Monthly Archives: November 2017

AIEQ Conference on Smart Grid

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Today, I moderated a panel on microgrids at a smart grid conference hosted by the electric industry association of Québec (AIEQ). I think that it went quite well. Chad Abbey (Smarter Grid Solutions), Michel Carreau (Hatch), Teddy Chettiar (S&C) and Ronald Denom (Ossiaco) were on the panel. Chad presented 3 microgrid cases, including one on the Shetlands Isles off Great Britain – an obviously remote community. Michel continued by presenting the challenges of microgrids (and the recent progress) in the Canadian North. Further South, Teddy both in-front and behind-the-meter examples, including one in North Bay. Ron focused on behind-the-meter applications, with the “nano grid” concept.

Other panels focused on the smart grid proper, with Greg Farthing (ABB) moderating Gary Rackliffe (ABB), Jayant Kumar (GE) and Mark Feasel (Schneider), and on cybersecurity, with Oral Gürel (Schneider), moderating and Dominique Gagnon (CGI) , Robert Nastas (PM SCADA), Bruno Lafeytaud (Accenture) and Pierre Taillefer (Vizimax) presenting.

The panels were followed by a dynamic luncheon presentation by Eric Filion, VP Customer Service at Hydro-Québec Distribution. Éric highlighted the goal of Hydro-Québec to become more of a lifestyle service provider and increase customer loyalty (going well beyond customer satisfaction). Éric presented 5 innovation trends (see picture) which, I think, are worth sharing.

Thanks to all panelists and to the AIEQ for organizing this very successful event.

Strategic Electricity Inter-ties Committee of the House of Commons

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On October 25, I appeared before the Standing Committee on Natural Resources discussing Strategic Electricity Inter-ties. The Standing Committee on Natural Resources studies bills, government activities and expenditures, and issues related to Canada’s energy, forest, minerals and metals, and earth sciences sectors.

The idea behind strategic electricity inter-ties is to improve power exchanges between provinces by increasing tie capacity with new transmission lines. The brief that I wrote  and my testimony argued that that energy storage may be a better alternative in light of the long time frame to build new transmission lines (15-20 years is typical), the current state of the art in storage, and expected growth in performance and cost decline of the technology.

It was my first experience of appearing before such a committee, and I like the experience. I was impressed by the questions that the members of parliament asked. They also seemed to like my arguments, as many came to me afterward to thank me.

Here is the brief that was presented: S&C Brief Standing Committee RNNR 20171024.