Bonus question: Are you aware of any Smart Grid options available to consumers in the Northern Virginia area?

I like your framing, and hope you’ll focus on the politics of your two pieces (e.g., the technologies and the functionality). It seems to me that much of the functionality you describe is available without any technological change – but does require much regulatory reform. Conversely, the technologies implicit in a smart grid are helpful, but not sufficient to ensure those transactional changes, which would – as you note – make the smart grid dumb (but not before spending a lot of money on Nifty Technologies).

Therein lies the political challenge I hope you’ll discuss. Those entities who like the current status quo can endorse the technologies to give the appearance of action without actually jeopardizing their business model, and I generally see much more support (and press) for the technological wonders of the smart grid than I do for the regulatory reforms necessary to allow those transactions. How do you see those two pieces being coupled, so that the headline matches the reality as we move forward?