Symphony of Intelligence
In an area of deployment, where the generating capacity is reaching critical, the art of the design
of Negawatt will enable verifiable load shed feedback with prioritization of conditions not seen the
residential market to date.
It's all common sense, with computerized assistance
The profile of the customer's preferences enables the individual to have custom fitted energy sav-
ing programs to fit their individual needs, lifestyle, health or medical conditions, work at home
schedule, and security issues. This will be matched with negotiated preference and necessities of
the utility condition at that time - meaning if a critical load shed is required the utility will take
priority. Customer will see the benefit by allowing conflicts to be granted to the utility, because the
alternative is a total blackout. Also, home automation will become a by-product of command &
control. A homeowner could, for example, turn off exterior lights by clicking on a field on their
personal Negawatt page with their laptop, BlackBerry, iPhone, whatever - from where ever in the
world they are.
Let's follow out a simple example. The utility is calling for a 20 MW shed to occur in 30 minutes, so issues a XML transmission to 15,000 homes for status check of water heaters, pool pumps, and HVAC. It's then determined that 8 MW can be shed by the 100% control of water and pools, and another 7 MW by the AC units currently in use. It can even perform a quick cooling of the non-cycled units to give them a blast of cool air prior to the shed event, and then switch off the entire area bringing the shed to 18 MW. It will then reach out for a neighborhood to switch off water and pools bringing the load shed to their needed value. After a period of time, the utility can perform a rolling cooling of homes for a selected period affording the allocation of power on a controlled basis. Other non essential services can be selectively cycled, remotely disconnected, or put back in service with the orchestration of robotic intelligence. On an individual home, the impact may be felt but not excessively intrusive, and the area of coverage will be spread out over hundreds of thousands of homes over altering periods of time allowing each home a shift in services to allow minimum electrical usage for essential items such as freezers and communications.
A neighborhood's street lights can be turned off but traffic lights remain on. This common sense approach is carried out throughout the priority of the household needs, placed against the needs of the utility. Hording of power is halted. Lifeline support is maintained. Control is dynamically allocated.
Battery back up? Not needed ~ save the energy.
One technical issue is the loss of power for C&C. The technology of HPCCv1.0 allows for "set it and forget it" commands - meaning you can tell a device to switch off at a predetermined time for a set interval of time, and to turn on after the time has elapsed. This minimum level of clocking power is no more that a small capacitor or battery in the device necessary to keep the clock. Each module, whether it is a wall switch, appliance, breaker or whatever, can be instructed to perform distributed control of commands. This is also a precaution in the event of outages by nature, where once again devices can be booted to achieve a recognition pattern of events and make appropriate distributed processing decisions based on downloaded and flashed firmware.
The financial account established by the Negawatt program would, in an analogy, follow the guidelines of the HSA - or Health Savings Account model.
Under the plan, savings of money contributed by utilities under demand response programs and energy reduction programs can be viewed by an individual on their Negawatt profile homepage. This account, growing, would be a very powerful incentive for Negawatt users to see a clear benefit other than lower bills. Money in this account can be used for purchases of other energy conservation products and services. For example, someone can "tint" their windows to provide less energy needed for cooling in their house out of the money gained from reducing their HVAC usage. Many Federal and State governmental programs are focused on creating initiatives to entice and enhance energy conservation, and this will ball within alignment of such programs.
There will be tax issues affecting the money, and for that legislation may be necessary and be on a time frame beyond the scope of Negawatt development and deployment. These issues will not be a discussion of this business plan although the account will be a focal point of the company's proposal.
Items that would fall within the Negawatt Account program would include:
--discounts on utility bills
--an avenue for funds to be received for power placed into the grid
--Purchasing of CFL (Compact Fluorescent Lighting)
--Carbon offset credits
--Insulation and energy saving building enhancements
--Solar, wind or geothermal systems or components
--Command & Control peripherals such as data frames, thermostats, motion detectors
--referral bonuses for adding other properties or customers to the program
