Economy Cycle
Energy cycle emphasizes on self-reliance energy production from various natural resources, such as solar energy, biogas, and biomass energy by using smart grid to manage electricity production and consumption in community. In addition, there are activities for energy conservation and behavior adaptation for energy consumption in the Smart Community.
Community Smart Grid
adiCET is developing DC Smart Grid in the Smart Community with the supported from the Office of Naval Research, USA.
The objective of this project is to study the efficiency, stability and safety of distributing direct current (DC) through the DC Smart Grid to the Smart Community. The DC electricity is used in residential homes, office, restaurant, convenience store, coffee shop and farm with electrical appliances such as computers, air conditioners, refrigerators, televisions and light bulbs. This is the world’s first smart grid system that uses DC power for the entire community. The DC Smart Grid has power generation capacity of 25.5 kW from 510 thin-film PV panels of 50 W and 100 kW battery bank as energy storage.
With the support of the Energy Conservation Fund, Thailand’s Ministry of Energy, AC Smart Grid was installed in parallel with the DC Smart Grid. The 24.8 kW AC Smart Grid comprised of 225 thin-film PV panels of 110 W and 100 kW battery bank. The AC Smart Grid and DC Smart Grid were used as a comparison to study the suitable smart grid format for Thailand and ASEAN member countries. Therefore, the Smart Community is considered as a model for distributed community power system that other communities could learn from and apply the smart grid concept to their communities.