Originally Posted by joelpalmer
we'd be better off getting away frmo the whole grid concept. as long as we keep trying to tie every house and business together and feed one source of energy to them we'll be stuck with giant power plants. a better system would involve individual homes/buildings using the apropriate power for their area/need, whether that be solar, wind, tidal, geothermal...
but as long as most people want cars all of this is for naught
Ah, but this is not a good system for people who don't have a steady source of natural energy. Take most of Canada for example, we get lots of sun in the summer, but in the winter it's crazy cold. Not so good for solar in the winter! A grid system is needed to bring power to areas that can't generate as much as others.
What the grids need however, is redundancy. A single breakdown of one substation or plant should not shut down the whole network in some crazy cascade (like the August blackout... remember that?) A smart grid could shift power from all parts of the country (or at least surrounding states) to areas that need more. And, smaller power generators (like a solar farm) could be tied into the grid to supply power to a large area.