Tom Raftery of Greenmonk asks "What if electricity were like the Internet?" that is, what if electrical transmission grids distributed electricity in much the same way as the Internet replaced contiguous point-to-point communication circuits (POTS) with communications transmitted via packets that can be routed separately, though different paths, and reassembled at the intended reception point, thus bypassing or supplementing trouble spots.

Tom posits various scenarios, such as excess wind energy generated at night in one region being used to power the grid in another region that is at peak demand, and a read/write electrical grid, where consumers of electricity can also be producers. Tom concludes by asking

What if most of the technologies to make this happen already existed? How long will it be before the utilities embrace the Internet model in the same way the Internet is jumping on the utility model?
-- Tom Raftery on Greenmonk: The Blog in "What if electricity were like the Internet?"

And actually, as I'm sure Tom knows, much of this technology does exist today, either in production or in a nascent form. There are many smart grid companies forming, mostly selling instrumented (wired, Zigbee, WiBee or other remote feedback technologies) meters that can help either consumers or utility companies monitor or regulate load. In many countries, including the USA, one can run their meter "backwards" if they have power generation capacity where they normally consume electricity, such as photovoltaics, and generate more electricity than they use.

There are however physical limitations to this. Losses over the power lines will likely prevent transmitting or selling electricity half-way around the world. Being an open minded scientist at heart, I hope to see these limitations overcome (high-temperature superconductors maybe). Even given these limitations, better distribution and retransmission of electricity is certainly possible. For example, Microsoft and Google both have recently announced predictive traffic routing for their driving map/direction services. Similar concepts can be applied to the electrical grid anticipate and redistribute power to anticipate loads and reduce generation costs.

More local generation of power (thank you, Tesla, and future examples such as adaptiveARC, coupled with Smart Grids, will definitely bring the world closer to Tom's vision.

I have to run for my meeting and weekly lunch with Earl of Tigo Energy. I'll update links here later.