Feb 8, 2023 · 25m · green-blueprint
A new catalyst for the smart home: electrify everything
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of The Carbon Copy, host Stephen Lacey and Canary Media reporter Julian Spector examine how building electrification and virtual power plants are transforming smart homes from novelty gadgets into vital, automated grid-balancing assets.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 5.5 Guest teaching 5.7 Guest disagreement 1.0 The hosts pushing back 1.2
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 2:47 Debunking the shiny smart home illusion
Spector tempers hype around smart homes by emphasizing how mass market grid interactivity remains in an extremely early, unintegrated state.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 12:09 Rejecting text alerts as real grid managementLacey underscores that broadcast social media messages and text alerts to conserve power represent an uncontrolled, unmanaged stopgap rather than true grid interactive assets.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 18:35 Sonnen's unique Utah virtual power plant deploymentSpector educates the listener and host on how Sonnen bypassed unfavorable rooftop solar compensation in Utah by building a fast-responding frequency regulation fleet.
The host holds their own ▶ 7:32 Framing generation demands via NREL researchLacey commands the technical conversation by citing NREL's study detailing the need to double renewable electricity generation capacity by mid-century.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Casual Banter from a Utility Closet | 5 | 4 | 1 | 1 | Lacey sets the conceptual foundation by differentiating between fictional smart home tropes and real-world grid orchestration. Spector provides ground-level context on how early adoption remains despite device proliferation. | |
| Episode Introduction: A New Smart Home Catalyst | 7 | 5 | 1 | 1 | Lacey demonstrates substantial subject matter mastery, citing early Microsoft/Google dashboard failures and data from NREL's Electrification Futures Study. Spector complements this by walking through the evening load spike caused by rapid residential electrification. | |
| Existing Technology vs. Outdated Regulations | 6 | 6 | 1 | 2 | Lacey highlights how sending consumer text alerts during grid crises fails to create automated assets. Spector explains the disconnect between utility-focused engineering startups and mass consumer marketing. | |
| Octopus Energy's Dynamic Flexibility Model | 5 | 6 | 1 | 1 | Lacey tracks Octopus Energy's retail model and asks about integrated EV leasing contracts. Spector shares operational data from the UK energy crisis response and dynamic Texas pricing. | |
| Sonnen's Virtual Power Plants in Utah | 5 | 7 | 1 | 1 | Lacey recalls Sonnen's historical pricing challenges in the US, and Spector provides deep reporting on Sonnen's Rocky Mountain Power virtual power plant partnership in Utah, noting that 88% of their US batteries participate in grid services. | |
| OhmConnect's Scalable Behavioral and Plug Strategy | 5 | 6 | 1 | 1 | Lacey contrasts high-cost battery hardware with low-barrier smart plug approaches. Spector details OhmConnect's California deployment scale and psychological consumption reductions. |
Statements from this episode (12)
Spector: Grid-interactive clean energy homes remain far from mass participation
“We're extremely early. There's, there are some really meaningful achievements in select pockets of the country and the world. But it's very, very far from any kind of mass participation in the energy system.”
Lacey: Google Nest has sold 11 million smart thermostats
“Google Nest has sold eleven million of them.”
Lacey: Gadget-centric smart devices failed to spark an energy revolution
“They have been really helpful for demand response programs, no doubt, in shaving off some money from energy bills here and there, but the gadget-centric model just hasn't unlocked a smart home revolution.”
Lacey: US regulatory thicket obstructs turning homes into grid assets
“I mean, here in America, it's so hard to make homes into grid assets because of a thicket of different utility programs and regional market rules.”
Lacey: NREL study finds electrification requires doubling renewable capacity deployment
“NREL, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, put out an electrification futures study and found that with widespread electrification across the economy, we're going to have to double the amount of electricity generating capacity that we're installing. Renew…”
Spector: Clean tech startups build complex grid tools disconnected from consumers
“So I think a critique that you can make of the clean energy industry writ large, this is generalizing a little bit, but there's a lot of companies that are very good at tackling these thorny, wonky, Really complicated grid problems, engineering problems, desig…”
Octopus Energy cut 108 MW of demand with 400,000 flexible customers
“And they got like a 400,000 people to sign up almost overnight. And in the first event that they responded to with this kind of decentralized grid response fleet, they lowered demand by a 108 megawatts, which is like a serious amount of power.”
Octopus Energy offers 20% electricity discount for managed EV charging
“If you're a customer of their electricity and you get a EV and you say, hey, you can control my smart EV charger within certain parameters schedule when it charges up they chop your rate per kilowatt hour electricity by 20%.”
Spector: 88% of Sonnen's US batteries participate in virtual power plants
“Yeah, so Sonnen it was actually 88% of the batteries they've installed in the U.S. Are part of some sort of virtual power plant or grid, grid interactive program, which is just a wild statistic compared to the norm for the market where, you know, most people a…”
OhmConnect manages 300,000 grid-interactive homes globally and 250,000 California devices
“They've got 300,000 grid interactive homes worldwide. That they're managing, and in California, which is their main base of operations they've got 250,000 appliances and devices under their control.”
OhmConnect customers reduce summer energy use by 10.2% on average
“He said they've noticed when people sign up, they'll compare the, like, key summer months energy consumption to the year before the customer signed up, and they reduce energy use by 10.2% on average.”
Spector: Using existing home devices for grid flexibility beats complete rebuilds
“You don't need to overhaul the home entirely. You can take devices people actually have already and make some use out of them for the grid. It's a more modest goal, and I think more realistic than swapping out the entirety of the built environment for somethin…”