FORT COLLINS - Local smart-grid developer Spirae will participate in the Pacific Northwest Smart Grid Demonstration Project.

Spirae will collaborate with utilities, energy providers, vendors and research organizations on the Richland, Wash.-based project. The demonstration, which will span five states and include more than 60,000 consumers, to validate new smart-grid technologies and business cases; provide two-way communication between distributed generation, storage and demand assets and the existing grid infrastructure; quantify smart grid costs and benefits; and advance interoperability standards and cyber security approaches.

It is one of 16 similar projects around that nation that recently received American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding from the U.S. Department of Energy. The Pacific Northwest project will receive $88.8 million from the DOE for the $177.6 million project, with the remainder of the funding supplied by the participants. The Battelle Memorial Institute is the primary awardee.

In all, the DOE pledged $453.3 million to $877.2 million worth of projects, none of which are based in Colorado projects.

Spirae will deploy its smart-grid solutions at at least four test sites and utilities. The company will focus on managing diverse forms of distributed energy resources and demand management. Spirae's technology provides advanced modeling and simulation capabilities as well as control of distribution systems.

"Spirae is very excited about participating in this innovative project which will demonstrate how smart-grid technologies and distributed energy resources can be deployed on a large scale to improve the reliability and efficiency of the power system," said Sunil Cherian, CEO of Spirae, in a prepared statement.

The DOE also announced $184.4 million in funding for 16 utility-scale energy storage projects. Again, no Colorado companies or organizations are the lead in the selected projects.