Newsletter – December 2014

THIS MONTH…..
–TRENDS
–EYE CATCHING
–ANNUAL PLAN
–2014 YEAR IN REVIEW
–EXISTING CODE
–LASTLY

–TRENDS
The stuff going on in the big picture now…..

United States Electricity Price per KWH
Current and Past

September	October	Trend	% Change
$0.141	$0.136	Decrease	-3.55%

Year	October	Trend	% Change	% Since	Difference
2004	$0.094	Same	0.00%	0.00%	0.00%
2005	$0.102	Increase	8.51%	8.51%	8.51%
2006	$0.112	Increase	9.80%	19.15%	10.64%
2007	$0.117	Increase	4.46%	24.47%	5.32%
2008	$0.126	Increase	7.69%	34.04%	9.57%
2009	$0.126	Same	0.00%	34.04%	0.00%
2010	$0.127	Increase	0.79%	35.11%	1.06%
2011	$0.130	Increase	2.36%	38.30%	3.19%
2012	$0.128	Decrease	-1.54%	36.17%	-2.13%
2013	$0.132	Increase	3.13%	40.43%	4.26%
2014	$0.136	Increase	3.03%	44.68%	4.26%

United Kingdom Utility Prices
Current and Past

London by night, seen from the International Space Station

–EYE CATCHING
The stuff that has caught our eye…..

Demand Response

• An article, announcing The President of the United States will appeal to the United States Supreme Court a lower court ruling vacating Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Order No. 745.
• An article, describing the fate of FERC Order No. 745.
• An article, considering the legal battles of FERC Order No. 745.
• An article, reporting the Washington D. C. Circuit Court Of Appeals has delayed their order vacating FERC Order No. 745.
• An announcement, stating OpenADR Alliance’s Barry Haaser has been appointed to the United Department of Commerce Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Advisory Committee.
• The Fall 2014 webinar series, from OpenADR.
• Legislation, United States Senate Bill S.2947. This legislation has been approved for study and sent to the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. Any outcome from this committee will most likely end up in the U.S. House of Representatives Energy & Commerce Committee.

Power Line Communication

• An announcement, stating Texas Instruments expands its leadership in Smart Grid Power Line Communication with G3-PLC certification.
• A trend, showing radical growth in Texas Instruments stock price.
• An article, expecting phenomenal growth in the wireless sensor market.

Smart Grid – Consumer

• An article, describing how consumers cannot understand their HVAC thermostat.
• An opinion, explaining how to make the Smart Grid brilliant.
• An article, depicting how the modifying utility-customer relationship is changing home energy management.
• An article, explaining why average energy consumption figures cannot be located.

Smart Grid – Producer

• An article, calling for leadership to build a better connected Smart Grid in Nigeria.
• An article, explaining why both integration and public policy are keys to the success of any Smart Grid effort.
• An article, stating the UK Smart Meter roll out has been temporarily halted.

Smart Grid – Security

• An article, from the United States Department of Homeland Defense (DHS), warning of cyber threat to critical U.S. infrastructure.
• An article, finding the United States DHS has identified 79 electrical grid cyber attacks within the Untied States this year.

–ANNUAL PLAN
Status Update of our 2014 Plan…..

Demand Response

• Further discussions with members of the electronics industry.
• No other work since the April newsletter.

Unattended Server Side Automation

• No other work since the April newsletter.

Power Line Communication

• Further discussions with the members of the electronics industry.
• No other work since the January newsletter.

Talk to us with your comments and suggestions on our plan for this year.

–2014 YEAR IN REVIEW
We believe our 2014 annual plan turned out pretty well. You may want to review our June 2014 and July 2014 newsletters, for a refresher on dynamic Demand Response. Now, let’s see how we did with our annual plan.

Unattended Server Side Automation
We released our first script on 29 March 2014. This script is integral to any Demand Response effort. We realized there are many ways to automate what we have built. We also realized we can do a better job separating the front-end of the code from the back-end of the code. HINT…..this realization is going to show up in our 2015 Annual Plan.

Demand Response
We worked on this effort through Unattended Server Side Automation. We spoke at length with many members of the electronics industry. The summary position of most of the folks we spoke with is they like GNU remotecontrol, but want a bit more maturity in the code, by means of increased ease to access the code through automation by external technologies. HINT…..this realization is going to show up in our 2015 Annual Plan.

