuming devices, an alert relating to the plurality of power consuming devices, and/or a status for the plurality of power consuming devices.
“15. The system of claim 9, wherein the plurality of power consuming devices includes at least one electric vehicle.
“16. A system for managing an electric power grid, comprising: a server, including a processor and a memory, wherein the server receives a power control command requiring a reduction of an amount of power consumed by at least one power consuming device; wherein the server determines an amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device; wherein the server issues a power control message in response to the power control command; wherein the power control message is received by a controller, and wherein the controller transmits at least one Internet Protocol (IP)-based initiation message to the at least one power consuming device to initiate the reduction of the flow of power to the at least one power consuming device; wherein the at least one IP-based initiation message causes a reduction of a flow of power to the at least one power consuming device based on the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device; wherein the amount of the flow of power reduced to the at least one power consuming device is confirmed by measurement and verification; and wherein the measurement and verification is transmitted to the server.
“17. The system of claim 16, further comprising a database for storing information including the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device and/or the amount of power to be reduced to the at least one power consuming device.
“18. The system of claim 16, wherein the amount of power available for the at least one power consuming device is based on a baseline historical load for the at least one power consuming device, an estimation based on load profiles of the at least one power consuming device, and/or-real-time or near real-time measurement of the power consumption of the at least one power consuming device.
“19. The system of claim 16, wherein the measurement and verification is performed by a smart meter, and wherein the smart meter transmits the measurement and verification to the server in near real-time.
“20. The system of claim 16, wherein the at least one power consuming device includes at least one electric vehicle.” |
