Let’s Build a Global Power Grid (2015) | Hacker News Reader

Let’s Build a Global Power Grid (2015)

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The Internet of energy is real, and it's a generational opportunity. If anyone wants to come and work on it at Enphase [1], please email me.

[1] https://enphase.com

Tell me more about what you mean exactly by "internet of energy". What is Enphase doing with this that's unique?

enphase is like the linksys of residential solar. no one piece is unique, but they have a product line that both nails the featureset well and is very cost competative.

Its hard to tell because industry numbers like this are private and expensive to come by in detail, but Enphase is likely #1 if not #2 in the residential "solar + storage + saas-platform" market. That means their saas platform can then turn around and act as a "virtual power plant" that bids into different markets and services.

imagine if linksys had figured out some bitorrent like protocol and managed to not just sell the equipment but also make loot in the CDN market.

Enphase's claim to fame is the "microinverter". In most solar systems the direct current from all the panels is combined and sent to one big inverter. With microinverters, there is an inverter per solar panel and the power is combined as alternating current. I gather the advantage is that the operating point of each panel is optimised independently, so you get better performance across an array when light conditions are different across the array (eg. a tree shading part of the array).

I was really excited for the IQ8 until I realized it was three years behind schedule with no release in sight. Elected to go Solar Edge instead. I wonder if Enphase just pivoted to something else entirely and never thought to formally announce a cancellation?

One interpretation of the "Internet of Energy" is that it is the use of data networks to improve the control of energy networks.

I think there is another level beyond this though. The revolution in data networks happened when they shifted from circuit-based (telephony) systems to packet based (IP) systems. There were significant benefits to be had in the switching of standardised packets with standardied equipment, allowing us to cheaply build and manage complex networks with a mix of underlying technologies.

I can see a revolution coming in the "packetisation" of energy, meaning that we will be able to switch units of energy with the same ease and versatility with which we switch data bits. Any load will be able to consume a standardised "packet" of energy from any source. Data and energy will be mingled, in that each energy packet will be accompanied by a data packet describing its properties. Complex networks will be able to be safely constructed and automatically managed by non-specialists, as the network will use the data portion of a "data/energy" packet to safely and efficiently manage the energy portion of the packet as it passes through the network.

I've been watching/waiting for something like this to come along. There was a startup years ago whose name I can't remember anymroe that tried doing it with a (relatively) high voltage DC system (I think 240), where the "packets" were very short (ms) bursts of energy, followed by short signaling bursts with very little amperage. Something about the protocol and design of it meant that even though high voltage DC systems like that are typically considered very dangerous, this one you could just grab a live wire, and it would just not send the next pulse because the signaling had been interrupted. The energy within a given pulse was under the safety threshold of things we tolerate now.

That and of course the reigning champion so far: USB PD. Wicked hot mess that it is, wouldn't be the first time the kludge wins.

Respectfully, as a power systems engineer, I'm unable to grasp how what you're describing is beneficial compared to current power networks or how it respects the underlying physics of electricity.

The design of power transmission and distribution networks is driven by several physical realities: high voltage is needed to transmit power over long distances with acceptable losses, it is easier and cheaper to transform voltage and switch ultra high power circuits in an AC network than a DC network, all power conversion is lossy, electricity is hazardous and therefore electrical circuits must be insulated and protected adequately to protect public safety.

I've heard this question of "why don't we have some kind of universal power outlet that any load regardless of voltage or current needs can connect to?" before. The answer is the same as in many other fields of engineering: it's not efficient to overbuild every node in an network to handle any possible load when electrical loads are usually well-defined and do not change rapidly. We don't have a universal train that runs in the metro, for freight and for high speed rail not because it's not possible but because that would not be efficient. The same applies here.

Thanks for the respect! I understand your points and I think you are correct in light of today's technology, but respectfully I think you're being a bit pessimistic about the future. (I'm an Electrical Engineer, qualified to work in power systems, but ended up working in data networks and RF.)

What I'm envisaging doesn't rule out voltage transformations. A "packet" could have its voltage or current transformed as required to suit the mode of transmission. Nothing to say it has to remain as DC either. The idea is that the energy (or some other property) would remain the same (apart from losses). The packets might also be conceptual in some transmission modes. For example, take a bunch of "packets" all with the same DC voltage, butt them up in time and you have a regular DC transmission line with a constant voltage and current, the main difference being that you now have an embedded/parallel data stream which logically delineates the packet boundaries. This data stream allows the receiving station to treat each packet differently if required.

