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One of the most bandied-about promises by those involved in creating the smart grid is that it will allow consumers to network their appliances with a smart meter, letting them view real-time information about their energy usage and even program their appliances to operate at off-peak hours.
Sounds easy enough. Especially for those of us who have grown accustomed to living in this electronic age — of which, by virtue of reading this post online, you are a member. Think of your smart meter as a home PC. You can connect dozens of electronic devices to it: router, printer, USB hub, external hard drive, web cam, and on and on. Basic stuff.
But what if some of those peripherals had no USB or Firewire ports, or if each had an entirely different type of connection? And what if some or all of the peripherals ran on a different operating system software, some of it long outdated; how would you then get the devices to speak to each other? What if there were no standards?
That pretty much sums up the challenge facing those who are developing demand-response (DR) appliances and the technology that will allow them to communicate with smart meters. At present, there is no common standard that governs how smart meters and DR appliances communicate in home area networks. That leaves the companies that build the appliances and those that manufacture the smart meters having to take some leaps of faith when it comes to deciding which technology to use in their products.
The good news: the recently-released NIST Framework and Roadmap for Smart Grid Interoperability Standards has made the development of direct-response standards a “top priority.” As the report’s authors note: “lack of widely accepted signals across the entire DR signaling and validation chain hinders widespread deployment of these technologies.” Fortunately for the industry and for consumers, NIST has targeted the publication of draft DR specification by January 2010.
Studies show that when consumers have access to real-time or near real-time energy usage information, they make better decisions about their energy use and energy conservation. In a recent smart meter pilot program in Fayetteville, North Carolina, homeowners participating in the program reduced their average electricity consumption by an initial 20 percent.
Several states, including California and Texas, have even mandated customer access to their energy usage information in 2010. For these reasons, the NIST also made the development of standards for energy usage information a top priority too.
The NIST’s initial plan calls for developing a summary of exactly what metering and billing information needs to be collected, how it’s collected, and which technologies are used to make that information accessible to the consumer. As with the DR standards, the energy usage information standards are expected by January 2010.
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