U.S. Armed Forces require a power grid update for continued success

By Lindsay Palma, Program Manager

Last week, I attended the Department of Defense Power and Energy Summit in Washington D.C. and participated in conversations about how the aging power grid is becoming a challenge for U.S. Armed Forces.

The requirement for remote substations, an increase in electric vehicles and reducing carbon intensity of power generations have all overloaded the power grid in recent years. Now, our commercial and defense customers alike are struggling with finding solutions to ensure the grid doesn’t fail.

Luckily, our team of engineers have developed solutions to eliminate these challenges for a successful power grid update. Moving computing out of the data center and to the edge is not a new feat for Crystal Group. For over 30 years, we have been designing rugged servers, embedded computers, and portable workstations for the U.S. military that meet strict environmental standards required for mission success at the tactical edge.

Not only have we produced rugged computer hardware for our Armed Forces but we have also provided complete solutions to leading energy industry partners through the vPAC Alliance. This complete solution reduces the amount of technology required to operate a substation from hundreds of units into just one, all-encompassing server.

As we heard at the conference, a “vision without resources is a hallucination” and I feel confident that our team has already designed a viable solution to act as those resources needed to eliminate the expected challenges that the aging power grid presents.