The Future of Microgrids – Anna Hermansen, Linux Foundation Research

This is Techstrong tv. Hi, I'm Bonnie Schneider with the Techstrong Group, and joining me now is Anna Hermanson, ecosystem Manager for Lennox Foundation Research. And today we're going to explore the pivotal role of open source technology in the field of micro grids.

Anna, thanks for joining us. Thanks very much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Well, I'd love to hear more about your background and how you got involved in this project. Yeah, so in, um, I started at the Linux Foundation about eight months ago, and I started at the, at the foundation with this project already kind of conceived, but, um, the, we had a sponsor from Future Way who came to us and said, you know, we wanna know more about what's happening in the microgrid space, particularly when it comes to the open source developments. You know, whether that's, are there open standards?

Are there, is there open software being developed? Um, and how can we propel this area forward? Um, because we know that open source provides a lot of innovative and, um, economically friendly solutions around technology development.

And so that was kind of the, the, the starting point of this research project. And we wanted to ask the question, um, you know, what, what is the state of open source in the microgrid sector? What are some barriers to adoption?

And, and also what can open source, uh, try to solve in this area? What are the issues that this, this industry is facing right now? Um, and this really comes from an impetus around, uh, you know, energy transformation and how do we build out renewable systems that are also more reliable, um, that are more democratizing and that support the energy grid that we're looking at as we move forward, um, in this century.

That's, that's a good point to kind of modernizing for what we need. Uh, now, um, talking about microgrids, can you kind of, uh, break down a little bit more about microgrids and, and also explain the challenges that they face and, and the obstacles that have impeded their growth and maybe what you're working on now to, to change that? Yeah, absolutely.

So just a, a quick, uh, definition of what a microgrid is. Uh, it's a small scale, localized energy grid that generates and distributes energy in that kind of smaller ecosystem. Um, it can also be connected to a larger utility grid, but it typically is independent of that grid and can operate either in island mode where it's not connected or in an ener in a grid connected mode.

Um, it's made up of a centralized controller, which is plugged into the energy, uh, sources, you know, solar, um, wind, and then also a battery that can store, especially when you have energy sources such as solar, um, that is more kind of intermittent, so a battery that stores that energy. And then it also has that connection to the, to the larger grid. Um, so microgrids are kind of the, um, a solution around how to build out these more kind of independent localized energy systems.

Um, so that's what, that's what a microgrid is. Um, can you repeat your follow up questions? Yeah.

Just wanted to talk about with what the role of, uh, open, well, I kind of, this actually moves into my next part about open source opportunities and your research that you're doing related to microgrids. So maybe we can talk about that. Sure.

Yeah. So the, the microgrids sector is, is, um, really ballooning right now with more interest in energy resiliency, whether that's from an individual who can access renewable energy, um, who might want to build out a charging station in their home, all the way up to governments who, you know, given the energy crisis that was experienced in, particularly in Europe, you know, governments looking for more resiliency around energy and, um, um, other kind of corporations that don't want to rely on a larger grid that might have shortages. And so, um, the, the microgrid sector is really growing, but it is still nascent.

And particularly in the open source space, there is not a lot of, um, open source development in the space. In our research, we identified 20 open source projects and built out a landscape, which you can access in our report. Um, but there's, there's still a lot of growth in this space.

I think particularly when it comes to microgrids, some bigger challenges, uh, surface around incumbent resistance to the microgrids technology. You know, we have these large players, these large utilities that, um, have quite a large space in this, in this energy sector. And, and for them there are, there's economic uncertainty and hurdles around, um, implementing microgrids and working with microgrids.

Um, there's also some, you know, there's a lot of fragmentation in this space. Microgrids, there are so many different pieces to a microgrid, the hardware, the software, um, even standards around, around microgrids and, and how it connects to other kind of parts of the energy sector and energy grid. So, um, there's a lot of fragmentation in that.

Um, you know, there's also a large learning curve to microgrids. There's, um, concerns around how to actually implement, what is a microgrid, what are all the pieces that go into it? And so, uh, open source represents opportunities around building out more modular pieces of microgrids, having these kind of building blocks where you can develop, um, you know, software on or other pieces on top of what's already been created in the, in an open source space.

Um, and open source. Another big, uh, component of open source is the ethos around collaboration consensus. And that's really needed in the, in a space where you do see a lot of fragmentation.

That's what I was going to ask you about the collaboration with future y uh, LF Energy and International Futures. Can you talk about this partnership and what the mission, how, how contributes to your overall mission? Yeah, absolutely.

So the, the f uh, future way came in with the kind of concept around this research project. And, um, we partnered with LF Energy, given their expertise in this area and their ability to really connect us to other stakeholders that have, um, opinions and perspectives to give to this research. And then we partnered, as you said, with Intentional Futures as they helped us build out a really rigorous, uh, qualitative report.

