Industrial Automation

energy prices have dropped ..
Maybe where you are.
Petrol prices in the UK are creeping up again...profitteering bastards.
Gas and Electric prices barely fell.
Del

Yes.

Because in the longer term, market share will otherwise transfer to organisations that are doing better.

I agree with Del if you look around the US oil prices have risen about 82%, and utility company's want to raise their rates for various reasons. Its just hard to sell to companies who's resources were drained due to the past economic problems. I do believe the market will prick back up as we see energy pricing raise again.

The whole thing reminds me of the kind of things we saw in the "Information Age" or at the time in which the first personal computers arrived on the scene (circa 1979).

Now we are entering the "Energy Age" and the big utility suppliers are kind of like the big computing centers were in the 1970's. They thought (like IBM) that nobody could touch them because they were way out there, ahead of the rest of the world. And for the most part, they were right.

Then along came Bill Gates with the answer to the problem. He provided an operating system for the little computers and the rest is history. I expect to see a similar development for the little guy which will be scooped up by businesses everywhere, just like the personal computer business did. Why not? History doesn't repeat itself, historians just repeat each other!

They call it "distributed generation", where there are local power sources in addition to the large utility power sources. There are many advantages to distributed generation when considering all of the disasters that have or could happen to interrupt the electric grid. This is kinda "deja vu all over again", before the electric grid each little town had it's own generating plant, some still do, this is distributed generation.

Back-up power or standby generators could become distributed generation, usually in a cogeneration application where steam, hot water, and electricity are produced concurrently from the same fuel using a CT or diesel usually, the best can also use the hot air from the exhaust for maximum efficiency. Fuel price is a big determining factor. Making the same match burn twice, using the heat and light from the flame.

Distributed generation is solar (PV), wind, wave power, usually ranging from hundreds of watts to a few megawatts.