Can the consumer-friendly brand of GE put a face on the smart grid?
The industrial giant on Tuesday introduced two products–a home energy management system and electric vehicle charger–which are some of the most tangible aspects of what GE CEO Jeff Immelt on Tuesday called digital energy. The products were announced in tandem with a $200 million award competition to spur smart-grid technology ideas.
via GE brings smart grid home with energy monitor, EV charger | Green Tech – CNET News.
Just three weeks after partnering with Cisco Systems to fast-track development of a state-of-the-art electric smart grid, Duke Energy has signed a new agreement with Cisco to pilot and further develop a smart grid-enabled home energy management solution. The goal is to provide Duke Energy customers with secure and reliable energy information and a simple-to-use tool to help them reduce the amount of energy wasted in their homes.
Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK) and Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) have signed an agreement to pilot and further develop a smart grid-enabled home energy management solution to provide Duke Energy customers with home energy use information.
The announcement corresponds with the unveiling this week of Cisco’s Home Energy Management Solution, which features a proprietary Home Energy Controller (CGH-100) designed to work in concert with Cisco Energy Management Services, a platform whereby utilities can manage and integrate data from homes with their back-end applications.
Networking company Cisco got into the home energy management sector this week as it unveiled a new in-home energy management device along with connected services that, when used in conjunction with utilities, “help consumers securely and reliably gain insight into, and easier control over, their energy use.” It also wasted no time in immediately finding a large utility partner to field trial this with, as Duke Energy in North Carolina and Ohio has stepped up to test the first generation technology with its customer base.
via Cisco Gets Its Smart Grid Toys On With Duke Energy Trials | EarthTechling.
Cisco Systems on Tuesday introduced a home energy management system, which it will test with customers of utility Duke Energy and which it plans to offer to other utilities.
The two companies said that Cisco will supply a home energy “controller,” a countertop touch-screen display that allows people to monitor electricity usage and to program home energy to reduce waste and take advantage of off-peak pricing.
via Cisco enters home smart-grid fray with energy display | Green Tech – CNET News.
PassivSystems has today launched PassivEnergy, a unique home energy management system that can reduce household energy use by up to 18 per cent, a saving of £214.92 on the average household energy bill of £1,194. PassivEnergy optimises a home’s energy use, learning when it needs to use energy and when it needs to save it.
Intel will show off an experimental device this week in China that could someday substantially cut the costs of wiring homes and offices for energy efficiency, one more step in the company's foray into energy.
The device is a server/sensor that monitors the power consumption of the various appliances in a home or small commercial building in real time. The device then sends the data, via Wi-Fi, to a phone, PC or a home energy management console, like the one Intel showed off at CES earlier this year.
The smart grid community saw a major meeting of the minds today: the ZigBee Alliance and Wi-Fi Alliance have teamed up to develop applications for home energy management and networking.
Both ZigBee and Wi-Fi are wireless protocols that allow electronic devices, smart meters and utilities to wirelessly send data back and forth. This is the foundation of the burgeoning smart grid: the ability of utilities to receive data directly from their customers’ meters and for consumers to have access to the same data so they can conserve energy and save money off their monthly bills.
via ZigBee, Wi-Fi join forces to kick home energy management up a notch | VentureBeat.
DistribuTECH, the once-sleepy power grid trade show, has been transformed into a high-profile smart grid showcase over the past couple of years — and this year’s show in Tampa, Fla. is no exception. Only two days into the event and we’ve got a host of announcements detailing new partnerships between IT giants and home energy management startups, new ways to do demand response, and new technologies for keeping the grid running smoothly. Here’s 10 things you should pay attention to coming outta DistribuTECH:
via 10 Things Outta the Smart Grid World of DistribuTECH – Earth2Tech.
A lot of the interest in the smart grid industry tends to swirl around consumers and home energy management. It can be fun to picture consumers one day buying gadgets at big box retailers that will let them micromanage their home heating, cooling and lighting, and it's an especially attractive venture option for investors and entrepreneurs who cut their teeth on Internet and telecom startups.
