Ahead of Sustainability Symposium 2023: The Great Conversion, U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich describes how quickly the electric grid is changing, pointing to new battery chemistries, power flow controls and dynamic line ratings as sources of both capacity and optimism.
00:00:03:28 - 00:00:39:24
Senator Martin Heinrich: Our grid is going to change very rapidly in the next couple of decades, to be able to really solve the challenges that we have and also just make homes better, healthier, more comfortable. It's fun right now to watch just how much change and how much research and development is happening. Capital is flowing into a lot of these things at a rate that we haven't seen in the past, but I'm really excited about some of the new storage technologies and new chemistries coming out.
00:00:39:26 - 00:01:10:07
Senator Martin Heinrich: You know, some of the stories around ion air batteries, for example, those are not going to be the things that solve transportation electrification, but they're going to be huge on the grid. So the pace of innovation right now really is incredible. And just some of the innovations around things like power flow controls and just how we use data, dynamic line ratings are going to change the amount of energy that we can put over the existing grid while we work on on changing the grid and upgrading the grid.
00:01:10:13 - 00:01:27:04
Senator Martin Heinrich: But more importantly, people need hope. And so you have to have an optimistic vision of where to go. And I think the electrification caucus, as we find those new solutions, the better mousetraps for how to power our world. That gives people hope.