John Douglas McDonald, Director, Technical Strategy & Policy Development, GE Digital Energy

John McDonald

What makes him powerful: McDonald has made many contributions to energy and the smart grid over his 36 years in the electric utility transmission and distribution industry, but two more recent contributions stand out as industry game changers.

After becoming an IEEE Fellow in 2003 "for technical leadership in the development of substation integration and automation," McDonald wrote an article in the March/April 2003 issue of IEEE Power & Energy magazine titled "Substation Automation - IED Integration and Availability of Information," introducing the concept that there were two types of data in an Intelligent Electronic Device (IED) -- operational and non-operational. In the article, McDonald discussed how to manage the two types of data so the utility would realize significantly more benefits from their investment in IEDs. Today, this is an industry standard adopted by all electric utilities, as the substation and its data is a key component of smart grid.

When NIST became the coordinator for smart grid standards work in the United States as a result of the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007, the NIST Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP) was formed. In late 2009, the NIST SGIP Governing Board was formed through industry elections, with McDonald elected to the Governing Board, and later unanimously elected Board Chair for 2010 and again for 2011.

The 27-member Board represents the more than 700 company and 1800 individual SGIP membership. For the last two years, McDonald has led the board in smart grid standards development, interoperability testing, architecture development, and cyber security recommendations, and has mobilized the United States to work together holistically in smart grid standards. With an emphasis on international outreach and working relationships with standards groups in other countries, McDonald has made a significant impact on the smart grid in the United States and abroad.