Can Home Networking Find A Happy Medium?

Furthermore, many states are pushing energy monitoring and control methods through local utility companies—systems that require some kind of network connection. But will these networks be separate from or part of the home entertainment network? Apparently, it can go either way. The most likely approach right now, though, seems to be a separate network for monitor and control functions.

ZigBee already addresses this home-networking niche. The low-speed, 2.4-GHz unlicensed wireless technology is ideal for setting up point-to-point, point-tomultipoint, and mesh networks to control lighting, appliances, and other electrical devices. Such systems are already on the market using ZigBee, Z-Wave, and other wireless standards.

One interesting development is that the HomePlug Powerline Alliance and the ZigBee Alliance are joining forces to create a way for the ZigBee stack to run over the HomePlug ac power-line PHY. Along with major utility companies, these groups hope to build the Home Area Network (HAN) Green Ecosystem for controlling load devices at peak demand. Covering everything from thermostats, pool pumps, and white goods to electric vehicles, it would ultimately provide real-time information to the consumer. In fact, larger states like California and Texas have public utilities commissions (PUCs) that mandate the implementation of an automatic metering infrastructure (AMI).

With an AMI, electric and gas utilities can have two-way access to the home heating and air-conditioning systems as well as other heavy-energy home systems like hot-water heaters and pool heaters. The nation’s energy policy demands such systems be in place by 2013. The utility company would control your energy usage based on your volunteer approach to set temperatures or to minimize cycling. This will cut your utility bill and save enormous amounts of energy overall.

According to Ed Drew, director of utilities solutions for machine-to-machine (M2M) company KORE Telematics, such an energy monitoring and control system might be a ZigBee network within the home linked to thermostats and other devices. The ZigBee node would then form a neighborhood-area network (NAN) with homes nearby to provide the communications link back to the utility company.

Several hundred homes in the mesh would transmit their data and any control information to a central collection point linked to the utility via M2M cellular backhaul. Texas and California already have such systems in place and seek to expand them over the years. Most other big states are also looking at this approach as we become a greener nation.