Silver Spring expands Partnership with OG&E on Customer Engagement and Demand Response

Silver Spring Networks is leading provider of smart grid platforms. Recently, they announced that their company is expanding its partnership with Oklahoma’s largest electric company, OG&E. The electric company is expanding its work with Silver Spring as they begin their second year of its demand response study, which currently serves 6,000 OG&E customers. OG&E will leverage Silver Spring for installation, demand management software, in-home energy management technologies, online enrollment services, and program management for the study.

By providing the Silver Spring’s CustomerIQ web portal to its entire smart meter customer base, OG&E has dramatically increased its smart grid leadership in consumer engagement, delivering customer participation, outreach, research and the economic benefits of deploying smart grid technology. Efficiencies created by the Positive Energy Together® program, OG&E estimates it could avoid building two new peaking generation plants between now and 2016.

OG&E is the first utility to offer the recently enhanced and expanded version of the CustomerIQ web portal to all 775,000 of its customers. CustomerIQ enables utilities to directly engage customers to reduce support costs and deliver energy efficiency improvements in meeting overall demand reduction goals.

Silver Spring is leading OG&E’s implementation of a fully integrated demand response solution this summer, to an additional 3,000 residential and business customers. OG&E uses the Silver Spring UtilityIQTM Demand Response Manager back-office software, because the software leverages the Silver Spring IP-based network, which supports multiple smart grid applications on common infrastructure.

For the summer of 2011, participants who volunteer for the second phase of the study will have the opportunity to manage their electricity use and costs with Control4® EC-100 in-home energy displays and the Energate Pioneer PCT. OG&E will use study results from 2010 and 2011 to determine how customers respond to price signals and information delivered via smart technology to reduce energy consumption during peak demand and price periods.

Control4 and Silver Spring Networks Announce Strategic Reseller Agreement

Control4, a leader in affordable IP-based home control systems, announced the signing of a strategic reselling agreement with Silver Spring Networks, a leading Smart Grid solutions provider. Together, they now offer a Home Area Network (HAN) solution interoperable with utility Smart Grid and Demand Response systems.

By offering the Control4® Energy Management System (EMS) 100, Silver Spring extends its Demand Response solution to deliver an engaging in-home experience, exchanging up-to-the minute consumption data between customer and utility and providing intelligent automation and control of smart devices throughout the house. The combined solution incorporates Silver Spring’s Advanced Metering, UtilityIQ and CustomerIQ applications with Control4® ADVANTAGE software, Control4® EC-100 Energy Controllers, and Control4® WT-100 wireless programmable thermostats, providing a comprehensive solution set for utilities of all sizes.

The EC-100 is one of the several ways that Control4 addresses energy management in the home. Control4’s energy solutions span from energy management applications in the 4Store to utility driven deployments of the EC-100, offering consumers a variety of cost effective, energy saving options.

For the complete article, please click here.

Itron and Silver Spring Networks Expand Agreement

Itron Inc. and Silver Spring Networks announced today that they have finalized an expanded agreement to integrate Itron’s CENTRON® II electricity meters, 100G gas ERT® modules and 100W water ERT® modules with Silver Spring’s Smart Energy Platform.

Under the terms of the agreement, the companies have addressed the technical, functional and solution delivery issues required to deliver a robust, multi-vendor advanced metering solution for gas, water and electricity providers. This further extends our existing agreement which provides for compatibility of the Itron CENTRON I electricity meter with the Silver Spring Smart Energy Platform.

Integration between the Itron modules and Silver Spring Smart Energy Platform is underway. Orders will soon be accepted for delivery in mid-2011.

For the complete article, please click here.