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22nd May 2007

ZigBee to play key role in low-carbon future

According to leading wireless developer Cambridge Consultants, ZigBee - the low cost, low power wireless technology - could play a significant role within the low-carbon home of the future. Due to significant pressure from leading governments, such as the UK's which wants to cut carbon emissions by 60% by 2050, the emphasis is on consumers and energy suppliers to radically cut energy consumption.

As well as generation technologies, such as micro-CHP and wind power, the low-carbon future involves many initiatives to better manage the supply and demand of electricity and gas. However, it is widely accepted that no one particular product or technology will result in drastic carbon reduction on its own. Instead a range of techniques will need to be deployed to have a positive effect and their combination will enable homes and businesses to reach national and international targets.

A crucial element in these developments will be to enable users to understand their energy use, its cost, and link this information to the primary contributors and perhaps even make suggestions to users about how they can reduce consumption. In other concepts, in exchange for favourable tariffs, a user might cede some level of energy management to the supplier, such as the control of thermostats, for example.

To provide these sorts of benefits, multiple systems within the home need to be linked by a very low power wireless network. Such systems might include thermostats on radiators, the utility meters, a home display unit and motion sensors. Making this technology simple for the homeowner to use will be crucial in realising the benefits. So, for instance, there might be pre-programmed profiles which adjust the temperatures of thermostats when the house is unoccupied or switch off appliances in unoccupied rooms. Or a user display might break down the energy usage into a simple histogram and make recommendations like: 'you can cut your bill by 20% by reducing the temperature of your central heating by two degrees'.

An important enabling technology for these developments is ZigBee. The specialised technical features of the wireless standard, in particular its mesh networking characteristics, low cost and ease of installation, means that it offers an exciting opportunity to network a consumer's home and enable them to understand and actively manage their usage levels. Importantly for the technology, we have recently seen the release of ZigBee platform solutions that include single chip silicon, reference designs and sophisticated toolkits, enabling the development of these products by non wireless specialists.

In particular, ZigBee chips from leading supplier Ember, which were developed based on cutting-edge radio technology purchased from Cambridge Consultants, have been widely adopted by OEMs and systems integrators developing and shipping more real-world products than any other vendor.

Along with sophisticated tools to support application development, these tightly integrated chips, both the EM250 full 'system on chip' and the EM260 network co-processor, offer manufacturers a best-in-class radio, providing excellent sensitivity and transmit power for long range with 802.11 immunity - essential for many of today's WiFi-enabled households.

"ZigBee technology holds enormous social, environmental and cost-savings potential in reduced energy consumption in buildings and homes, while increasing comfort and convenience for work and home environments," said Robert LeFort, Ember's CEO. "Ember's chips are already helping to cut energy cost in buildings by up to 40%. And our technology has been adopted by many leading home and building automation vendors including AMX, Control4, Crestron, Eaton, Hitachi, Panasonic, Rite Temp, Siemens and 4-NOKs."

"Last year was significant in ZigBee's progression," says Tim Whittaker of Cambridge Consultants. "We now have low-cost chipsets, perfectly illustrated by those available through Ember, which not only meet price-performance requirements but that also support a number of new applications, such as the exciting area of electricity demand management."

Whittaker continued, "Cutting our carbon emissions has to be done with minimum pain, or it just won't happen. Because there are significant commercial gains to be had in the area of demand management, there's an incentive to both users and suppliers. The government wants the country as a whole to be environmentally minded and for consumers to take interest in their carbon footprint. With these drivers, as well as the possibility that the average household could save money, you have a market that offers significant rewards."

'Smart metering' pilot schemes are already underway in the US state of California. Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric are looking to start installing systems over the next few years in the state which endured rolling blackouts over the summer in 2000. The shortages in California provide the rest of the world with a stark reminder of what we could all expect if energy initiatives are not implemented soon.

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