The Pecan Street Project – a demonstration “smart grid” energy system in the emerging Mueller development – was featured on the PBS NewsHour.
Charles Upshaw, a mechanical engineering graduate student working on the project, told StateImpact Texas the initiative is ”a collaboration between the University of Texas, the City of Austin, Austin Energy and a bunch of companies. In order to really test, and have a real world kind of experiment with high density residential solar, they have offered additional incentives to the [Mueller homeowners] on top of the Austin energy rebate and the federal rebate, so the people in Mueller have an opportunity to get solar really cheaply.”
In exchange, the homes plug in to the energy grid to help test new solar energy distribution systems. As Pecan Street Project executive director Brewster McCracken tells the Newshour, “This is real similar to a pharmaceutical clinical trial's effort, but it's on electricity and consumer electronics.”
You can watch the clip, "In Austin, Charged up About Smart Power" on the NewsHour website.
