Evolution of Power Grids (Transmission)

Today's electric power transmission grid is the result of years of technological innovation driven by the needs of the institutions that have planned, built, operated, and regulated the grid. To understand how smart grid technologies – monitoring, communication, and control devices and systems – will influence the grid's future evolution, we must understand how the institutions and regulations that influence the grid have evolved and the challenges they currently face. This chapter illustrates the relationship between transmission grid evolution and the future of smart grid technologies by describing how a leading example of smart grid technologies, synchrophasors, will contribute to the continuing evolution of the US transmission system.