WSN Buzz
Fresh updates on wireless networks standards and new technologies
Archive for June, 2009
June 30, 2009 at 3:33 pm · Filed under WirelessHART
Emerson Process Management announces a series of free web seminars for professionals in the chemical industry. The seminars will demonstrate how Emerson’s open standard WirelessHART™ process automation solutions can be used in real world installations to help users achieve challenging business targets by enabling safer and leaner operations, and reducing costs.
The first web seminar, tailored to the needs of senior plant management, will take place on Monday 6th July. The planned programme includes seminars for project, operations and maintenance personnel to take place later this year in October, November and December.
By participating in these web seminars, delegates will learn how new wireless process automation can improve the bottom line of their plant. This will be demonstrated using typical wireless applications based on existing Installations. Topics to be covered include plant safety, workforce productivity, process diagnostic information, maximising production and minimising costs, proactive maintenance best practices and equipment lifecycle management.
To join or find out more about Emerson’s wireless web seminar programme – visit www.EmersonProcess.eu/ChemicalWebinar and you will receive the joining instructions by email.
June 30, 2009 at 10:10 am · Filed under ZigBee
New energy harvesting, no battery required feature set expands
ZigBee networks
The ZigBee(R) Alliance, a global ecosystem of companies creating wireless solutions for use in energy management, commercial and consumer applications, today announced development of the ZigBee Green Power feature set to establish a global, standard technology for self-powered devices operating through energy harvesting techniques. These devices will communicate seamlessly with existing ZigBee and ZigBee PRO networks and will enable maintenance free, environmentally friendly products that eliminate the need for wires and batteries to power control devices.
ZigBee Green Power enables new capabilities available to the ZigBee and ZigBee PRO networks. When the ZigBee Green Power standard is made available to Alliance members at the end of 2009, only ZigBee will offer an established,
competitive marketplace for deploying switches, sensors and controllers using harvested energy in residential, commercial and industrial environments. Itsenergy harvesting capabilities will give manufacturers greater flexibility
when designing innovative ZigBee products and solutions.
More here.
June 25, 2009 at 6:11 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
A new alliance led by IBM aims to improve energy, water, waste and greenhouse gas management through interoperability. Green Sigma applies Lean Six Sigma principles and practices to these areas.
IBM is teaming with ABB, Cisco, Eaton, ESS, Honeywell Building Solutions, Johnson Controls, SAP, Schneider Electric, and Siemens Building Technologies Division to create the Green Sigma Coalition.
The partner companies will work with IBM to integrate their products and services with IBM’s Green Sigma offering, which applies Lean Six Sigma principles and practices to energy, water, waste and greenhouse gas emissions in all operational areas, including transportation, IT systems, manufacturing and distribution, offices, and retail spaces, IBM officials explained.
“As we all work toward creating a greener, smarter planet, it is plain that none of us can get there alone,” said Rich Lechner, IBM vice president for energy and environment.
More here.
June 25, 2009 at 6:03 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Microsoft Hohm is a free home energy management site that will soon be available throughout the United States. But that’s just the first step in a plan that includes home energy management devices like thermostats and smart plugs.
Microsoft has entered the home energy efficiency sector Wednesday with the launch of Microsoft Hohm – a free website that, like a host of others being developed by startups like Greenbox and giants like Google, allows homeowners to analyze and react to home energy usage data to save power and money.
But that’s just the start of the software giant’s plans for home energy. Eventually it envisions providing home energy management devices like smart thermostats and “smart plugs,” all leading to a business in reducing home energy use to help utilities.
That’s the vision Troy Batterberry, product unit manager for Microsoft energy management and home automation, laid out for the new site, which is expected to be available throughout the United States some time next week at www.microsoft-hohm.com.
More here.
June 25, 2009 at 6:00 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
The ZigBee(R) Alliance and HomePlug(R) Powerline Alliance today announced public availability of the next generation market requirements for Smart Energy, and supporting use cases. Smart Energy enables both wired and wireless communication between utility companies and everyday household devices such as smart thermostats and appliances. Captured in the market requirements document are details for the next generation of functionality envisioned for the Smart Grid with accompanying consumer control. It includes insight to a variety of use cases including plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) charging, installation, configuration, firmware download for home area network (HAN) devices, prepay services, user information and messaging, load control, demand response, and common information and application profile interfaces for wired and wireless HANs.
The Smart Energy market requirements document is available for review at http://www.zigbee.org/smartenergy. It was jointly developed by ZigBee Alliance members, HomePlug Powerline Alliance members, utilities, regulators, suppliers and technology providers as a foundation for an enhanced ZigBee Smart Energy profile and as the basis for global standards development by other organizations. On May 18, the ZigBee/HomePlug Smart Energy profile was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) as an initial interoperable standard for HAN devices and communications and information model.
More here.
June 25, 2009 at 5:59 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
The Continua Health Alliance, a consortium of wireless and medical companies, which aim to create an interoperable ecosystem of medical devices and systems, has been busy this year. After announcing its first two Continua-certified products, the Alliance also announced two new wireless technologies for its Version 2 guidelines: ZigBee and Bluetooth Low Energy. Most of the devices under Continua’s purview are in the wheelhouse of wireless remote monitoring.
…
Chuck Parker, Executive Director of Continua Health Alliance, said that remote patient monitoring doesn’t need to do anymore trials or pilots. The Veterans Health Administration (VA) has done remote patient monitoring pilots with about 30,000 patients over the past four years, Parker said. That’s enough pilots, Parker said, we don’t need to do any more pilots for remote patient monitoring; we need to move to deployments, and look to the VA for their pilots’ findings.
More here.
