Irvine Smart Grid Demonstration


UC Irvine hosted one of the country’s largest smart grid demonstration programs, the Irvine Smart Grid Demonstration (ISGD). ISGD evaluated various aspects of the future smart grid through a public-private partnership led by Southern California Edison (SCE) and the U.S. Department of Energy with UC Irvine’s Advanced Power and Energy Program as a research partner, and Facilities Management, Campus and Environmental Planning, and Transportation and Distribution Services as partners also. The ISGD program was comprehensive in that it spanned from regional grid intelligence technologies, to the substation and distribution circuit level, down to individual homes outfitted with smart appliances, solar panels, and electric vehicles to help understand how the grid will need to interact with the home of the future.

Objective

The vision for this demonstration deployed various smart grid technologies in an integrated framework that was expected to be more reliable, secure, economic, efficient, safe, and environmentally-friendly than those in general use today. The ISGD project is designed to satisfy the following objectives:

  • •   To demonstrate a variety of existing and new smart grid technologies within a concentrated geographic region by:  Determining how smart grid technologies connect, communicate, and operate with each other;  Reducing energy costs to customers by shifting usage loads to off-peak hours

  • •   Optimizing the performance of the electric grid. Renewable generation, and advanced energy storage that yields cost savings and reduces emissions.