At the new Reynolds Landing community in suburban Birmingham, Alabama Power is partnering with a local developer, technology vendors and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory to create a state–of–the–art "smart" neighborhood.
Featuring emerging energy–efficient materials, appliances and a community-scale microgrid, the community is a research and demonstration project focused on how cutting–edge technologies will help homes function more efficiently while providing more convenience to homeowners, and how advanced communities will impact the electric grid. Information from the homes, distributed generation and other systems will help determine which programs and services provide the best solutions for customers.
Reynolds Landing is powered both by the traditional electric grid, as well as a community–scale power system called a "microgrid," which is composed of solar panels, battery storage and back–up generation. With the capacity to generate more than 600,000 kilowatt hours of energy annually, the microgrid can potentially power the entire community, if needed.
On Atlanta's Upper West Side, Georgia Power is creating a similar townhome community, Altus at the Quarter, where power from the grid is supplemented by rooftop solar installations and in–home battery storage.
Each of these real-world research and development projects provides insight into the effectiveness of emerging energy technologies and how high–performance homes will be built in the future.
