ITEXPO Speaker: Will the Smart Grid Dominate in 2010?

The year 2010 is sure to offer innovation in products, but it is still unclear as to what will really make an impact in the market.

 

To get an idea of what to expect, TMCnet’s Rich Tehrani (News - Alert) spoke with Didier Boivin, vice president, marketing, Watteco, in an interview provided in full below.

 

Boivin believes some of the most important innovations will evolve out of Cisco’s (News - Alert) Smart Grid Ecosystem. While 2009 did present certain challenges for Watteco, Boivin also noted that it brought a renewed focus on and investment in smart-energy technologies.

 

At the ITEXPO (News - Alert) East, Boivin is scheduled to speak during a session entitled, “Home Energy Management and a Smart Home Opportunities.” Attendees can learn about the opportunities and challenges of home energy management, including real-time data access, device interoperability and consumer privacy.

 

Their conversation follows:

 

 

Didier Boivin: I believe some of the most important 2010 innovations will evolve out of Cisco’s September 2009 formation of the Cisco Smart Grid Ecosystem, which is facilitating the adoption of Internet Protocol-based communications standards for Smart Grids that will benefit the energy industry as well as business and residential customers. The members of the Cisco Smart Grid ecosystem include system integrators, technology vendors, power and utility integrators, service providers and services and sales vendors who represent various elements of the Smart Grid infrastructure. Ecosystem members are working with Cisco to support interoperability testing and enable industry migration to an IP-based infrastructure for smart grids and energy management applications, all the way from generation to businesses and homes.

This effort will help reduce the cost and complexity of deploying multivendor smart grid communications infrastructure solutions for both utility companies and ecosystem members.

We strongly endorse this vision of intelligent and resilient end-to-end management of power distribution and, alongside other ecosystem members, are developing products that will help the industry realize what companies like Cisco have described as a complete electricity system communications fabric – from electrical generation to business and the home – based on IP standards.

The ultimate goal is for any device to be able to talk to any other device at any location -- in the home, at the meter, at the substation, or in “the grid.”

 

 

DB: As it did for most companies, 2009 presented many challenges. But the year also brought a renewed focus on, and investment in, smart-energy technologies like those from Watteco that reduce costs and power consumption. The European, North American and Asian AMI/smart-metering markets are all growing. For the next two years, we see tremendous opportunities for devices that support both wired and wireless IP-based Smart Grid connectivity.

 

To support this growing demand, Watteco established its U.S. sales, marketing and technical support headquarters in Santa Clara, Calif., during 2009. The office serves as the anchor for our growing North American business operations. We also launched several key powerline networking products for the residential energy-management market. Watteco also joined Cisco’s smart grid ecosystem group, which is designed to facilitate the adoption of IP-based communications standards for smart grids that will benefit the energy industry, as well as business and residential customers.

 

DB: I would continue and expand the Obama administration current stimulus plan in the area of energy technologies, which is accelerating Smart Grid installations through a smart meter deployment mandate driven by the NIST at the Department of Energy.
Consumers are still for most part not really sensitive to the need of efforts when it comes to energy efficiency and management. As we all know to be accepted by consumers, there is a need to educate and a possible effort in that area should be possible with the help of subsidies to develop products that will facilitate this education process.

 

DB: Altogether, the total market for smart grid type of devices integrated into In-Home Smart Grid and Home Control systems is expected to be more than 600 million devices in 2012. ABI Research (News - Alert) has said that, “two new approaches to home automation – ‘mainstream’ systems based on standardized technologies and packaged components, and home automation as a managed service offered through a broadband or wireless service provider – have the potential for such broad market appeal that new research forecasts shipments to grow more than 50-fold between 2007 and 2013. In addition to Smart Grid and Home Control applications, there are also opportunities for low-cost, ultra-low-power, small-profile devices in photovoltaic field management for solar panels, and in street lighting management, for which the total addressable market for devices could grow to 18 million in 2012. These growth opportunities will accelerate as innovators bring compact, low-cost, easy-to-deploy, highly integrated System-on-Chip solutions to market.

 

DB: I will be speaking during a session entitled “Home Energy Management and a Smart Home Opportunities” on Jan. 21 at 4p.m. The session will discuss the opportunities and challenges of home energy management including real-time data access, device interoperability, consumer privacy and the impact of government regulations. I will discuss the technologies that will be required for core, “Smart Plug” technology, which will need to reach capabilities of a few hundred kilobits per second, consuming several tens of milliwatts of power, in a footprint that’s less than a few square centimeters. This will require an SoC approach that leverages multiple processor cores and companion task accelerators. Smart home technology providers and telcos engaged in in-home communications management are encouraged to attend the session.

 

DB: Developed countries will finalize an aggressive plan at the next climate conference in 2010 to avoid a repeat of the one in Copenhagen…!