Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2023 | 8:45 p.m.
The U.S. Department of Energy plans to give $2 million in research funding to NV Energy, the electric utility with 1.5 million customers throughout the state, as part of an effort to modernize and strengthen the energy grid nationwide.
The DOE gave a total of $8.4 million to a total of four applicants that are researching grid enhancing technologies, improvements that would lower operating costs by maximizing transmission. NV Energy will spend the funds on a three-year study of new grid enhancing technologies with help from the University of Nevada, Reno.
“NV Energy is proud to be chosen for this award and our teams are already working to implement these funds to be able to leverage additional real-time capacity of transmission lines through sensor and engineering enhancements,” Josh Langdon, NV Energy Vice President of Transmission, said in a press release.
NV Energy will research existing power lines' capacity and how new tech could improve and expand it, especially for renewable energy sources. The project will also study how to use fewer sensors along lines by placing them more strategically. The project’s official title is “Direct and Indirect Contact DLR Technologies; Digital Twin Technologies for Increasing Transmission Capacity and Reducing Congestion Without Reconductoring,” according to a DOE press release.
$6.8 million came from the DOE’s Office of Electricity and the remaining $1.5 million came from the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
Gene Rodrigues, Assistant Secretary for Electricity, said the department’s goal is to modernize the country’s electricity grid and reach the Biden Administration’s goal of 100% clean energy by 2035.
“Modernization will integrate grid-enhancing technologies into our existing system and result in better grid performance, stability, and affordability,” he said in a press release.
Other funding recipients include Georgia Tech Research Corporation, Pitch Aeronautics Inc. in Boise, Idaho and the University of Connecticut.
