®
oundtable:
Energy innovation South Jersey is leading the charge in revolutionizing the energy industry. Here, leaders discuss the future of the energy grid.
Gary Stockbridge
Mike Renna
Region President Atlantic City Electric & Delmarva Power
President & CEO South Jersey Industries
In what ways is SJI helping to push New Jersey toward its clean energy goals? Certainly, in the state, the region and nationally there is an emphasis on reducing our carbon footprint and greenhouse gas emissions. SJI has embraced that goal. We’ve spent a lot of time identifying areas where we as an energy delivery company could not only support those goals but, more importantly, accelerate them. SJI has committed to what I believe to be industry-leading greenhouse gas reductions for our operations. We’re looking to reduce the emissions from our operations by 70% by 2030 and 100% by 2040. Beyond that, I think we’re the first and only utility company that has committed a certain percentage of our CAPEX on an annual basis to decarbonization investments. In this case, we’re committed to investing at least 25% on an annual basis on decarbonization projects and initiatives. That’s quite a bit when you think about the fact that, on a five-year average, we’ll spend $2-3 billion in terms of our traditional CAPEX. So, 25% of that would be for decarbonizationtype investments. What does the future of hydrogen look like? A future of hydrogen at a significantly reduced, lowcarbon gas stream is possible. It can certainly be in place by 2050. There is a misconception that gas can’t be part of the solution. I’ll further say that in the end, we’re agnostic: I don’t care what the molecular content of the fuel flowing through the pipes is, as long as it’s safe and available. If at some point down the road, we as an industry are delivering hydrogen, great. That’s the business we’re in: delivering energy. 94
What role is Atlantic City Electric playing in the transition to greener energy? We do business in a lot of states and I think New Jersey is at the forefront regarding green energy, so kudos to the governor for his legislation and everything he has done in this regard. First and foremost, we continuously look at our fleet and facilities to make sure that we’re walking the talk relative to the conversion of our fleet to electric vehicles and running efficient buildings in contributing to that effort. The good news for us is that we play a bigger role within the state than just our own footprint. Almost all of the activities and clean energy priorities that we’ve been working on are either driven by legislation, are under regulatory review or have received regulatory approval. Thankfully, these are nearing the launch phase. All these programs will help the state achieve its green goals one customer at a time. What does the future of the energy grid look like? In our industry, we often talk about the utility grid of the future. In my mind, this is a smarter grid with a lot of data going through it, which would help us and our customers understand how our energy is being used. It also needs to be a self-healing grid, understanding when issues are happening and performing self-repairs to a certain extent. This includes innovative technologies to improve system reliability, such as specialized equipment that can restore service faster or isolate damage in the event of a power outage. We need to be able to bring on distributed generation quicker. In the utility grid of today, we still run into issues of congestion and there’s still a general lack of knowledge regarding how energy is used.
| Invest: South Jersey 2021 | INFRASTRUCTURE, TRANSPORTATION & UTILITIES
