The two ends of the challenges moving the world to sustainable energy is going to be on the micro (the individual person controlling the loads) and the macro the smart city.
A smart city could begin with inner city reclamation. Renewable sources close metro power consumption. Abandoned properties can be repurposed to store batteries and solar arrays. Rail lines are in place for solar battery delivery.
Employment of a workforce is needed. Heavy equipment such as forklifts, cranes, loading ramps are essential and need humans to operate. Solar arrays, battery banks and docks will need to be constructed.
Solar towers and solar battery hubs could be set up to refuel government vehicles and community free energy project centers. A people’s utility center could refill portable batteries serving those in energy poverty.
Modernizing the nation’s energy control through smart systems and battery banks can be done. Smart cities and smart houses at some point, will interconnect. There will be full smart control redoing of the basic design of the grid. Germany’s Ernergiewende is an excellent example of a country phasing out the negatives of fossil fuel energy and phasing in renewables. The goal is modernizing the grid. Germans know to use their own solar intermittently with wind and hydro. In home use Germans may use solar for two or three days of the week. They manage it, on/off the grid. They take cold showers and eat sauerkraut.
As we progress to the Energy Eden with the smart house smart neighborhood, and smart city we’ll need the technology to turn on and off the nationwide grid. https://www.youtube.com/user/ASistasCircle/videos
The US needs to plan and create a strategic energy electrical grid reserve with batteries built by American companies like Tesla, GM and Ford to offset the losses incurred in their internal combustion engine categories as the world transfers to electric vehicle technology. Large pack batteries in a substation lot do not have to be precisely configured as in a space confined vehicle. This would lower the cost of the large-scale packs.
The conversion to the solar battery energy system will spawn a whole new industry and employment sector. Battery suppliers and manufacturers will be a massive part of this new industry. Battery managers and technicians will be needed in the field. There will be suppliers of the rental business and power backup batteries. There will be cleaning crews and maintenance workers to take care of all this stuff. There will be a large industry of coders for controllers with microprocessors.