They conducted the interviews and they did the, the research. The team also consisted of other subject matter experts. We had Peter Asus come on that was, he's a, a big player in the, um, uh, in the, um, in the Alaska area in microgrids.

And so we had this, this really large group of, of collaborators come around this project. And I think, you know, even the way that that lf LF and LF Research works is at that basis level of, of collaboration and consensus. And so that's, that's really what we saw in this project as well, where we had these subject matter experts come in, provide ex experience and advice, and we, we built out this report where we all kind of collaborated on and, and worked on.

So, so yeah, collaboration was definitely baked into this report, and it also became a pretty key finding of our research is that collaboration layer is, is, is missing in this microgrid space and, um, is, is really important and which is why open source represents such an Opportunity. And in the general energy sector, uh, where do you think open source with microgrids, where does that fit in, um, in the industry? Well, I was, I just presented this fi these findings at, uh, LF Energy Summit in Europe.

And, um, it's clear that this open source concept is growing in the energy sector in general. And, um, it's really valuable, you know, from across from software and hardware to governments to other kinda stakeholders, utilities, operators in this space. Um, you know, to bring all of those groups together, not just in microgrids, but generally in the energy sector, you know, uh, decarbonization and climate change are really big issues.

And, and, and, you know, having all of these stakeholders come together and then not necessarily, you know, reinvent the wheel, but to, to produce outcomes that can build off of these, these building blocks, these mod modular pieces, um, is a really, is a really beneficial way of looking at, um, these issues that face the energy sector right now. And, um, yeah, I think, I think the microgrids at this conference, the microgrids report that we spoke about, really those, those findings of, of the need for collaboration and, and consensus building really, um, uh, fed into the rest of the conference and was a key topic and, and a lot of the sessions. So I think, I think open source, the, the ethos of open source is really crucial at this point in the energy sector.

And how does open source reduce, uh, financial and techno, and I'm sorry, financial and technical barrier as, um, possibly for micro grids that comes up in the conversation, but, uh, does the adoption of open source help reduce these barriers? Yeah, so, so open source is often seen as a cheaper alternative to proprietary solutions. And so, um, that's not always the case, but as we found in our research, open source provides like kind of modular pieces that, as I was saying before, you can build off of, to avoid reinventing the wheel or recreating new pieces that have already been developed.

And so there's a cost savings and there's also an efficiency or time savings and resource savings in that. Um, and so I think the, the open source there, there's definitely a financial benefit to incorporating more open source into the microgrid space. Open source also has, um, typically a large community around it and a lot of learnings get developed and, and published in this community and best practices.

And so in order to address that, one of those challenges I mentioned earlier, which is the, the learning curve in microgrids, um, you know, building out this kind of informational hub around microgrids through the open source, um, you know, practices of, of publishing and sharing documentation is a really great way to, um, to build up knowledge not just in the developers and, and other kind of, uh, players in the, in the development of microgrids, but also in the education of policymakers and incumbents that are looking at tackling this issue. And, uh, finally as we look ahead, what are some of the emerging trends and technologies that could potentially enhance the potential of microgrids? Yeah, that's a great question.

Uh, one of the findings that we had was that, uh, open data and, and better access to data, um, will help in education and in, in innovation in this space. And so, um, you know, building out infrastructure, uh, and cloud through kind of managing data in, in, uh, sharing microgrids is, is really, um, one way that we could use new technologies. Um, any sort of kinda machine learning around the, um, understanding of how, of how energy is being used, um, will greater enhance a more di uh, will create a more dynamic demand response when it comes to, um, uh, producing energy, but also distributing energy as microgrids connect to larger grids.

Um, and, um, I think also the, I mean the iot space and kind of the, um, the different, uh, technologies needed to sense kind of what, what is happening in, cuz micro grids are a, a physical, tangible, um, you know, hardware for the most part and, and components. So having IOTs to sense kind of what's happening in the grid, um, is, is another way that, I mean, it's, it's all kind of connected to different technologies and, and they're, they're so, they're so fragmented and there's, there's so many pieces to it that, um, there's definitely a lot of space for, for technological growth in the microgrid sector. Excellent.

Well, thank you Anna Hermanson, ecosystem manager of the Linux Foundation Research. That was really interesting and I'm sure our audience will, uh, enjoy learning more about microgrids and the work that you're doing. So thank you.

Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I'd love to point everyone towards our report on the Linux Foundation page under our latest research. So thanks very much.

Okay, Great. Yes, though, we'll definitely include that. Thank you.

Alright, well stay with us. We'll have a lot more coming up on Techstrong tv.