BONITA SPRINGS, Fla. — At the recent Danfoss EnVisioneering Symposium, senior HVACR industry executives and government and industry officials explored the broad potential of the smart grid. Smart grid is a term used to describe the transformation of the existing U.S. electrical power and wiring system into a technologically advanced system that will allow for electronic communication across the entire power grid. At the symposium, speakers discussed the impact of the smart grid on the challenges faced by U.S. buildings and building systems.
Christopher Irwin, smart grid standards and operability coordinator for the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, opened the symposium and underscored that HVAC manufacturers can impact the smart grid. “Equipment manufacturers know best how to optimize energy — and are most responsive to how it can be linked to the grid. Engineers need to design systems that take into consideration how they can be integrated into a whole building system and applied to a smart grid.”