Finding sustainable and affordable ways to power the world is clearly a substantial and increasingly urgent challenge. We covered consumer-generated power back in 2006, but Dutch startup Qurrent is taking the notion a step further with technology to enable neighbourhood-wide energy networks.
Because of fluctuating patterns of consumption, homes with wind and solar energy generators can find themselves with surplus energy at some times of the day but not enough at others. Surplus energy typically gets sold back to the main grid, but as much as 30 percent of it gets lost along the way, according to EcoGeek. When a group of homes work together to manage their collective energy generation and use, on the other hand, higher levels of demand in one home can be matched with surpluses in others, thus evening out the group's overall consumption and minimizing the amount that must be drawn from the main grid. Participating homes essentially form a "mini-grid" that shares energy internally before exchanging any with the main grid, thereby minimizing waste and maximizing efficiency.
To make it all happen, Qurrent provides a device for each participating house known as a Qbox. Each linked to a central Qserver, the Qboxes in the network monitor energy flows in each home and optimize them for maximum network-wide efficiency. They share capacities as needed among neighbours, and can also autonomously turn on devices such as washing machines and dryers so that they are run at the optimal time. A consumer could tell their Qbox that they want their laundry done by 6 p.m. and that it will take roughly 1.5 hours, for example. They can then go to work and the Qbox will decide when is the best time to run it, taking into account their production profiles and energy rates as well as those of their neighbours.
Qurrent won the 2007 Picnic Green Challenge for the best marketable green idea that could be developed and sold to consumers within two years. Along with the award came a EUR 500,000 prize, which reportedly will be used to pilot-test the concept in a Netherlands neighbourhood. One to get in on early?
Website: www.qurrent.com
Contact: info@qurrent.com
Spotted by: RK
I am not sure how this could work on a small scale between the neighbours in close proximity. There can be some fluctuating patterns in consumption. However there won’t be any fluctuation between neighbours in wind and solar energy generation because the neighbours are located close to each other. As there isn’t any possibility to store the surplus energy, it will be sold to the main grid anyway.
I presume this could work on a large scale.
At http://www.business-idea.com/ShowPosting.asp?ID=2510 I read about US energy company buying energy wholesale from competitive providers and passing the savings to the customers. This is on large scale, but the principle could be used to scale up the neighbours energy saving approach too.
It would only need a handful of consumers to make it worth investing in a deep cell battery bank to store the power for the "consortium's" own use - and why not pick up on that idea where people talked about plugging electric cars into the "grid" as a means of storage
This is a super idea. True that the wind would blow for everyone at the same time but everyone's usage of electricity would be different. Even without battery storage this would still make better sense then simply selling the power back to the electricity company and loosing much of the power along the way.
I see cars as the only reasonable thing to power with this grid. But then the car would have to be parked at home during the dy and paople taking public transportation to work. Or you would need to get a small local business that uses energy during the day signed up that can use it while nobody else is using the power.