THE GIST: Businesspeople and homeowners alike are learning that generating their own electricity is cheaper - and more reliable - than buying it from centralized power plants. What Y2K couldn't accomplish, California's energy debacle did: Consumers are getting serious about catalytic fuel cells and microturbine generators that run cleanly on natural gas or propane.
FALSE ALARM: Centralized power forever! Naaah. Political salves will provide short-term relief, but the conventional power grid ignores basic laws of physics: Sending electricity over hundreds of miles of wire is a losing proposition.
EXHIBIT A: Got a laptop? If so, you're familiar with the heat its power converter gives off as it goes from 117 volts of household current to the 12 volts your computer runs on. That heat is energy lost forever. Now visualize the big picture: Huge power plants - perhaps hundreds of miles from your home - burn natural gas to heat water into steam that spins generator turbines; in the process, they vent 40 to 60 percent of the flames' energy into the environment as waste heat. An additional 50 to 60 percent of what's left is lost on the way to your house, as transformers and wires heat up in resistance to the current. "It's a fundamentally flawed system," says inventor Dean Kamen, rumored to have created a super-efficient Stirling engine that could serve as a household generator. "At the time these plants were set up, most were based on natural resources available in the area. But there are better ways to generate more power locally now." All Temperatures Controlled, a California ventilation contractor, gave up the grid in favor of its own gas-powered generator. Michael Holzer, a director at ATC, says, "Brownouts and power surges were costing us $5,000 per hour. Now we have a monthly savings of about $800 on utilities."
WORDS TO LIVE BY: "Why not just buy natural gas for your home and generate the 12 volts you need locally? Some of the waste heat could go to your hot-water tank."
ON THE RISE: Micropower is already popular with people who need an uninterrupted source of electricity. California-based Capstone Turbine sold $7.1 million worth of generators last year to business customers, half of whom use the units as their sole supply of juice. "At first, micropower will complement central power," says Seth Dunn of Worldwatch, an environmental think tank in Washington, DC. "But as the technology's costs come down, it will be more logical for everybody to have these kinds of systems."
FUTURE REFERENCE: Micropower: The Next Electrical Era, by Seth Dunn; Powering the Future, by Tom Koppel; American Stirling Company (www.stirlingengine.com); Capstone Turbine (www.capstoneturbine.com); International Fuel Cells (www.internationalfuelcells.com)
