The Internetification
of Energy Distribution
How EnergyNet's distributed grid architecture and Inergy Systems' demand control technology converge to define the next-generation energy ecosystem.
Executive Summary
The global electricity grid stands at an inflection point comparable to the telecommunications revolution of the late 1990s. The centralized, synchronous, hierarchically managed power distribution system that electrified the twentieth century is increasingly strained by the realities of distributed generation, bidirectional power flows, intermittent renewables, and the electrification of transport and heating.
EnergyNet, an open-architecture framework developed by ViaEuropa and documented in a 2025 arXiv paper by Birgersson et al., proposes a radical restructuring of energy distribution modeled directly on the architecture of the Internet.
The Legacy Grid: An Architecture Under Stress
For over a century, electricity has flowed in one direction: from large centralized power plants through high-voltage transmission lines, stepped down through substations, and delivered radially to passive consumers. This architecture — the Plain Old Grid System (POGS) — was optimized for predictable, top-down power flows with centralized protection coordination and synchronous coupling across the entire network.
This model is now encountering fundamental structural limitations. Rooftop solar PV, battery storage, electric vehicles, and heat pumps are proliferating at the grid edge. Power flows have become bidirectional and intermittent. Distribution capacity fills, protection coordination breaks down, and single points of failure at substations create systemic vulnerability.
The 2025 cascading blackout across Spain, Portugal, and southern France demonstrated in real terms what happens when a synchronously coupled system encounters a fault that should have been isolated but instead propagated uncontrollably.
The Internet Analogy
Before the Internet, telephony operated on a circuit-switched model: dedicated circuits established between callers consumed resources for the duration of each call regardless of actual data flow. This was the Plain Old Telephone System (POTS). The transition to packet-switched networks transformed telecommunications from a scarce, expensive utility into an abundant, affordable commodity.
EnergyNet's thesis is that energy distribution faces an analogous inflection point. The centralized model must give way to distributed generation and storage managed through software-defined routing, open protocols, and local-first coordination. Jonas Birgersson, the Swedish tech entrepreneur credited with bringing broadband to Sweden in the late 1990s, has described this as the "internetification" of energy distribution.
Core Design Principles
EnergyNet is built on three foundational principles drawn directly from Internet architecture.
Galvanic Separation
Each microgrid operates as an electrically independent domain, separated by power electronics that act as an energy firewall. Faults are contained locally — cascading failures become architecturally impossible. Birgersson calls it "Schrödinger's microgrid": simultaneously on and off the traditional grid.
Software-Defined Routing
Energy flows are managed by software that dynamically routes power based on real-time conditions, local generation availability, storage state, and demand profiles. The Energy Router converts between AC and DC and enforces policy-based distribution decisions.
Open Protocol (EP)
The Energy Protocol serves the same role for energy that IP serves for data. Developed by the nonprofit Energy Engineering Task Force and released with a zero-license model, EP provides vendor-neutral interoperability. No electricity transfers until both parties agree through the protocol.
Technical Components
Energy Router
The central hardware device. It sits behind the utility meter, provides galvanic separation, and manages a DC backplane interconnecting local solar, storage, and loads. The Energy Router Operating System (EROS) governs all local decision-making including load prioritization, storage dispatch, and interconnection management.
ELAN & EWAN
The Energy Local Area Network (ELAN) connects resources within a single building. The Energy Wide Area Network (EWAN) interconnects multiple ELANs across neighborhoods using DC microgrids in ring or mesh topologies. Ring topology — dangerous in a traditional AC grid — is both safe and beneficial in EnergyNet because all connections are software-negotiated and galvanically isolated.
Energy Network Management System (ENMS)
The operator-scale control plane handling fleet management of Energy Routers, software updates, security monitoring, and system-wide optimization. EnergyNet operators fill a role analogous to Internet Service Providers.
Deployment & Early Results
The first EnergyNet deployment is underway in Lund, Sweden, as part of the CoAction Lund initiative funded by Vinnova and the Swedish Energy Agency.
Each building is equipped with rooftop solar and 100 kWh of battery storage, interconnected via dedicated DC "freedom cables" in a ring topology. Initial results demonstrate the ability to install substantially more solar capacity than the traditional grid would permit, since the local microgrid absorbs and shares excess generation without stressing upstream distribution.
The Demand-Side Gap
EnergyNet represents a transformative advance in distribution architecture. But distribution is only half the equation. Without demand-side coordination, even a well-architected distributed grid faces inefficiencies: local storage depleted prematurely during peaks, generation-consumption temporal misalignment, and unrealized economic optimization through demand billing rate structures.
