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1. Under $100 At Fry's: The PowerCost Monitor
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2. How Weather Data Could Be the Next Location Data
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3. Sprint: 2010 Is a Major Year for The WiMAX Smart Grid
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4. The Case of the Home Energy Boom: 3M Invests in The Energy Detective
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5. How Apple Could Jolt the Smart Home Energy Market
Under $100 At Fry's: The PowerCost Monitor
Katie Fehrenbacher - Green IT
The news comes on the heals of Apple reportedly filing patents suggesting its been eying energy management, and 3M’s new interest in energy management through its investment in Energy Inc, which makes The Energy Detective. Earlier this month at the Consumer Electronics Show there was a spate of home energy management announcements from both large electronics firms and startups.
The PowerCost Monitor is interesting because at under $100, it’s one of the lowest-cost home energy management devices we’ve seen yet that is widely available. The Energy Detective (TED), which was the first gadget partner of PowerMeter, has been sold out for months on the TED web site. And the device costs closer to $120 for the older TED models and at least $200 for the newer models. AlertMe has been selling a home energy management kit for months now that costs £69 ($112) plus a £30 annual subscription ($50) (they dropped the price from last year).
The PowerCost Monitor comes in two parts, a sensor and radio device which fits onto any electricity meter, and a display, which picks up the wireless signal of the home’s electricity data emitted by the sensor/radio. It can be so cheap because it’s so incredibly simple. Blue Line Innovations says the device can help users reduce their electricity consumption by 6-18 percent.
Will getting its price point below $100 put the PowerCost Monitor at the front of the consumer energy management pack? When I interviewed Savraj Singh, the founder of Y-Combinator startup Wattvision, which makes a gadget like the PowerCost Monitor, last year, he thought that a super cheap cost was the answer to winning in this market. According to a survey from Greentech Media last year consumers are likely to pay closer to $48 for such an energy management product.
But clearly distribution into the direct to consumer market will also hold a key for this market. That avenue has been tricky for small startups, which is why Blue Line Innovation’s deal with Fry’s is interesting.
Blue Line Innovations was founded back in 2003, and already has over 100,000 PowerCost Monitor’s in the field today mostly through utility installations. The company told me this morning that over the last months it has been shifting its primary focus to the consumer. Analysts like Gartner’s Zarco Sumic told us that in the long run "The vendors that will dominate will be the ones who know how to market, sell and meet the needs of the consumer space. It is a consumer technology play. It is not a utility play." However in the short term, many analysts, like Pike Research’s Clint Wheelock, have maintained that the utility is still the dominant distribution channel.
How Weather Data Could Be the Next Location Data
Katie Fehrenbacher - Green IT
We can thank communication technology — satellites, mapping databases, software and high-powered computing — for creating the ability to track and use real-time weather info. The National Weather Service, developed by the U.S. government’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has been one of the key driving factors behind delivering this information in the U.S., and the organization provides “weather, hydrologic, and climate forecasts and warnings,” for “the protection of life and property and the enhancement of the national economy.”
Combine the National Weather Service data with Google and the open Internet ecosystem, and you have the makings of a platform for web 2.0 style services, not unlike how innovators are building applications off of mapping and location data. David Friedberg, the CEO of weather risk management company WeatherBill, which uses data from the NWS, explained to me in an interview last week that most of the private online weather data companies have built services on top of the National Weather Service’s XML feed and its API. There’s no doubt that the Internet has made real-time weather data more available, says Friedberg.
John Steinberg, CEO of smart thermostat software maker EcoFactor, which uses weather data to automatically adjust home owner’s connected thermostats, explained to me that in a pre-Internet world there would need to be one or more sensors on every home for EcoFactor get the type of weather data that it uses in its service. Steinberg says that EcoFactor works with a variety of weather data, but he didn’t want to disclose the sources for proprietary reasons.
Other infotech companies like IBM are building platforms leveraging NWS data and computing to develop prediction services specifically targeted at industries that rely heavily on weather data like travel, transportation, energy production, and agriculture. IBM sells a weather prediction service called Deep Thunder to municipalities, organizations and utilities, which use it to do things like tailor their services, change routes, or generate more or less power.
Weather data is moving down to the micro and personal level with better, more granular data, and the emergence of applications that can use weather data effectively. I Google my local weather on a daily basis, and objects like clock radios commonly that provide real-time weather forecasts. In a video on Deep Thunder, IBM research Lloyd Treinish explained it as: today we need super computers to deliver this type of prediction service, but someday this will be more widely available on a desktop and for individuals.
