The Dept. of Energy has selected 32 projects to receive a total of $620 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds to advance and evaluate new technologies to make the nation's electricity grid more effective. The DOE funding will be complemented by more than $1 billion in private-sector matching funds for those projects.
The "smart grid" funding awards, announced Nov. 24, include energy-storage pilot projects, as well as plans that involve smart metering and distribution and transmission monitoring equipment. If the demonstration projects prove the worth of the technologies, DOE says they will lead to more extensive applications around the U.S.