Great news today in the battle to secure our energy independence: $3.4 billion dollars in stimulus funding will be used for the expansion of our nation’s “smart” grid.

America’s electrical grid is a dinosaur in a digital world. A “smart” grid is not your typical point-to-point power system – it actually allows power generated from anywhere (a home with solar panels, a farm that captures biofuels) to be uploaded onto the grid, letting you sell electricity back to the grid. And and allows consumers to time their use of energy to minimize both generation needs and cost. For example, smart grid technology will let you time when your plug-in hybrid charges itself based on when electricity is cheapest and the technology producing it is the cleanest.

This has a two-fold benefit for our energy security: By spreading the ability to generate power among more, smaller sources, we guard against the potential for a single event — a terrorist strike or natural disaster for example — to completely disrupt our power supply.

Secondly, the “smart” grid itself is required for us to maximize our renewable energy potential by allowing individuals the choice to equip their homes and businesses with alternative energy generatorsand to sell any excesses back to other users. This will help decrease our dependence on fossil fuels, much of which we purchase from states whose interests run contrary to our own.

Read more about the announcement.

Matt Oberhoffner is an Operation Free Field Director.

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