Power Line Communication
IEEE 1901-2010 is protected by copyright. Anyone wanting to discuss this standard with us must first own a copy of this standard. Suffice it to say, there is a struggle in the electronics industry to know how to use this standard. We love the IEEE 1901-2010 standard. Everyone we spoke with at IEEE provided us loads of help to understand the construct of an IEEE standard and their individual viewpoint of how the electronics industry operates. We are quite impressed with IEEE as an organization. They do have the ear of most of the electronics world, for both standard development and standard implementation. The forward progress of Power Line Communication has stopped, until the electronics manufacturers discover how to implement this standard in a cost effective manner. GNU remotecontrol firmly believes Power Line Communication technology will become pervasive in the residential premise. It is a matter of how long this prevailing position will take to occur. Specifically, getting the Power Line Communication technology into the hands of homeowners at a price point they will accept.

So, boiling everything down to a simple set of statements……

• GNU remotecontrol does not see any possibility for safe and effective Demand Response to occur without an internationally accepted technology standard for the residential network connected HVAC thermostat.
• GNU remotecontrol believes the only way an internationally accepted technology standard for the residential network connected HVAC thermostat will ever succeed is if the electronics manufacturers want this standard.
• GNU remotecontrol believes the consumer, the residential homeowner, is the only source capable of convincing the electronics manufacturers to generate an internationally accepted technology standard for the residential network connected HVAC thermostat.
• GNU remotecontrol believes the consumer will find a way to convince the electronics manufacturers to produce an internationally accepted technology standard for the residential network connected HVAC thermostat, by having the combination of money to spend and the nationalized authority to accomplish Demand Response. This authority, in the United States, will come from some judicial decision defining the authority of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. We have spoken about the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission case, at length, since our June 2014 newsletter.

So, there we have it. The intersection between consumer and supplier, again, will decide a matter dramatically impacting a culture. Throw in some government regulations, and we have a new culture. This new culture will have not only the consumption of energy monitored in real time, but also the price of energy established on a national basis. This is a culture change like nothing seen in history, because it is about to happen on a national level. The data privacy matters are paramount. Security of both the application operating these technologies, and the data generated by these collective technologies, is uncertain during the maturing of this new technology platform.

In conclusion, GNU remotecontrol firmly believes any approach using only a propriety technology platform will fail. We hold this position because there would be insufficient resources thinking about, checking on, and helping to improve the technology platform. As you read above, the United States Supreme Court having to decide both the definition of Demand Response and who has the authority to regulate Demand Response illustrates the magnitude of this subject.

OTHER TYPES OF THERMOSTATS?
Many people have asked us about adding other types of thermostats to GNU remotecontrol. There are three questions that need to be answered before we can offer GNU remotecontrol support for any IP thermostat. These questions are:

• How to CONNECT to it (NETWORK).
• How to READ from it (CODE).
• How to WRITE to it (CODE).

It is our hope to have dozens and dozens of thermostat types that work with GNU remotecontrol. Let us know if you designed or manufactured a device and you would like to test it with GNU remotecontrol.

–EXISTING CODE
The stuff you may want to consider…..

BUGS
We have 0 new bugs and 0 fixed bugs since our last Blog posting. Please review these changes and apply to your GNU remotecontrol installation, as appropriate.

TASKS
We have 0 new tasks and 0 completed tasks since our last Blog posting. Please review these changes and apply to your GNU remotecontrol installation, as appropriate.

REMEMBER
GNU remotecontrol relies on OS file access restrictions, Apache authentication, MySQL authentication, and SSL encryption to secure your data. Talk to us you want to find out how you can further strengthen the security of your system, or you have suggestions for improving the security of our current system architecture.

–LASTLY
Whatever you do…..don’t get beat up over your Energy Management strategy. GNU remotecontrol is here to help simplify your life, not make it more complicated. Talk to us if you are stuck or cannot figure out the best option for your GNU remotecontrol framework. The chances are the answer you need is something we have already worked through. We would be happy to help you by discussing your situation with you.

…..UNTIL NEXT MONTH!

Why the Affero GPL?