The demand-side gap is the architectural space between the distributed supply infrastructure and the appliances, HVAC systems, water heaters, EV chargers, and loads that actually consume electricity. Closing this gap requires premises-level intelligence making real-time decisions about load prioritization and demand threshold management.
Demand Control Technology
A demand controller continuously monitors aggregate energy consumption in real time, intelligently orchestrating high-consumption loads — HVAC, water heating, electric dryers, pool pumps, EV chargers — to keep peak demand below a configurable threshold while maintaining occupant comfort.
Inergy Systems has developed and deployed demand control technology for over three decades, with deep expertise in residential and light commercial applications. The Inergy controller integrates with existing building electrical systems, works alongside solar PV and battery storage installations, and enables customers to access utility demand billing rate structures that offer substantially reduced per-kWh charges in exchange for maintaining demand below a specified limit.
Architectural Convergence
In a converged deployment, the demand controller at each premises functions as the load-management agent within the ELAN. It communicates demand state and flexibility capacity to the Energy Router, which factors this into its routing and storage dispatch decisions. Supply-side distribution and demand-side management operate as a coordinated whole, rather than independent optimization loops.
Integration Scenarios
| Scenario | Converged Behavior |
|---|---|
| Peak Demand Shaving | Inergy controllers hold each premises below its threshold, reducing aggregate ELAN peak demand and preserving battery reserves for shared use across the EWAN. |
| Solar Overgeneration | Controllers pre-cool buildings, pre-heat water, or accelerate EV charging to absorb excess local PV generation before it must be exported or curtailed. |
| Grid Disconnection | During islanding events, demand controllers extend microgrid autonomy by enforcing stricter limits and prioritizing critical loads, reducing battery drawdown rate. |
| Market Participation | In EP-based energy markets, demand controllers provide granular load flexibility as a measurable, verifiable, tradeable network resource. |
| EV Charging Coordination | Demand controllers manage charging schedules to prevent coincident spikes while the Energy Router coordinates capacity across the ELAN and EWAN. |
Economic Model
Household Level
Demand control reduces costs by 25%+ independently. Combined with ELAN solar and storage, additional savings from reduced grid import, local surplus sharing, and time-differentiated rates.
Building & Community
Aggregated demand control across multiple units reduces the aggregate peak reported to the utility, lowering demand charges for the entire property. Coordinated control smooths load across the EWAN.
Grid Operator Level
Premises-level demand management reduces upstream distribution stress, deferring costly substation upgrades. For EnergyNet operators, it reduces peak throughput requirements and capital expenditure.
U.S. Market & Inergy's Position
While EnergyNet's initial deployment is in Europe, the underlying market dynamics apply with equal or greater force in the United States: grid congestion, rising demand from data centers and electrification, aging infrastructure, and climate-driven resilience requirements.
The U.S. also has a critical structural advantage for demand control: widespread availability of demand billing rate structures, particularly in the Southwest, where utilities offer dramatically reduced per-kWh charges for customers who maintain peak demand below specified thresholds.
Proven Technology
30+ years of field-proven demand control deployments requiring no fundamental R&D for distributed grid integration.
Demand-Side Expertise
Deep knowledge of utility rate structures, demand billing mechanics, and consumption patterns that pure distribution players lack.
HVAC Channel Partners
Established HVAC installation partnerships provide a scalable distribution channel aligned with building-level energy deployments.
EP Integration Pathway
The open Energy Protocol creates a clear integration path for demand controllers to communicate with Energy Routers and the ENMS.
Resilience & National Security
A grid composed of galvanically separated, locally autonomous microgrids with endpoint demand intelligence is inherently resistant to both physical attack and cyber disruption. For defense installations and critical infrastructure, this combination provides energy assurance independent of centralized grid infrastructure.
Development Roadmap
The Path Forward
The centralized electricity grid served its purpose for a century, but the convergence of distributed generation, electrification, storage, and digital control is rendering its architecture fundamentally inadequate. EnergyNet offers a compelling, architecturally rigorous blueprint for the next-generation distributed grid.
The opportunity is to establish Inergy's demand control technology as a foundational component of the distributed energy ecosystem — not merely a cost-saving device for individual households, but a network-level resource that enables the full potential of architectures like EnergyNet.
The technologies are complementary. The market timing is favorable. The integration pathway through the open Energy Protocol is clear.
The internetification of energy distribution is underway. Intelligent demand management must be part of the architecture from the beginning.