The market
The global market for intelligent network technologies should exceed $ 110 billion in 2011 and should continue to grow to reach $ 171 billion by 2014. The strongest growth is expected on the smart sensor market which should more than double, Going from 37 to 85 billion dollars between 2009 and 2014. TI hardware and software also benefits from rapid expansion during the same period, from $ 15 to 40 billion, while integrated communication systems will almost triple, going from 10 to 27 billion. However, the highest annual rate of annual compound is planned for intelligent material and counting software, going from a low $ 6.4 billion to just under $ 20 billion five years later. The American market was in 2010 the largest in the world, estimated at $ 21.4 billion, and it is expected that it will reach $ 43 billion in 2014. However, by then, it will be overshadowed by the market Chinese who is expected to reach $ 61.4 billion. The intelligent counting transmits and organizes data waves collected by the meters. This stimulates business growth like General Electric, Siemens, IBM, Itron, Landis+Gyr that provide equipment to be installed in millions of households. Suppliers of intelligent networks like Silver Spring Networks and Surveillance Surveillance Surveillance Tendril, Openpeak and Control4 are fighting for domination. However, behind the dozens of start-ups hide the pillars of the Internet boom, such as Intel and Cisco Systems, which provide additional income for public services which go from the status of energy and water suppliers to that of complete service companies.
Innovation
Most public services deployed in industrialized countries were built between 60 and 80 years ago. It was designed to provide as much energy, water and gas that customers can consume it, from a huge fossil fuel factory. Concerns related to climate change and renewable energy mandates force public services to modernize their infrastructure. In order to accommodate renewable energy sources on an intermittent basis, it is necessary to carry out measurements, monitoring, control, analysis and a specific correction. Innovations have therefore focused on mobile communications, IP standards, data processing and mining. The counters and the network are connected, communicate and become smarter, while the average American house has 24 consumer electronic devices, compared to 3 in 1980. Electronics now represents 31 % of domestic energy consumption, and satellite And the cable television receiver consume more energy today than a family -sized refrigerator. The time has come to go beyond smart meters, beyond aggregated data. Dan Yates, computer graduate from Harvard University, began his entrepreneurial career as a founder of Edusoft, an educational software company that assesses performance. After sold the business, he undertook to realize a child's dream by driving with his wife from the Arctic coast of Alaska to the extreme South of South America. During the trip, Dan became aware of the deterioration of the environment and decided to devote his professional life to the sustainability of the company. He realized that energy consumption is one of the main culprits and is committed to exploiting his computer skills to involve millions of people who are in ignorance of their energy consumption. In 2007, he created Opower starting with a rented office in San Francisco. In 2011, he was a finalist for the Ernst & Young Prize of the entrepreneur of the year and already had more than 200 employees - and this number continues to grow.
The first cash flow
Dan and his team invented a new platform allowing public service companies to interact with their customers - of the quality of the information provided to the way it is presented and disseminated, by helping people to use energy effectively , by saving money by making energy consumption personally relevant. It begins with a report on the energy consumption of a house which reviews the amount of energy consumed by the house, when and at what price. Today, Opower provides reports to more than 3 million households, putting people on the right track to save hundreds of millions of dollars. Public service companies have put a lot of information on prices - only to realize that their customers barely browse on their website. Dan and his colleagues transform the public service website into highly personalized and engaging energy management tools. These include alerts indicating consumption tips and immediate advice on how to avoid them. As Dan does not believe that it is necessary to flood people of data and cards, he filed a patent application to convert this flow of information to simple, practical and personal advice. Opower does not produce electricity, he works with what is available, and makes the network more effective, thus applying one of the fundamental principles of the blue economy. By working with more than 50 public service companies, Opower has saved in a few years as much energy as what is produced by 40 % of the American solar industry without any compromise on the quality of life.
The opportunity
A study by the University of Oxford has confirmed that when consumers have real -time information on their electricity consumption, they can act and reduce their consumption by 10 % without changing anything in their current system. A Chilean team led by Gabriel Antonio Villalón Sepúlveda and Robinson Eduardo Gálvez Herrera, both electricians, took a step more than Optower. Their intelligent network offers real -time electricity consumption data and displays performance data in real time, both in KW consumed and cost for each electrical device lit at home. Their software compares actual consumption with theoretical performance, detecting underperformance and overconsumption. It also checks if the equipment is really necessary at this particular moment, and if the standby mode is not better converted into complete stop mode using a remote control. If, on the other hand, the data indicates that certain machines must be started, the system provides for a start -up. The entire management begins with the existing installation, evolving towards an optimization including the instantaneous calculation of the carbon emission savings, depending on the energy source for the electricity supplier. This Santiago -based team from Chile then created the Ekeeper, and each customer is equipped with a portable screen, the size of a GPS, which provides all the information and allows you to perform corrective actions via any mobile phone or computer interface. These experiences of Opower and Ekeeper will soon be supplemented by intelligent networks that will regulate energy production from multiple renewable energy sources created at home or at the office, and not only by the company of service . The next intelligent network combines production and consumption at home to create real sustainability, by controlling all uses as is the case today, by completing them with the management of local electricity supply ranging from resistance At the compression of the building (case 59), the recovery of the energy of the water heaters (case 60), the energy produced by the water flow (case 42), the solar cells in the slim layer of the windows, the Wind vibrations (case 12), biogas of wastewater and organic solid waste (Case 51) and thermal exchange of black walls (Case 14). None of these energy sources provides energy all day, or provides enough energy to meet all needs on its own, it takes an intelligent network to manage the supply of these sources of rather tiny electricity. The intelligent network of the future will not be content to monitor consumption and individual costs, it will also regulate the individual supply of electricity from more than a dozen sources in order to guarantee the availability of electricity at any time . This is one of the essential characteristics of the Blue Economy Center that will not only integrate the energies described, but also the next generation of intelligent networks.
