GridSTAR Opening

I just returned from the grand opening of the GridSTAR center at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. This center was created by Penn State and the Department of Energy as a combined education and research center for smart energy grids.  Their first demonstration is this model home.  It both demonstrates a number of smart grid technologies as well as providing a training center for people to develop the skills required to work on these new systems.  The smart home includes three buildings.  The house itself demonstrates systems ranging from solar panels to radiant heat.  The learning center in back has a number of electrical systems installed inside that can be used for training.  The third building contains an energy storage system that is hooked into the Navy Yard grid.

They also showed cool systems  like this solar-powered electric car charger...

and this electric motorcycle.

Over the longer term, GridSTAR will use the entire Navy Yard as a testbed for smart energy technologies.  Given the wide range of businesses there, ranging from a major shipbuilder to the headquarters of Urban Outfitters, the Navy Yard should be a great place to develop new smart enertg grid solutions.