如何避免“桑迪”式瘫痪重演

    分布式发电所采用的技术包括天然气发电以及地热、太阳能等可再生能源发电，可根据条件就地采用不同的发电技术。就地发电意味着即便电网出现故障，设备还可以自行紧急发电。比如在“桑迪”飓风这样的灾难中，这种应急发电对医院和公寓楼将发挥极大的作用。

    包括通用电器（GE）、凯普斯通涡轮公司（Capstone Turbine）和布鲁姆能源（Bloom Energy）在内的许多公司都可以提供就地发电的技术。比如布鲁姆能源公司的天然气发电箱就被谷歌和其它数据中心管理公司所采用，以提供紧急备用电力。此外，还有许多公司正在与建筑物的所有人一道，评估能源使用情况，像约翰逊控制公司（Johnson Controls）、仲量联行（Jones Lang Lasalle）和CBRE等公司也都有自己的方案。

    许多国家已经把分布式发电系统整合到了主要电网中。比如欧盟根据“第五框架计划”已经投资了大约7,000万欧元，用于发展本地区的电网和岛屿电网的分布式发电系统、电力输送、能源存储以及高温超导体等项目，以确保电网安全。八家领先的欧洲电力公司已经联手发起了大规模的分布式发电系统的部署，美国也不应该落于人后。

    美国的交通系统同样漏洞百出，导致过去几周内，生产力损失达数十亿美元。虽然纽交所和纳斯达克采用电子交易，但是由于交易员们根本没法到达办公室，因此两大交易所也不得不停盘了——这可不是21世纪的交通系统应该有的样子。

    我们可以采取以下三个措施，避免再次遭受交通瘫痪。

（１）在加油站安装发电机

    我们的交通网络也严重依赖那个不可靠的电网，因此我们现在应该投资给加油站安装发电机，为我们的交通网络提供备用电力。如果没有电力驱动加油泵，加油站就毫无用处了。既然是加油站，就肯定有足够的柴油能用于发电。

    如果加油站不想急着采购发电机，一旦灾难发生，它们也可以从租赁公司租用发电机。赫兹设备租赁公司（Hertz Equipment Rental）和联合租赁公司（United Rental）就可以提供这样的服务。（披露：笔者本人为赫兹公司提供电动汽车方面的咨询服务，所以很了解他们的设备租赁部门——许多楼宇的业主还不知道，像赫兹公司这种供应商可以向他们提供备用电源。）

    Distributed generation includes a range of technologies from natural gas in a combined heat and power setup to renewables such as geothermal or solar. Different power generation technologies can be combined right onsite. Having onsite power means that even if the grid goes down, the facility can still maintain emergency systems. This would have been of immense help for hospitals and apartment buildings that lost power during Sandy.

    A number of companies supply the technology for onsite generation including GE (GE), Capstone Turbine (CPST) and Bloom Energy. Bloom natural gas boxes are used by Google (GOOG) and other data center managers to provide immediate fail-over backup. A number of companies are working with building owners to assess their energy usage and options including Johnson Controls (JCI), Jones Lang Lasalle (JLL) and CBRE (CBE).

    Dozens of countries already have distributed generation systems integrated into the main grid. The European Union, in conjunction with the Fifth Framework Program has invested about 70 million Euros in distributed generation systems, electricity transmission, energy storage, and high temperature superconductors for power supply in regional local and island grids. Eight leading European energy utility companies have joined forces for a massive deployment of DGS -- we shouldn't stay behind.

    Our transportation system is also riddled with single points of failure that caused billions of dollars in productivity loss just in the last few weeks. Even though the NYSE and NASDAQ work with electronic trading they had to be closed for business since the traders were not able to make it to their offices—this is not a 21st century transportation system.

    Here are three actions we can take to prevent the transport meltdown we experienced:

Add generators to filling stations

    We should invest now in generators at filling stations to provide back-up power for our transportation network, which is dependent on our unreliable power grid. Filling stations are useless without electricity to power the pumps. Of all places, filling stations have enough diesel fuel to keep a generator going to power the pumps.

    If gas stations want to hold off on purchasing a generator they can contract now with a generator rental company to supply one in case of disaster. Hertz Equipment Rental (HTZ) and United Rental (URI) are two such providers. (Full disclosure: I advise Hertz on EVs and learned about their equipment rental division – many building owners still do not know that these suppliers can outfit them with backup power.)