The greatest movements accelerate change, whether economic or political, because they answer a certain call in society. We want it, even though we may not know it, and a smart thinker fulfills that desire.
But such movements usually die or fade out because they don’t evolve with the times or recognize change is a’coming. Think Blockbuster, Lehman Brothers, Woolworth, the Whig party.
Microgrids are not a company, but they are part of a movement. They serve certain needs for resiliency, sustainability and efficiency. Over coming decades, the mission might change and the movement needs to be ready and adaptive.
I was struck by a quote from a company leader in the story by Kathy Hitchens recently on a collaboration between ProtoGen and the Idaho National Laboratory to develop a microgrid resilience corridor in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Microgrids too often focus on internal benefit elements and don’t stretch outward to find new pathways of scalability, to paraphrase ProtoGen President Kevin Wright.
He says it much better than I, and you can find the quote in the story. We also see new thinking in an expansion of Maryland’s resilience and microgrid investment objectives. We find it fortunate and timely that our Microgrid 2024 Conference will be April 22-24 in Maryland at the Baltimore Marriott Waterfront.
Microgrids are clearly an answer to current and future needs in how both power distribution and the economy are going to electrify and adapt to become less pollutive and hopefully more profitable. In moving forward, of course, it’s always smart to be cognizant of history and know that the future requires revolution in evolution, expanding range in change. Time has proven this over and over again.