But as both Steinberg, Friedberg and IBM’s Director of Strategy for its Venture Capital Group Drew Clark all said to me, the really interesting part about weather data will be how it will be used automatically in systems. Whether it’s home and commercial building energy management systems that can automatically take weather data into account, or a large retail chain that could automatically starts stocking up on weather-related goods, weather data can make processes more streamlined, and importantly, making energy consumption more efficient.
Friedberg pointed out to me that there will likely be far less applications built upon weather, than say location and mapping data, because weather data is more used for direct consumption — it’s more like news (you ask what is the temperature or will it rain or not), and less like a real-time GPS location that has little meaning without its context. Weather forecasts are also less reliable — 75 percent chance of rain on Friday — so the applications would have to be less precise.
But I think in the context of energy generation and consumption in buildings, because heating and cooling and lighting are directly related to the weather outside of the home, there will be a wealth of applications that can be built on top of weather data and energy efficiency. EcoFactor is one of the first I’ve heard of that use this type of data directly and automatically linked to home energy consumption. It’s not coincidence that three-year-old EcoFactor was founded by Internet entrepreneurs (Steinberg, and SVP of Products Scott Hublou) looking to develop an energy efficiency product. In the course of a month EcoFactor says it can save 20-30 percent off of the heating and cooling costs on your bill and you won't even notice.
Utilities already use weather data to try to predict and adjust to how much power generation they will need for the grid depending on micro local temperatures, storms, and wind factors. The difference in a forecast of a couple degrees equals a lot of investment — and a lot greater carbon emissions — in terms of unnecessary power generation for a utility. Georgia Power is using an application built off of Deep Thunder to adjust its energy generation swiftly to meet weather predictions. But ultimately weaving in automatic weather data into all aspects of energy generation and building consumption will require more robust utility networks, better weather forecasting data and smart systems that can better adjust to the real-time information. And that type of smart weather system could be a crucial part of the future of the smart grid.
Image courtesy of National Weather Service.
Sprint: 2010 Is a Major Year for The WiMAX Smart Grid
Katie Fehrenbacher - smart grid
Sprint, which already has around 100 utility customers using its cellular networks in various capacities, says it’s in discussions with a good portion of those utilities about the possibilities of using WiMAX (or fourth-generation, 4G, as Sprint calls it). Sprint has responded to several smart grid utility bids that have called for a portion of the network to come from 4G, Gustin says. And Sprint is already in discussions with smart grid WiMAX players like GE, which makes a WiMAX-based smart meter, and startup Grid-Net, which makes WiMAX-based smart grid software.
While Gustin was quiet on details of its WiMAX smart grid announcements coming up, he was clear on what he thought were some of the benefits for Sprint, utilities and the smart grid ecosystem: “embedded cost.” In other words because WiMAX is an open standard, with large players like Intel, Motorola and GE building gear, the cost of WiMAX smart grid equipment could come down substantially in the future. As the CEO of Grid-Net, Ray Bell, put it to us last year: WiMAX chip sets currently cost around $36, but in a year they'll be closer to $12, and in another 6 months they could hit $8 or even $6.
As the carrier that is pushing WiMAX the most in the U.S., Sprint clearly has an incentive to sell services over the nascent network, which launched in several cities over the past couple of years. While Clearwire service is available in select locations like Las Vegas, Chicago, several cities in Texas and Portland, the build out has been somewhat slow going. The argument from industry players that dismiss a WiMAX-based smart grid is that until there’s a national WiMAX network, WiMAX will only play a minor role.
Outside of the U.S. a WiMAX-based smart grid could happen a lot more swiftly. In late October Grid Net announced that it would be supplying its software product for Australian utility customer SP AusNet. SP AusNet’s network, will use Motorola hardware, Unwired Australia's wireless spectrum, and will cost some "hundreds of millions" of dollars to build.
Still, U.S. utilities are clearly keeping an eye on WiMAX. Texas-based CenterPoint was one of the first utilities to test out GE's WiMAX-based smart meters. National Grid will be testing out WiMAX gear provided by Alvarion, to connect smart meters and distribution automation devices to the utilities' back office. Last year San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) said it had applied for stimulus funds to build a smart grid wireless network that would include about 30 percent of its network built with WiMAX. Southern California Edison (SCE) has also said it is looking at WiMAX for part of its smart grid network.
Gustin says a lot of the interest in a WiMAX smart grid this year is being supplied by the $4 billion in stimulus funds, which the DOE announced back in October. As these funds reach the utilities that have WiMAX plans, expect to see some big news in this space this year.
Image courtesy of Clearwire.
The Case of the Home Energy Boom: 3M Invests in The Energy Detective
Katie Fehrenbacher - Green IT
Terms of the investment were not disclosed but 3M New Ventures, which is based in Seefeld, Germany, said it made the investment because of Energy Inc.’s “high speed of innovation and entrepreneurial approach to serving customers,” in the “fast-growing energy monitoring market.” When companies don’t disclose the size of the investment, most of the time it means it’s pretty small.
