Everyone's focused on how AI spikes energy demand, but what about how it could actually fix the grid?
AI is already capable of:
- Predicting Grid Failures: Quickly identifying which power lines and poles will fail in storms, speeding up maintenance from weeks to just hours.
- Smarter Energy Use: Dynamically shifting demand to when energy is cheap and abundant, significantly easing stress during peak times.
- Lowering Costs: Prioritizing grid upgrades efficiently, saving money by targeting only the most critical areas.
The tech is here, utilities are seeing results, yet outdated regulations keep holding us back.
Genuinely curious to hear your thoughts: What would convince regulators to get serious about adopting AI for grid optimization? Have you seen effective strategies elsewhere?
I pulled a lot of my thoughts from a podcast with Doug Lewin and Mary Cleary, definitely worth the listen: https://www.douglewin.com/p/using-ai-to-strengthen-the-grid-with
Source: EnviroMaverick
4 Comments
You are assuming the utility companies want to spend money to fix the problems.
We already have tools that do this?
AI could do a lot of useful things but most of the energy demand comes from people googling things on ChatGPT.
Stop calling anything algorithmic “AI”…