Superhero Needed: DG, an energy option in search of P.R.

Some argue that Distributed Generation (DG) of electricity is flawed and not worth pursuing because it can never replace the production capacity of "the grid." Others argue that the flaw with DG is that it lacks a visible Superhero as its representative. I'm of the latter type. DG needs a popular Superhero to boost its visibility.

I favor the latter argument not only because the former is itself based on a flawed premise - DG advocates don't actually claim it could replace the capacity of the grid, as if the case at hand was either/or, either full-on centralized grid production and distribution (generally coal) or full-on DG, with locally generated electricity sources - but because I think some decentralized, renewably inclined Superhero is in the making, somewhere out there. Maybe she or he is Dutch or Swedish or something Scandinavian. Or maybe Canadian. Who knows. I'm wide open with this.

DG, as it happens, and as defined by the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) part of the U.S. Dept. Of Energy, is a system of "small, modular electricity generators sited close to the customer load [which] can enable utilities to defer or eliminate costly investments in transmission and distribution (T&D) system upgrades, and provide customers with better quality, more reliable energy supplies and a cleaner environment." These consist of, for example (from the EERE site again): wind, solar, biomass, fuel cells, gas microturbines, hydrogen, combined heat and power, and hybrid power systems. (Here's Colorado -and click here to open a map of Wind Power in Colorado; here's California; here's one from the UK government)

One goal is "net metering," where you connect to the grid, and switch to and fro: when you have more energy than you need, you can add it back to the grid; when you don't have enough, you can draw from the grid. It's an enormous technical challenge. And it's also an enormous political and cultural challenge. But people are working on it, just as we should be and are working on a host of possible solutions. But if there was a suitable Superhero as its frontispiece or spokesperson/spokes-hero, then I think these problems might be abated.

To me, "the grid" is like a network or a web, and so I could see Spiderman aiding that cause. But for the grid, which is what we have, all those interconnections - which, in cultural terms, are just my cup of tea, like the convergences theme - don't quite hit the spot for energy production. Centralized power production goes against political opportunities for democratic technologies, it goes against safety issues for the ease with which an entire system can be knocked out (accidentally, intentionally, or by a combo of the two, something like long-term infrastructure neglect), and it goes against local cultural rights for imposing reliance on systems from beyond.

But for DG, a better way to go energy-wise, another way to work on our energy problems without going nuclear, the Superhero assignment is a lot tougher. It'd have to be a Superhero that was dispersed, locally based, and flexible.

Obviously, I'm flashing in my mind to a Wonder Twins scenario. As I remember it, one of those two freaks could take the form of any kind of water, and the other was always some animal, right? So we have to do some tweaking. And that should be okay. The Wonder Twins are lame as is anyway. Maybe in a new incarnation for the sake of DG, they could take the form of ecologically sustainable energy units. Wow. That makes it even lamer. Let's back up. Or no, let's ditch the Wonder Twins idea. That was a stupid idea.

Someone proud and fierce. Someone that can be everywhere at once, that can't be knocked out with a single blow. That's what we're going for.

Hell, I was never actually a comic book fan or superhero fan, and it probably shows. But think of the children, people. For crissakes, think of the children for once.