Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ENERGY SPECTRUM (Market uptake a innovative Non-intrusive Appliance Load Monitoring (NIALM) to enlarge ENERGY efficiency SPECTRUM to comprise the families factor)
Período documentado: 2016-02-01 hasta 2016-07-31
It is becoming clear that household and small business electricity consumption is significant in a worldwide scenario.
In Europe, it's estimated that households are responsible for 68% of the energy consumed in buildings. Recent studies and market reports point out that approximately 20% of the consumers are interested in adopting/purchasing monitoring solutions for their household as a means to improve their electricity consumption efficiency. This represents approximately 40 million households that are considering installing a monitoring solution in the central and western European Union alone. Furthermore energy sustainability is a worldwide issue, therefore it's expected that other countries around the world follow the above-mentioned trends.
The objective of this project was to analyze the commercial and technical feasibility of the upscale of an energy sensing disaggregation system, ENERGYSPECTRUM, coupled with an innovative family eco-feedback. This is a novel approach for reducing energy consumption at home promoting a more smart and sustainable use of energy in households through a new product/service system that fall under the smart cities and communities.
Our sensing system is capable of disaggregating home energy consumption using a low-cost and effective non-intrusive approach costing less than most of our competitor solutions. The sensing system is coupled with a middleware web system that supports novel eco-feedback strategies that are meaningful and compelling for families and households.
In Europe, it's estimated that households are responsible for 68% of the energy consumed in buildings. Recent studies and market reports point out that approximately 20% of the consumers are interested in adopting/purchasing monitoring solutions for their household as a means to improve their electricity consumption efficiency. This represents approximately 40 million households that are considering installing a monitoring solution in the central and western European Union alone. Furthermore energy sustainability is a worldwide issue, therefore it's expected that other countries around the world follow the above-mentioned trends.
The objective of this project was to analyze the commercial and technical feasibility of the upscale of an energy sensing disaggregation system, ENERGYSPECTRUM, coupled with an innovative family eco-feedback. This is a novel approach for reducing energy consumption at home promoting a more smart and sustainable use of energy in households through a new product/service system that fall under the smart cities and communities.
Our sensing system is capable of disaggregating home energy consumption using a low-cost and effective non-intrusive approach costing less than most of our competitor solutions. The sensing system is coupled with a middleware web system that supports novel eco-feedback strategies that are meaningful and compelling for families and households.
The work performed during the project was divided in several tasks:
Task 1 - Analysis of the requirements to upgrade our system and establish a large scale demonstration: This task was accomplished by comparing the hardware specifications of our prototype with currently (commercially) available software. In general EnergySpectrum approach will rely on the integration of off-the-shelf equipment. The large scale demonstration will help us confirm this strategy.
Task 2 - Definition of the production process: During this phase we were able to find a potential partner that could help us during the production phase of the EnergySpectrum. We also identified several tasks, which will be important to the definition of the production process. Altogether, during this phase we did not find any technical barrier to the feasibility of our implementation approach, as the technology becomes more capable and less expensive, we also do not foresee any technical setbacks in the coming stages.
Task 3 and Task 4- Analysis of the customer sectors (Task3) and Task 4 - Commercialization strategy: We spent a lot of effort for the customer sectors analysis during this feasibility plan, which included analysis of potential clients, taking into account the current state of the market, and its predicted evolution. A competitive analysis was also performed, in which we gathered insights about how our competitors operate in the market.
Task 5 - IPR Strategy: An extensive analysis of patents (25) was made, generally we can confirm our Freedom to Operate (FTO) and sell EnergySpectrum. We did not encounter any barriers both in the software and hardware side of our approach.
Task 6 - Elaboration of our business plan: We have defined our business plan, in which, we made a SWOT analysis, defined the support needed to advance with our idea, estimated our future trading projections and the break even point as well as our staffing operations and funding requirements to help us in the commercialization stage of EnergySpectrum. We have defined our business model trough a CANVAS.
