Researchers at the University of East Anglia (School of Environmental Sciences) have published a useful review of smart metering and the various energy monitoring options on the market.  The report was funded as part of the Nuffield Bursary Scheme and details the current state of the art in the market.  The document (PDF) can be downloaded A review of smart metering andsurvey options for energy.

Project partners the University of Salford and Hildebrand recently published “DEHEMS: A User-Driven Domestic Energy Monitoring System”.

The paper’s abstract is “Persuasive energy monitoring technology has the potential to inspire sustainable energy lifestyles within the home. However, to effect positive ecological behaviour change, a more user-driven approach is needed for the development of the technology, where the design needs to be accompanied by study on user behaviours and motivations, and the prototype deployed and tested on large sample sizes to understand user preferences.We present DEHEMS, a wide-scale energy monitoring system that undergoes three cycles of design, development and usability assessment so that it can help facilitate energy literacy and environmental awareness based on user preferences. Through real-world deployment, survey and focus group studies carried out in the UK, we present motivations and constraints for saving energy, user assessment of the DEHEMS pilot system and identify some critical user expectations and concerns. We describe how the usability analysis is then incorporated into the design of the next generation DEHEMS system and demonstrate that the resulting system achieves 8% reduction in energy consumption within the first week of feedback.”

The PDF is available here: DEHEMS – User-driven Domestic Energy Monitoring

Hildebrand, the key technology partner of the DEHEMS project has been working with IBM address the issues of traditional databases dealing with time-series data  (i.e. ‘pulses’ of data arriving at regular intervals from one or more sources), because their structure makes it difficult to store and index this data efficiently. As a result, Hildebrand knew that it would be impossible to create a solution around a standard database engine without massive investment in high-end server hardware. The costs of this would be prohibitive, so a new kind of solution was required.  Following research in to leading-edge database platforms Hildebrand looked at the IBM Informix TimeSeries DataBlade and Real-Time Loader, which are specifically designed to handle time-series data.   Working with the software lab at IBM Hursley and they helped run a number of proof-of-concept projects using the facilities in the IBM Hursley Innovation Centre to see if it would be possible to handle the volume of data needed in a cost-effective manner.

The Informix TimeSeries technologies create a single database object for each data-source, and then simply update it with the latest readings whenever a new ‘pulse’ of data arrives. This provides a more manageable data structure, which makes it easier to store, extract and analyse data.

With help from the IBM Hursley team, it was quickly found that Informix TimeSeries could deliver spectacular results. In the first proof-of-concept three million homes were stimulated sending readings once a minute, and was able to capture nearly 40,000 readings per second using only a quad-core, dual-processor Intel server. In the second, using a slightly larger server and it was found it could deliver analytics response times of between one and three seconds for a load of 50,000 readings per second. Without understanding the technical details, energy monitoring for three million homes or more became a practical proposition.

Further details are available in the IBM press release.

The Social Trends report (published July 10) from the UK Office for National Statistics shows that the amount of domestic energy used in homes specifically for lighting and electrical appliances rose from the equivalent of 2.7 million tonnes of oil in 1970 to 6.8 million in 2007 – a 155% increase .  Interestingly the energy used for cooking fell by 41 per cent in the same period.

Comments from National Energy Action said there is a need education about energy efficient appliances with the roll out of smart metering going some way towards behavioural change.