While a lot of the attention has been focused on gadgets, software and services that will convince the consumer to engage with home energy management, an untapped area for opportunity for startups and incumbent players alike will be utility applications. That was one of the themes that came out of our Smart Grid Bunker Session we held last week in San Francisco (see videos here) and which I’ve focused on for an article on GigaOM Pro (subscription required).
via The Untapped Opportunity in the Smart Grid: Utility Applications.
While digital home energy management tools aren’t dominating the headlines from the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) this year, a few consumer electronics makers, utilities and software designers have launched some interesting products at the show. My biggest takeaway after looking over the releases and talking to some of the firms: Consumer gadget makers are folding in energy management as one part of the entire consumer option. Many of the energy management tools also highlight features like social networking and security because, well, let’s face it, at this point it’s mostly just the bleeding edge eco-nerds (OK, I’m one of them) who would like a stand-alone high-powered energy gadget.
GE will partner with the Chinese city of Yangzhou to build a smart grid demonstration center, the company announced Friday.
GE says the initial demonstration phase — which will include wireless-enabled smart meters, home energy management systems and smart appliances set up in a 100,000-square-foot lab — is designed to showcase how GE technologies can “help China improve the reliability, efficiency and carbon footprint of its energy delivery.”
Xcel Energy and GridPoint, Inc., announced that 1.4 million residential Colorado utility customers now have access to the My Account site on www.xcelenergy.com using GridPoint’s recently released home energy management solution.
The new portal allows customers to design and personalize both their electric and natural gas energy usage strategies based on their historical energy use. This could potentially save customers money and reduce their carbon footprint, as well as view and soon pay their bill online.
OpenPeak Inc., a leading provider of VoIP multimedia touch-screen device and telephony systems, announced today that its OpenFrame® 7E VoIP multimedia home energy management and communications platform has achieved ZigBee Smart Energy Certification by the ZigBee® Alliance.
While 2009 was the year that startups, smart grid firms and venture capitalists decided to move into the home energy management market, 2010 could be the year that the consumer electronics players make their moves. Energy reseller Direct Energy and a group of gadget heavyweights, including appliance maker Whirlpool, retail group Best Buy, and gadget developer OpenPeak, tell us they plan to launch a home energy management device dubbed the Home Energy Management (HEM) center at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show on January 7.
via Direct Energy, Gadget Group to Launch Energy Device at CES.
Amid historic volatility in energy prices and heightened concern about energy security and climate change, energy management and energy efficiency are hot topics. Tens of millions of smart electric meters are slated for deployment in the next few years. And billions of dollars of funds from the U.S. government are flowing to support smart grid investments and energy efficiency initiatives.
Every smart grid company, IT firm and software startup seems to have the desire to build a home energy management tool these days. But one we’ve been waiting to see for awhile has just launched: Smart grid player GridPoint says that its home energy management tool, which partly uses software from the company Lixar it acquired back in June, is now available.
Microsoft Hohm , the software giant’s new home energy management system, is now available for the 3.4 million households served by utility Xcel Energy . This is the second time the tool, which makes energy use and pricing data available via a web interface , has been tested with a mass audience.
One of the biggest hurdles standing between Google and wide adoption of its home energy management system PowerMeter — a service that makes your electricity consumption and pricing data available on the web — is that it depended on the broad roll out of smart meters (advanced meters capable of transmitting data to utilities and customers in real time). With only asmall percentage of smart meters in the field, this won’t be a reality for a while.
But today, Google announced a new partnership with Energy Inc., a provider of home energy measurement devices that negate the need for smart meters. Now homeowners and businesses that want to use PowerMeter to keep tabs on how much energy they are using won’t have to wait for their local utilities to install smart meters. Instead, they can buy one of Energy Inc.’s monitoring devices called the TED 5000 (short for The Energy Detective), for $200. This monitor makes the data you want available via any internet browser and any computer, all for free after initial purchase.
via Google lands energy device partner, doesn’t have to wait for smart meters | VentureBeat.
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