The main result of the project, summarized in the feasibility plan, was the confirmation of the technical viability of our idea and the corroboration of the growing market for this product and the clear advantages it has in relation to its competitors.
Task 1 - Analysis of the requirements to upgrade our system and establish a large scale demonstration: This task was accomplished by comparing the hardware specifications of our prototype with currently (commercially) available software. In general EnergySpectrum approach will rely on the integration of off-the-shelf equipment. The large scale demonstration will help us confirm this strategy.
Task 2 - Definition of the production process: During this phase we were able to find a potential partner that could help us during the production phase of the EnergySpectrum. We also identified several tasks, which will be important to the definition of the production process. Altogether, during this phase we did not find any technical barrier to the feasibility of our implementation approach, as the technology becomes more capable and less expensive, we also do not foresee any technical setbacks in the coming stages.
Task 3 and Task 4- Analysis of the customer sectors (Task3) and Task 4 - Commercialization strategy: We spent a lot of effort for the customer sectors analysis during this feasibility plan, which included analysis of potential clients, taking into account the current state of the market, and its predicted evolution. A competitive analysis was also performed, in which we gathered insights about how our competitors operate in the market.
Task 5 - IPR Strategy: An extensive analysis of patents (25) was made, generally we can confirm our Freedom to Operate (FTO) and sell EnergySpectrum. We did not encounter any barriers both in the software and hardware side of our approach.
Task 6 - Elaboration of our business plan: We have defined our business plan, in which, we made a SWOT analysis, defined the support needed to advance with our idea, estimated our future trading projections and the break even point as well as our staffing operations and funding requirements to help us in the commercialization stage of EnergySpectrum. We have defined our business model trough a CANVAS.
The main result of the project, summarized in the feasibility plan, was the confirmation of the technical viability of our idea and the corroboration of the growing market for this product and the clear advantages it has in relation to its competitors.
There is a clear and increasing demand in the market for solutions capable to increase the energy efficiency. A survey done to 10.000 home owners has ranked energy efficiency as number one among housing concerns. But there are several constraints to the adoption of energy efficiency measures as “the cost, ease of use, and product complexity need to be significantly improved before large-scale adoption is feasible” . The added value of our system is precisely the low cost and its simplicity as only one gadget is installed in the meter and has software with a highly friendly user interface
EnergySpectrum aims to expand the current state of the art competitors, by focusing on the following values:
Low cost: EnergySpectrum is to be sold at a lower initial price than our competitors.
All-in-one: EnergySpectrum provides a full-stack-solution for electricity monitoring, providing sensing, feedback and electricity services.
Easy to Use: Developed by a team specialized in user-centric development, EnergySpectrum visualizations are the result of several years of academic work in the eco-feedback field, which results in easy, very intuitive and accessible product and service.
Energy Savings: All the items above can result in energy savings by clients. It has been referred that awareness alone can motivate reduction in consumption, yet our system goes beyond fostering awareness. By providing contextualized and easy to understand information we aim at maximizing our customers’ energy savings.
Remote monitoring: EnergySpectrum services allow for the household consumption to be monitored remotely.
EnergySpectrum aims to expand the current state of the art competitors, by focusing on the following values:
Low cost: EnergySpectrum is to be sold at a lower initial price than our competitors.
All-in-one: EnergySpectrum provides a full-stack-solution for electricity monitoring, providing sensing, feedback and electricity services.
Easy to Use: Developed by a team specialized in user-centric development, EnergySpectrum visualizations are the result of several years of academic work in the eco-feedback field, which results in easy, very intuitive and accessible product and service.
Energy Savings: All the items above can result in energy savings by clients. It has been referred that awareness alone can motivate reduction in consumption, yet our system goes beyond fostering awareness. By providing contextualized and easy to understand information we aim at maximizing our customers’ energy savings.
Remote monitoring: EnergySpectrum services allow for the household consumption to be monitored remotely.