It’s unclear to me just what 3M plans to do with the Energy Inc. investment. 3M sells both utility electrical transmission and distribution equipment as well as technologies for consumer electronics like touch screen systems and also communications products. But in a statement 3M said synergies with its other businesses would have a “high commercialization potential.”
The investment seems like a way for 3M to experiment in the increasingly hot market of home energy management products. Computing giants like Google, Microsoft and Intel have been developing energy management tools, startups have been building energy dashboards in droves, and smart grid players like Silver Spring Networks and GridPoint have recently bought their way in.
Energy Inc was actually founded back in 2001, before energy management was a hot topic anywhere. President and CEO of Energy Inc, Dolph Rodenberg told me in an interview in October that about 40 percent of its sales come from utilities, though declined to name its utility customers, while the majority of its sales come from the direct to consumer market.
Energy Inc.’s TED 5000 is the device that works via Google PowerMeter, and it costs abut $200. All the attention from Google’s partnership means that the TED5000 has been constantly sold out and on backorder for months. Rodenberg told us that the company was in the process of raising funds back in October, but not via the traditional venture capital route. I’d speculate that the PowerMeter link only helped with this financing deal.
How Apple Could Jolt the Smart Home Energy Market
Katie Fehrenbacher - Green IT
Last week a site called Patently Apple, unearthed what it says is a patent for a smart home energy management system dashboard from Apple. According to the patent, Apple’s dashboard product would use powerline networking (using the electrical system itself for the communication portion) and specifically the HomePlug standard to enable users to manage the energy consumption of computing products like laptops, iPods, iPhones and printers. While filing a patent on the topic doesn’t necessarily mean Apple will launch such a dashboard, Apple’s efforts could go far just in showing the computing industry how important energy management will be.
It’s clear from the patent that Apple is focusing on energy management through the lens of gadgets and computers. Unlike other companies that are building standalone home energy management hardware and software dashboards — from Google, to Tendril to eMeter to Microsoft to GE — that look at whole-home energy and the energy of appliances, or connect with smart meters, I don’t envision Apple straying too far away from the energy of computing. And specifically the management of the energy of its own computing products.
Being able to make the energy information of its computing devices even just more transparent would be useful to offer to its hardware customers. Offering an interface that customers can use to manage, or even vary, the charge of various Apple gadgets, would also be something that could help Apple’s move into the broader digital home, following devices like the Apple TV.
Other consumer electronics companies are moving into energy management via the home automation market (like Control4), or the appliance market like GE. But an Apple energy gadget offering could be an even more powerful combo than what is currently emerging from the nascent home energy management market. As some analysts have pointed out the future of the home energy market in the long term will lie with consumers, and companies that “get” what customers want in terms of easy design and functionality.
As Gartner analyst Zarco Sumic told us “The vendors that will dominate will be the ones who know how to market, sell and meet the needs of the consumer space. It is a consumer technology play. It is not a utility play." That’s Apple’s forte: sleek design and oh-so-easy-to-use interfaces.
Intel appears to have a similar strategy to Apple in terms of energy management, at least in terms of seeing it through the lens of devices. Intel has been developing prototypes like its home energy management concept gadget, but I don’t envision the chip maker turning that into a real product. Intel’s research is more like Apple’s in that it’s interesting to show just how important the energy of computing will be going forward for IT firms and developers.
The energy consumed by information technology — including broadband and cellular networks, computing devices that connect to the networks and data centers — makes up roughly 2 percent of the world’s total carbon emissions, according to The Climate Group. In 2007 almost 50 percent of that carbon footprint was made up by edge computing devices like PCs, peripherals and printers. But by 2020 57 percent of that carbon footprint will come from PCs, peripherals and printers. In other words the energy consumption of our always-on gadgets and computing devices will only grow over the next decade, and companies will need to figure out innovative ways to track and manage that energy consumption.
Apple’s ability to single-handedly disrupt markets, shouldn’t be underestimated. The company remade the mobile industry with its revolutionary introduction of the iPhone, and has been dominating the digital music market with the iPod and iTunes for years. For those not familiar with the Apple-rumor mill that ebbs and flows in tune to upcoming presentations from Apple CEO Steve Jobs (the latest info is swirling around the Apple tablet) there’s an entire ecosystem of Apple rumor blogs and media that track and speculate on Apple’s famously stealthy moves (see GigaOM’s The Apple Blog here).
While I don’t begin to pretend what Apple intends to offer in terms of energy management, Apple is clearly weighing its options and through this patent signals how computing companies will have to increasingly take into account the importance of energy.
Related posts: Control4 App Store: Home Energy Management Trailblazer?
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