Energy TechnologiesChicago may be known as the windy city, but Texas is increasingly becoming the wind-powered state. With the largest wind-generation capacity in the country and wind speedsreaching 80 miles per hour in some areas, Texas is increasingly building and operating wind turbines to power the grid. Smart grid technologies that could make wind more dispatchable were investigated by the 1 ERCOT: Texas Wind Provided Nearly 11% Of Electricity For 2014, Jan. 28, 2015, Center for the Commercialization of Electric Technologies (CCET), located in Austin, Texas.
Seven technologies (summarized in Table 1) were picked in response to the changing mix of generation in Texas. Synchrophasors increase wide area situational awareness of the grid. To protect these data gathering assets and their communications, vendors Intel/McAfee3 deployed cyber security protection schemes. Together with the fleet V2G effort, these three research areas improved system frequency control.