At the White House Electrification Summit, Thomas Edison's must-do spirit continues to inspire

Last week, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy held an important summit on the future of electrification. It was a critical discussion at a pivotal time as we build resiliency while decarbonizing. It also reinforced how closely technology companies like GE are aligned with important policy to address the energy transition together.

The theme of the #electrificationsummit was straightforward: As Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm explained, the United States needs a tripling in the rate of electrification and a “new architecture” to achieve the goals of decarbonization and growing resiliency. As Dr. Sally Benson said, this means “the grid will look vastly different” both with physical and digital controls. Leaders from government, industry, academia, and NGOs focused on how companies will need to partner together to make sure the grid is ready, including for underserved communities. National Grid's Rudolph Wynter said it the best: “It’s a fine line between just in time and being late. We don’t want the grid to be late.”

One of my favorite moments of the day was Dr. Benson invoking the must-do spirit of Thomas Edison, who she said worked “one floor down” in the White House during World War I. His assignment was “about how science and innovation could make the country more secure.”

That hit close to home. A day earlier, I took the picture of Thomas Edison’s desk at GE's Global Research Center (GRC) in Niskayuna, New York. I had seen it probably a dozen times, but I studied it more closely on this visit. I was there, also “one floor down” from the desk, to learn about the work our researchers and scientists are doing to innovate the needed technology for decarbonization and electrification. A century later, Edison’s impact, to advance technology and solve pressing challenges was profound on both days.

At the GRC, our advanced decarbonization and energy research is focused on three paths: (1) decarbonizing energy infrastructure; (2) advancing renewables; and (3) accelerating electrification. On electrification, the team is working today on tomorrow’s innovations for grid digitization and modernization, grid resiliency, advanced distribution networks, hybrids and energy storage, and cyber and digital defenses. 

For example, in partnership with the Department of Energy, our business partner, Prolec GE, and utility partner, Cooperative Energy, we have teamed up to develop and install the world’s first large flexible transformer at the utility’s substation in Columbia, Mississippi. The flexible transformer represents the next generation of hardware required to manage a rapidly changing grid. It will support higher penetrations of renewable power coming online, improve its resiliency through better fault management, frequency and voltage regulation, and ease the supply chain for utilities by serving as a universal spare for a wide range of transformers operating at different voltage levels.

I left the GRC thinking 2023 is going to be the year of the grid and electrification, and feeling excited about the opportunity to highlight more of the work our teams are doing. The White House Summit reinforced the sense of urgency to electrify and harden the grid. After two back to back days, I came to appreciate better this is an issue of close alignment with many stakeholders beyond GE, and tackling it together will improve our success.

We look forward to collaborating closely with our partners from the Summit and around the globe in 2023 to succeed for both decarbonization and electrification.