Task force targets consumer education

New groups aim to educate consumers about the smart grid.

The term “smart grid” gets tossed around a lot, but when it comes to explaining what it means to consumers, a lack of early education efforts is causing headaches for some utilities. That’s something that a host of companies are trying to remedy, though.

In late June, Pacific Gas and Electric (NYSE: PCG), along with the city of San Jose and the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, a policy research nonprofit, announced that they were partnering to form the Silicon Valley Smart Grid Task Force. Funded by PG&E, the task force includes member companies Oracle (Nasdaq: ORCL), Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO), Silver Spring Networks and others, and plans to focus on public education and generating an economic analysis of the impacts of smart grid initiatives. While the task force plans to focus on California, the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative launched in early 2010, and is targeting similar goals on a nationwide scale.

In California, PG&E has faced consumer complaints that its smart meters have resulted in too-high electric bills, while San Francisco’s city attorney has sought to halt smart meter installation pending an investigation of their accuracy. In Maryland, state energy regulators denied an $835 million smart meter project proposed by Baltimore Gas and Electric (NYSE: CEG), though BG&E had already won a $200 million Department of Energy grant, citing high prices and unclear benefits.

About 70 percent of Americans are unfamiliar with the term “smart grid,” according to a 2010 survey by research firm EcoAlign. One of the reasons that presents such a problem is that grid upgrades will take massive capital investments, some of which will be reflected in electric rates, says Bob Hines vice president of the San Jose-based Silicon Valley Leadership Council, while public understanding is also key to the success of time-of-use pricing programs.

“The challenge in smart grid is that there’s not a lot of data out there,” Hines says. “There’s lingering confusion about what smart grid is.”