Many power companies now offer products and services to help their customers take advantage of the smart home. For example, many power companies offer an online marketplace, an Amazon-like website that allows you to purchase smart home and energy-efficient products, often with a significant rebate or incentive applied. On ComEd Marketplace, a website for Illinois’ largest power company, customers can purchase a Google Nest Thermostat for only $69 after instant rebate. Some power companies may give you a free smart thermostat or significant rebate if you enroll in a program to move your energy use away from times of high electricity usage (for example, the early evening on a hot summer day). These programs help power companies avoid using costly energy, and those savings are passed along to all customers, as well as the extra bill savings if you participate.

The smart grid empowers customers by creating the foundation necessary for a number of new technology-driven energy alternatives, emission reductions, efficiency improvements, a shift to a lower emitting fuel for transpor­tation, and encourages more energy efficiency by providing real-time energy usage data to customers. Research shows that when customers know how much energy they’re using, they will reduce their use by 5 to 10 percent. Additionally, the smart grid promotes integration of the vast amount of renewable energy that is currently being mandated and that is already in the pipeline for development.

• A smart grid senses problems and reroutes power automatically.  This prevents some outages and reduces the length of those that do occur.

• A smart grid helps meet growing demand for electricity while limiting the need to invest in new power plants.

• A smart grid delivers the power “quality” necessary to run our increasingly digital homes – power with fewer sags, spikes, and interruptions.

• Smart grid reduces greenhouse gas emissions by making it easier to connect renewable energy sources to the electricity grid.

• Smart grid and smart meters help consumers save money by providing near real time energy usage information and the ability to manage electricity use.

• Smart grid and smart meters make it easier for utilities to offer new kinds of rate plans to help customers manage energy usage and cost -- for example, by shifting some types of usage to times of day when electricity costs less. 

• Smart meters eliminate the need for meter reading – instead, usage information is transmitted directly to the utility for timely, accurate billing.  There is never a need to send an estimated bill to the customer.

Our electric system is more than 100 years old and although it has served us well, it needs upgrading. The energy industry is poised for a dramatic change. In the face of expanding customer expectations, increasing environmental regulation, and new technology, the traditional approach of building new power plants to meet energy demand can no longer be the only option. We must find ways to improve our service and meet our customers’ energy needs in a smart, lower-carbon way. Renewable generation and energy efficiency must, and will, play a larger role.

And consumers want more information and control, too; they want reliable and affordable energy that’s clean, and this requires a unique balancing act. By deploying digital energy technologies and modernizing our power grid, we can bring the grid into the 21st century, empower consumers to make wiser energy decisions, and help create a cleaner, lower-carbon and more energy-efficient world.