Smart Grid in Asia Pacific: Potential,Opportunities, and Growth

Asia-Pacific is consider one of the most dynamic and the fastest growing region in the world. With over quarter of the world population located in this part, and most of the countries still in development stages, there is huge growth potential in almost all segments. The hyper- growth is fueling the demand for more energy, which in turn is creating significant market opportunities for clean-tech market. According recent report, published by the leading clean tech market intelligence firm PikeResearch, Smart Grid investment in Asia Pacific is set to reach $171.3 billion by 2017. The report notes that for every country the drivers for Smart Grid implementation are significantly different.

According to senior analyst, Andy Bai, "Chinese market players believe that the construction of a smart grid is a key part of economic growth and enhancing the ability to optimize energy allocation, including the integration of new generation capacity from both renewable and fossil fuel sources.  Japan’s electric utilities have been investing huge amounts of capital in power infrastructure, resulting in advanced capabilities in transmission infrastructure and power delivery services; however, the tragic March 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and resulting Fukushima nuclear accident are likely to redefine not only Japan’s smart grid planning, but perhaps the direction of the nation’s utility industry.  Korea seeks to leverage its technology leadership in the IT and communications space to form an advanced smart grid infrastructure within the country, as well as an opportunity to export smart grid technologies around the world.  Significant and influential smart grid projects are also underway in Australia, India, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region.” The analyst further adds, the transmission upgrades, Distribution Automation, and Advanced Metering Infrastructure will capture majority of the market with each segment having share of 54%, 18%, and 15% respectively". 

The report provides in-depth analysis for market drivers, business models and applications, technology issues,  and government policy within Asia-Pacific Region. The study covers detailed forecast by application for China, India, Korea, Australia, Japan, and the ASEAN region. Overall, the study addresses following key questions. 

Key Questions Addressed

• What are the key market drivers for smart grid development in each Asia Pacific market?
• Which business models are being employed for APAC smart grid deployments? How are these similar to other models found around the world, and how do they differ?
• Who are the key industry players influencing the development of APAC smart grid initiatives? Are there opportunities for additional participants to enter the market?
• For each country, what is the size of the market opportunity within each smart grid application segment?
• What are the key technology issues facing smart grid industry players in each market?

What is In Store for Grids?

23 billion dollars! This will be the estimated cost of electricity distribution losses in India by 2014. The improvements that our electricity distribution grids need to put in — administrative and technological— cannot be underestimated. Elsewhere on our grids, problems like congestion persist. As the appetite of the country to consume more electricity increases and the trend for interstate open access increases, there will be increased pressure on our grid infrastructure in future.

There will be new challenges to which the electricity grids in future will have to live up. India aspires to generate a sixth of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020. Major renewable energy sources like wind power generates infirm power and therefore introduces variations in the electricity grid. Currently, since the generation of electricity from renewable sources, primarily wind energy is very low- around 5 per cent therefore it poses no challenge. But in future when this share increases, it will gradually start posing challenges of grid management.

And I must also mention some other possible scenarios which can further pose more challenges to our grid infrastructure- Electric Cars. If electric cars do penetrate sizably by the end of the next decade they will require our grid to be even smarter. India has announced policy mission for electric cars All these challenges not only require more investments into our electricity grid, to add more capacity but more importantly we need to make this capacity Smart grid is currently a term used to describe a number of new features that are being envisaged in future grids to cope up with the various future challenges.Yet it is important to see in one new interesting way in which the grids of future may transform- energy storage. The grids currently do not store energy through their networks. Power storage currently is a very costly option and it makes little sense for power storage, as both the losses involved in the power storage and the capital cost of power storage is significant But can the bets that are currently placed on innovations in power storage technology change that? If breakthrough storage technologies emerge then yes and the dice is probably loaded for that outcome.A majority of cleantech industry believes that battery is perhaps the most important opportunity area based on a recent survey. From thin film batteries next generation batteries. All those early signs of progress are out there already. In that case the grids of future will not only transmit power but they will also store power intermittently or provide extensive interface to power storage devices. Advances in the energy storage technology will advance many other clean technologies like electric vehicles and even allow renewable energy sources to supply energy more reliably. But what that will do to our grid is even more exciting. It is very likely that new grid management technologies that store power within the distribution networks will come up. This will allow distribution companies great flexibility in power distribution. For example it is possible that distribution companies may draw power during the afternoon slot and store the power within their distribution grid... .. Continue

Courtesy : Yash Saxena (www.businessworld.in)

ADB provides $759 million loans for Smart Grid development in India

The Asian Development Bank will invest $750 million in India for Smart Grid development. The project will enable bulk transfer of 3,000 MW of electricity from independent power producers of Chhatisgarh state to the areas of north India, including national capitol region Delhi, where the demand is high.  For this, 1300 km inter-regional transmission line will be established using 800 KV High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) line, which is key driver for Smart Grid development. 

"Strengthening the inter-regional HVDC transmission network will promote open access to power supply, increase investment in both generation and distribution, help integrate the electricity market and encourage power trading and competitive electricity prices," said Kaoru Ogino, Senior Energy Specialist in ADB's South Asia Department. 

The ADB funds will be available to Government owned PowerGrid Corporation India Ltd (PGCIL), which is India's largest power transmission and distribution company. PowerGrid plans to invest $22 by 2017 to double its transmission network. The energy infrastructure is unable to match India's growing energy demands, according to 2010 data, in India there is 12% peak power shortage. Some state are able generate more power,however due to lack of inter-regional transmission link are unable to move electricity to power deficient regions. ADB is going to provide $500 million as sovereign-guaranteed  loans and $ 250 million as non-sovereign corporate loans. The total project cost is $2.25 billion and is expected to be completed by 2017. 

ZTE Corp plans to enter in Indian Smart Grid Market

Chinese telecom major ZTE corp recently announced they will be providing range of Smart Grid solutions to address the needs of  power sector in India. It is well know fact that India has acute shortage of power, there are more than 100,000 + villages yet to be electrified, furthermore, brown-out & black-outs are common and T & D losses are high. To address this issues, Government has taken series of measures, one among them is implementation of Smart Grid technologies. Which represent huge market opportunities for both Indian as well as foreign companies. The Smart grid solution market in India is set to reach $10 billion in next 5 years.

ZTE corp is in advance negotiation with Power Grid Corporation India (PGCIL) to offer its range of Smart Grid solutions. The second largest Chinese telecom equipment maker plans to offer end-to-end smart gird solutions like smart meters, transmission networks, cloud computing solutions, video conferencing, video surveillance, along with next generation contact center, which will enhance power efficiency. "The demand for power in India is far outstripping supply and a significant percentage of power generated is lost during transmission due to which power generation & distribution companies are focusing on adopting efficiency enhancement solutions," ZTE India CEO Cui Liangjun said. The company headquartered in Shenzhen, China, has entered in partnership with system integrators and infrastructure vendors like Dongfang Electronics and TCIL to jointly offer this solution to power distribution and power generation companies.