Cisco Powers Up Energy Management Tools for Utilities, Consumers, Businesses

Cisco unveiled new technologies that build on its recently announced Connected Grid portfolio and help consumers and businesses better monitor and manage their energy consumption for cost and carbon savings, including an easy-to-use interface for the home environment. The Cisco Home Energy Management Solution features a Home Energy Controller along with Cisco Energy Management Services that, when provided by utilities to their customers, are designed to help consumers securely and reliably gain insight into, and easier control over, their energy use.

Additionally, Cisco announced key updates to its Smart Connected Buildings portfolio, including the new Cisco Network Building Mediator Manager 6300, which enables centralized management of Smart Connected Buildings across global enterprise operations, and the new Cisco Network Building Mediator 3.1, which provides the platform for linking multiple disparate building automation systems and protocols over Internet Protocol and for allowing greater integration and visibility of energy flows across real estate and information technology.

For more information, click here.

AT&T Announces Smart Grid Agreement with Current Group to Deliver Grid Optimization Solutions to North American Utilities

AT&T announced it is extending its reach with smart grid solutions for utilities throughout the United States with a new agreement with CURRENT Group, a leading provider of distribution Smart Grid solutions.

AT&T will offer CURRENT Smart Grid Distribution Solutions, which help utilities increase grid efficiency and system capacity by managing demand dynamically and reducing power delivery losses. CURRENT’s solutions includes intelligent sensors and analytical software that monitor distribution grid performance; its OpenGrid utility element management system; and its System Optimization and Reliability analytical software solutions. AT&T’s suite of M2M pricing plans designed specifically for the smart grid market makes this solution an economical choice for utilities.

The agreement between AT&T and CURRENT provides utilities with an integrated solution that includes the breadth of AT&T’s managed and network services, combined with AT&T’s mobile broadband network. Having an integrated solution helps utilities to streamline deployment and reduces equipment and maintenance costs.

AT&T offers a range of strategic mobility products and services to the utility industry, including wireless solutions for field service workers, outage detection and remote monitoring for automated metering infrastructure. AT&T’s dedicated team of industry specialists understands the business process from end to end and translates technical solutions into meaningful business value for customers.

CURRENT’s innovative and industry-leading solutions deliver consumer-less energy efficiency through load reduction, improved grid operations, and helps speed the integration and management of renewable energy sources. These solutions can be deployed cost-effectively without large capital expenditures and no retrofitting. Through its dynamic measurement and verification capabilities, CURRENT’s solutions enable utilities to prove energy savings and carbon emission reductions, critical for regulatory compliance and proof of value.

The joint solution offered by AT&T and CURRENT is immediately available throughout North America.

For more information, click here.

Andres Carvallo, EVP and CSO of Grid Net to Keynote at Smart Energy Summit 2011

Parks Associates is happy to announce Andres Carvallo, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, Grid Net will be the keynote speaker of the 2011 Smart Energy Summit.

Andres brings to Grid Net more than 24 years of experience in the energy, telecommunications, computer, and software industries. Having held executive management positions since 1992, he has been responsible for the successful development and commercialization of over 40 products, in companies ranging from start-ups to market leaders such as Philips Electronics, Digital Equipment Corporation, Borland, and Microsoft.

Most recently, Andres was the chief information officer at Austin Energy, the 9th largest public power utility in the nation providing low cost reliable power to the capital city of Texas, with annual revenues over $1.3 billion, servicing 410,000 premises representing approximately 43,000 businesses and 1.2 million consumers. At Austin Energy, he was responsible for the utility’s technology vision, planning, development and operations, and a member of both the eight-person executive team and the Innovation and Opportunity Development executive board. While at Austin Energy, Andres defined and promoted the term “Smart Grid”, was the chief architect of the first Smart Grid to be fully deployed in the U.S., became the premier Smart Grid industry thought leader, and led a comprehensive, highly lauded technology transformation of the utility.

Parks Associates is proud to welcome Gigle Networks as a 2011 Smart Energy Summit sponsor

Gigle Networks provides System-on-Chip (SoC) integrated circuits and complete system solutions for multimedia home networking that can extend wired and wireless Ethernet everywhere in the home –without the need for new wires. Targeted for applications such as Internet Protocol Television (IPTV), broadband TV (BBTV), video on demand (VoD), and Voice over IP (VoIP), Gigle Networks' products offer superior performance, coverage and quality of service when compared to alternative communication technologies, and are designed to be easily integrated into consumer electronics and networked products.

For more information on the Smart Energy Summit, click here.

Parks Associates is proud to welcome HomeGrid Forum as a 2011 Smart Energy Summit sponsor.

HomeGrid Forum is a global, non-profit trade group promoting the International Telecommunication Union’s G.hn standardization efforts for next-generation wired home networking and Smart Grid applications. HomeGrid Forum promotes adoption of G.hn through technical and marketing efforts, addresses certification and interoperability of G.hn-compliant products, and cooperates with complementary industry alliances. HomeGrid Forum members include the world’s leading consumer electronics manufacturers, service providers, PC makers, and semiconductor companies.

For more information on the Smart Energy Summit, click here.

Intwine Energy Expands WiFi Thermostat Retail Presence Through Partnership With Smarthome

Intwine Energy, a leader in the development of Internet connected smart-grid products for both utilities and retail customers, announced a partnership with Smarthome, one of the world's largest online retailers of home automation products. The first in a series of Intwine products to be sold via Smarthome is the Intwine WiFi Thermostat. Other Intwine products will soon be added as they become publicly available.

The Intwine WiFi Thermostat enables residents to remotely monitor and control all home energy usage via a WiFi connection. It will display historical data/trends on past energy usage for both individual devices as well as for the entire home.

Future products in the Intwine Energy roadmap include a whole-house power monitor and smart plugs which will be components of Intwine's Solution Suite, an integrated end-to-end system that empowers homeowners to monitor and control their household energy use. The end result is lower energy usage and cost as well the ability to integrate energy usage into personal lifestyles.

For more information, click here.

Oncor Joins IBM's Global Intelligent Utility Network Coalition; Furthers Smart Grid Collaboration

IBM announced that Oncor, a Texas-based utility that delivers power to more than 3 million homes and businesses, has joined the Global Intelligent Utility Network Coalition. This group of utilities works to further the adoption of smarter energy grids around the world and now collectively serves more than 115 million energy consumers globally.

The coalition's first collaborative effort was the creation of a Smart Grid Maturity Model (SGMM), a tool that benchmarks current progress and plans long term smart grid programs. More than 70 utilities have taken the SGMM assessment to date, and since the GIUNC donated the SGMM to Carnegie Mellon's Software Engineering Institute last year, it continues to be an effective method of evaluation for utilities around the world.

New projects include:
-Ways to understand the effect on emissions due to Smart Grid deployment. The group has developed a Smart Grid Carbon Model (SGCM) that allows utilities to analyze different carbon levers due to various smart grid investments.
-Issues related to integrating distributed energy resources. The group recently completed an extensive study on Microgrids and is now shifting its focus to studying grid impact and business strategy related to electric vehicles.
-The wants and needs of the consumer related to smart grid based on learnings from current pilot projects. The group is identifying customer behavior when given certain options, types of technologies that they are likely to adopt and how they perceive service value.
-Methods that evaluate regulatory models. In order for regulators to make more informed decisions, the coalition is also developing a system dynamics model that captures all the business case benefits that Smart Grid enables including improved reliability, grid efficiency improvements, renewable energy, CO2 emissions reduction, electric vehicle adoption rates and customer conservation.

For more information, click here.