The Grid: Electrical Infrastructure for a New Era

by Gretchen Bakke

the main reason given by voters for their vote against the utility was a lack of choice regarding generation. Whatever they thought about the SmartGridCity, what made them really angry was the utility’s unwillingness to integrate more wind power. Val, however, has different concerns. She wants her house to manage itself. She wants it to make electricity, store it, and use it without her having to do much more than punch into her smart phone, DISHES WASHED BY 5 P.M. and MAKE SURE THE CAR IS CHARGED BY 7. The coming “Internet of Things,” of which smart phones, smart appliances, smart meters, and electric cars are all integral parts (it is coming, by the way, it just hasn’t quite arrived yet), is in many ways the continuation of an emancipation project that began in the 1930s to free women from the drudgery of household work by electrifying common appliances. The laundry line became the electric clothes dryer, the washboard became the electric washing machine, the icebox became the refrigerator, the kettle on the stove for the weekly bath became the electric hot water heater, the mangle became the electric iron, and so on and so forth.