There is an old Irish joke in which a traveler asks for directions to Limerick and is told, “Well, you wouldn’t want to be starting from here.” That is the major problem facing the clean tech industry today.
Capital-intensive renewable power projects are now at a place where governments around the world are delaying their commitment to spend — at a time of economic austerity and fear of political suicide if they allow electricity charges to go up. In addition, the centralized structure of the electrical utility industry through which most of the renewable power will be traded is not the most appropriate structure and is not yet fully on board.
The consequence of this is that in the U.S. for the first 10 months of 2013, compared with the same period in 2012, new capacity from all power sources declined by 27.5 percent (from 17,008 MW to 12,327 MW).
However, there is a more appropriate direction that will take us down the path to reach our destination of a low-carbon economy in the 21st century. This can be accomplished by simply putting a lot more effort into reducing CO2 emissions in buildings and cities.
Industry experts expect that in 2014 this will be the direction and route that governments will take, including through the provision of more attractive financial inducements for those who install plant equipment and controls that reduce energy consumption in buildings and by implementing more stringent regulatory targets. These initiatives can be achieved through private investment with technologies that are now well-proven and through a capable competitive supply structure that delivers.
Smart cities provide further support for such efforts. As cities across the world face aging infrastructures and dwindling financial resources, city governments will increasingly undertake initiatives to manage these challenges, using such innovations as smart grid technologies for grid modernization; outage management; and integration of a variety of power generation sources, including on-premises generation and consumer energy management solutions.
New York state’s clean energy industry announced in December 2013 a $210 million investment in initial capitalization for the New York Green Bank, a new initiative created to leverage public funds into private investment to boost clean-energy projects. The key to its success is moving from government subsidies to a self-sustaining clean-energy engine.
Having struggled for the past 15 years to get environmental services — building energy management systems (BEMS), enterprise energy management (EEM) software, smart grids, LED lighting — to work together, we have now reached a point where connectivity can be achieved directly through Internet protocol (IP) allowing the “Internet of energy” to become a reality.
For example, LED lighting controls could act as a stratagem for the “IoE” in buildings. Each new LED fixture can, in essence, become the node on an intelligent control, turning off the lights when people aren’t around or dimming them when exterior light can be harvested. But those sensors also can be used to harvest other useful data about temperature, occupancy and their surroundings that have many other applications.
Historically, building control applications have been HVAC-centric because that was the element where controls could add significant value, particularly in new construction applications. In many retrofit situations, the return on investment rate for HVAC-oriented building automation has not been compelling, so the majority of buildings around the world are still waiting to be converted to “smart” systems.
The case for retrofitting buildings with LED lighting has become compelling, and wireless technology has negated the need for control wiring, reducing the installation costs. This will result in LED lighting controls being installed in many more buildings that don’t have building energy management systems.
The case for retrofitting buildings with LED lighting has become compelling, and wireless technology has negated the need for control wiring, reducing the installation costs. This will result in LED lighting controls being installed in many more buildings that don’t have building energy management systems.
Bus-based lighting controls have taken the responsibility for controlling HVAC services, but this has been on relatively small- to medium-sized projects where heating and cooling is achieved through a combination of chilled beams and natural ventilation. This approach requires blinds to control solar gain and the lighting controls fall into the low-voltage category, which are engineered and designed through the electrical contract and not the mechanical, as is the case with BEMS.
The key difference is that, for these projects, the controls applications will be lighting-centric rather than HVAC-centric, which may result in the emergence of new industry players and new application delivery mechanisms as well as major changes to existing industry structures and a need for suppliers to adopt new business models.
Technical synergy combined with the fact that the supply structure is becoming interrelated further strengthens the industry’s ability to provide both more efficient and lower-cost solutions. BEMS and EEM are working together to deliver distributed energy and demand-response services connecting across smart buildings and smart grids.
This approach reinforces the notion that, together, they can reach across associated applications. There is no doubt that through alliance, acquisition and integration, these two separate businesses will play a vital role in maximizing energy conservation in buildings while generating income and reducing operating costs.
Leading BEMS companies have massive heritage estates and are among the world’s major energy service companies (ESCOs). They are therefore in a strong position to help EEM suppliers get a foothold in the smart building market.
However, BEMS suppliers and ESCOs also are intent on taking a piece of the EEM business. Although not particularly well known for their prowess in EEM, they have been acquiring companies with this expertise for the past five years.
The supply side is investing heavily in developing both hardware and software products to ensure that they have the solutions that will make the investment in energy conservation in smart buildings and smart cities a “no brainer.”
Allan P. McHale, CEng, MIMechE, MEI, MBIM, has a career spanning 40 years in the energy and building controls industry. In 1980, he formed Proplan to provide consultancy services in the marketing and business development of products for security, safety and environmental control in buildings. In 2008, the assets of Proplan were acquired, and McHale became a founder member of Memoori Business Intelligence Ltd, a Web-based intelligence service focused on intelligent controls in buildings.
This article was provide by Multibriefs.