The talk of non-specialists wiring systems doesn't mean your hairdresser will be running a 1MV transmission line across the suburb. Rather they could wire something like a house in a risk free manner with no need for a specialist electrician. The idea is that a source would be measuring what it is driving, so safety is inherent and serious power would only be delivered if the measurement says it is safe to do so.

Yes, this is pie-in-the-sky talk. It's not a design, but a collection of wild ideas which might turn out to be practical. It's the sort for thing one talks about with colleagues at the pub, but those colleagues do include academics with high level power engineering qualifications and in conversations they are also thinking along similar lines.

It's an interesting idea and hopefully it works out; but there are so many ways this can go wrong. Losing a power grid is an emergency of a pretty high order of magnitude - a long period of time without power and society basically collapses. Limited refrigeration, limited communications, transport might look vulnerable too looking over the long term where it is likely we have to phase out gasoline and replace it with ... maybe electricity from the grid. This would need to be highly redundant and that is not going to be cheap.

I'll opine that it should totally unacceptable for a city to be relying on distant foreign climes for their electricity. Mega-grids to help stabilise the thing over an hour or two, sure. But if I couldn't drive to a big, 24/7 electrical plant in a few hours I'd be feeling very nervous.

OPEC is quite bad enough, there is an enormous strategic problem with sourcing so much oil non-locally. We'd be much better off with decentralised local generation, and the world would be much more peaceful.

>...long period of time without power and society basically collapses.

Im hoping this is a joke.

I live in a country that had terrible electricity issues. Much to say there are no riots on the streets and society has not even come close to collapse. (Everyone from the president to schoolkids makes fun of the utility on Twitter) People just make fun of the fact that they have to BBQ more often than not and change diets slightly to account for the lack of constant refrigeration. More people have invested in solar solutions for creature comforts like lights and such.

Moral of the story is, people have just become a wee bit less reliant on the energy grid. Renewable sector is booming too.

So I'll just stop right here. Because some humans have clearly forgotten the human race has existed for millenia without electricity.

> some humans have clearly forgotten the human race has existed for millenia without electricity.

And some humans have never lived in a place that falls below freezing in the winter.

I lived through a 3-week ice storm in '98 in eastern Ontario [0]. That wasn't even a large outage, just constant failures all over because the ice weighed down and broke power lines. 34 people died, a huge number of farm animals died, and that was with the military being called in to try to help everyone.

You take out all electricity to a major city like Toronto in the dead of winter for a week, thousands would die from the cold.

Take your "liveable climate privilege" outta here, lol.

[0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/January_1998_North_American_...

Haha. Freak events happen everywhere but I doubt the dessert dweller wants to hear stories of your floods. A couple thousand dead people, bless their souls, does not constitute a break down in society. And considering we have people in remote regions shrugging these things off without electricity but basic tools and fire - Id be concerned about the lack of thinking and foresight among the population rather than the weather.

> society has not even come close to collapse

> change diets slightly to account for the lack of constant refrigeration

Maybe I have unreasonably high expectations of civilised society compared to you. What country, and what is the longest (contiguous) period your area has gone without power?

I'm just doing rough estimates, but after ~72 hours any food that needs refrigeration is at risk, mobile phone networks are gone and electronic transactions are gone. That is a pretty crippling level of stress on a modern first world nation.

This is isolationist fear-mongering, which would be one thing if you put forth clear arguments for why this is a good idea. Sadly all that is here to find is how bad the consequences are if something would go wrong and something about OPEC.

Outages are not really more likely under this model of many grids connected with DC interconnectors unless a government plans really badly and ends up relying on them. It will always be assumed that interconnectors could go down, thus countries will make sure they have enough reserve generation.

A few things on the history that often comes up, but I didn't see mentioned in the article:

I thought Quebec had pushed this high voltage technology in the 1960s. (I can't find the source on this at the moment...)

Buckminster Fuller also popularized the idea of an integrated world electric grid in the 1970s and in his book "Critical Path".

Quebec indeed pioneered the first multi-terminal HVDC line and it’s still in use today (it goes all the way from the James Bay project to Massachusetts). It’s a very cool system.

I gave a talk about it here: https://github.com/pirate/quebec-power-grid-talk

I remember learning about it as a kid and I remember the ice storm in '98. I enjoyed the talk--well done!

This really is the right idea. Screw batteries, this is acheiveable today and outright fixes all the issues with solar and wind as the only required source of energy humans will need.

Not sure how this could work geopolitically. You need to able to build it to prevent a country from having the ability to hold another country hostage by cutting another country out of the network.

very very high costs, and although not horrible still comparatively significant efficiency losses, now when we get some superconducting wires

Great, if this works we can capitalize on all that Chinese coal energy!

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