The Smart City San Diego initiative, which was designed to promote smarter technology development, solar energy storage integration, and increased electric vehicle infrastructure and deployment, reports it has begun to achieve results. Partners in the effort include the city of San Diego, GE, UC San Diego, CleanTECH San Diego, and San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E). It was established to leverage each member’s strengths to create and implement initiatives to improve the region’s energy independence, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

San Diego Mayor Sanders says, “Over the past year, Smart City San Diego has been forward-thinking about creating opportunities for a more sustainable region. Moving into 2012, our collaborative will continue to build on those results and develop and launch even more initiatives to drive economic growth for our region.”

The City of San Diego and SDG&E worked with Daimler’s Car2Go to launch San Diego’s plug-in electric vehicle car sharing pilot. The City continues to work with SDG&E to increase the number of public-access charging stations throughout the Car2Go targeted region.

SDG&E and GE are collaborating to test the communication links between GE’s smart appliances and SDG&E’s smart meters. GE is supplying SDG&E with a smart dishwasher, washer, and dryer along with a GE Nucleus energy manager and Programmable Control Thermostat to expedite the testing process.

CleanTECH San Diego, in conjunction with the City of San Diego, SDG&E, UC San Diego, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and its private sector member companies says it is “quantifying and categorizing regional clean tech companies that touch smart grid technology development. Categories include solar energy, energy storage, energy efficiency, clean transportation and other technology companies.”

UC San Diego and SDG&E are planning to test, demonstrate, and evaluate a variety of solar integrated energy storage projects. CleanTECH San Diego supports this initiative as part of efforts to promote the region as an Innovation Hub (IHub). In August 2010, the California Governor’s Office of Economic Development designated the greater San Diego region as an IHub for solar energy storage.

Mark Hura, global smart grid commercial Leader for GE’s Digital Energy business, says the company “is proud to bring our grid modernization technology and expertise to Smart City San Diego. An efficient, reliable and sustainable electric infrastructure is essential to powering economic growth and supporting business, industry and the dynamic lifestyles of a skilled workforce. We applaud all the successes over the past year and look forward to many more to come.”

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