In 2001, the U.S. Department of Energy issued its National Energy Policy based on the recommendations of a task force led by Vice-President Dick Cheney. The comprehensive report called for the implementation of 21st-century technology to improve America’s aging energy infrastructure with the ultimate goal of providing more reliable and affordable electricity to all Americans. As one response to issuance of that policy, the broad-scale Energy Policy Act of 2005 was passed, focusing on expanding energy production, providing incentives to encourage conservation and promoting certain “Smart Grid” initiatives to improve the reliability and efficiency of energy services.

Legislators and regulators alike are focused on the national energy priority of electric network modernization. While electric distribution networks are large and complex, they have evolved little since their creation more than a hundred years ago. Today’s networks face multiple challenges: demand for power continues to increase, transmission systems are plagued by capacity constraints, and government officials have labeled electric networks as leading terrorist targets. A major transmission grid disruption, such as the widespread outage which occurred throughout the Northeastern U.S. in August 2003, can cost hundreds of billions of dollars in lost economic output.

While transmission bottlenecks are an issue, there also are constraints in local electric distribution networks, which extend from the utility substation to the on-premise electric meter. Electric distribution utilities today have limited means to monitor the distribution network. Their electric networks are focused on delivering power to the end user and they have no way of ensuring that power actually has been delivered. The very fact that these utilities still deploy armies of meter readers to tabulate energy consumption and first learn of power outages from customer telephone calls suggests that this country lacks a true 21 st-century electric distribution network.

From a functional standpoint, CURRENT Smart Grid Services work as follows: BPL network devices measure and collect information from meters, transformers, secondary lines and scores of other devices comprising the local distribution network and then transmit this information to a central site where proprietary CURRENT systems enable utilities to analyze real-time data to dramatically increase efficiency and realize more reliable and efficient energy delivery. This network will not only link devices on the grid, but it also will enable end users to remotely control a myriad of devices in the home via an Internet connection.