June 25, 2009 at 5:57 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Now that the United States has committed $4.5 billion to implement so-called smart grid technology over its energy infrastructure, AT&T is trying to stay ahead of the curve by getting into the smart grid sensor business.
AT&T Wesdnesday announced a deal with energy technology vendor Cooper Power Systems to jointly sell and market sensor devices that will be activated on smart grid power networks. The sensors will run over AT&T’s wireless data network and AT&T says they will deliver “real-time performance data” to help utility companies “efficiently operate their electric grids, reduce the need for on-site inspection and identify and solve problems that could cause outages or increase system energy losses.”
Cooper Power Systems’ Energy Automation Solutions wing concentrates mainly on developing smart grid technologies that help utility companies improve their metering infrastructure, their responses to power demands and sensors that monitor power use. Under its agreement with AT&T, Cooper Power will run two of its core smart grid technologies over AT&T’s network; the OutageAvisor, which helps utility companies locate outage along their delivery lines; and the VARAdvisor, which AT&T describes as “a low-cost sensor alternative to manual inspection of equipment that controls the voltage supplied to consumers.”
More here.
June 24, 2009 at 6:07 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
There’s been plenty of hype about the Smart Grid — some justified and some not. But the gold award for Smart Grid hype has to go to Cisco, whose spokesperson last month said that the grid could end up being up to 1,000 times the size of the Internet. Martin LaMonica of CNet wrote last month that Cisco believes that just the communications portion of the Smart Grid represents a $100 billion opportunity — “$20 billion a year over the next five years.”
That’s certainly reasonable and believable. LaMonica interviewed Marie Hattar, vice president of marketing in Cisco’s Network Systems Solutions group, who then seemed to ratchet up the hype at least a notch.
Hattar noted that Cisco already had a variety of products designed for the Smart Grid, such as various pieces of data center equipment. It also has released EnergyWise software, which will be used to manage energy use throughout an enterprise.
Hattar added that Cisco is also developing new products designed for home use, not just use in enterprises, such as home energy controller devices for its Linksys router line, or set-top boxes that can track energy use throughout the home.
Home use of the Smart Grid represents and enormous opportunity for Cisco and other companies, who may develop devices that attach to home appliances to connect to the Smart Grid. Hatar noted:
“Our expectation is that this network will be 100 or 1,000 times larger than the Internet. If you think about it, some homes have Internet access, but some don’t. Everyone has electricity access–all of those homes could potentially be connected.”
Clearly, the Smart Grid will not dwarf the Internet in that way. I can’t blame her for her enthusiasm about the technology — I share it as well. But 1,000 times larger than the Internet? Don’t expect that to happen.
June 23, 2009 at 5:54 pm · Filed under Powerline
We put four PowerLine adapter kits to the test. Can they carry a full load of media around the house using the power grid? Short answer: No, not really.
Back in 2000, a group of electronic device and networking manufacturers got together and founded an industry association called the HomePlug Powerline Alliance. Their objective was both interesting and appealing and has generated considerable interest and buzz from consumers: to develop networking devices that can plug into standard home power outlets (110/120 V 60 Hz in most of North America and 220/230 V 50 Hz in most of Europe and the rest of the world) in order to create a bridge between conventional or wireless Ethernet and power lines in the home. The idea is to let in-home wiring provide the links between rooms and around the house, while standard Ethernet or wireless devices handle the links between the HomePlug Device and PCs or other networking gear (routers, Cable/DSL modems, wireless access points, and so forth).
Beyond allowing your network to extend where it isn’t otherwise able to go, PowerLine technology offers interesting capabilities for households and small office/home office environments. It’s great for extending the reach of home media, especially for the growing number of small networks with streaming media servers or to bring media extenders or gaming consoles into the mix.
…
There’s no denying that this is a brilliant idea and helps to turn something everyone has at their disposal—in-wall electrical wiring—into the backbone or infrastructure for an in-home network. Initial implementations of this technology called HomePlug 1.0 started to appear in 2001. But it was limited to a theoretical maximum throughput of 14 Mb/s and quickly proved too slow for many in-home applications, especially multimedia (music, video, TV, and so forth). By December 2005, a second version called HomePlug AV was released, and HomePlug AV devices started hitting the market in 2006. This version is designed for HDTV and VoIP traffic in the home and supports a much higher theoretical bandwidth of 189 Mb/s. However, you will see that the Alliance Web pages claim rates up to 200 Mb/s, while other sources use a more conservative estimate—and as our test results will show, these claims are more or less moot anyway.
More here.
June 23, 2009 at 5:50 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
CNET’s Martin LaMonica raised the interesting question last week: Is there an investment bubble building around the smart grid? He cites the opinions of several investors worried about too much money being invested by venture capitalists, corporations like Cisco and IBM, and even governments. From my perspective, there is one clear area of the smart grid that is seeing too much investment from venture capitalists, specifically — home energy management tools — but much of the smart grid investments coming from IT firms and the federal government just represent the first phase of funds that will help build a potentially huge market. At this point I don’t see unreasonable amounts of money being invested into many other areas of the very nascent smart grid sector.
…
But venture capitalists have clearly been flocking to the home energy management space. It’s a favorite for VCs partly because they can easily understand it — it looks (and is) about connected gadgets, software and wireless communications. At this point the amount of VC-backed companies is really starting to get out of control. Earlier this month both home energy management dashboard companies Tendril and AlertMe raised multimillion-dollar rounds; last week home energy management startup EcoDog raised $4.6 million. Here are 10 startups that are offering home energy management tools and another that is using open source to make the products even cheaper (and result in lower margin for the companies that make the tools). Never mind the huge, blue chip companies that are also building these tools, like GE.
More here.
Next entries »
