Consumer home applications based on low-cost intelligent sockets

Informations projet

CHABLIS

N° de convention de subvention: 24081

Projet clôturé

Date de début 15 Mars 1997

Date de fin 14 Juillet 1999

Financé au titre de

• Specific research and technological development programme in the field of information technologies, 1994-1998

Coût total € 2 464 500,00

Contribution de l’UE € 1 100 000,00

Coordonné par

Bticino
Italy

Résultats exploitables

Consumer Home Applications Based on Low-cost Intelligent Sockets; CHABLIS

CHABLIS creates the necessary conditions for mass-market consumer home appliances by developing application and system components that allow the creation of low-cost appliances using the European Home Systems (EHS) powerline communication technology. CHABLIS focuses on the development of possibly the most important low-cost consumer home appliance - the intelligent socket. CHABLIS provides: - application software components for EHS-PL intelligent sockets - system software components for EHS power line protocol version 1.3 for low-cost 8 bit microcontroller (e.g 128 bytes RAM and 4/8 Kbytes ROM), including a receive-only profile version suitable for developing very low cost appliances - installation test tools for powerline communication. Tools are needed for installers, to support them in checking the power line communication between two devices in an installation. - a network access unit for conformance test tools. This access unit is typically connected to a PC on which certification laboratories can run conformance test suites to ensure EHS conformance and interoperability of the resulting products. The industrial objective of CHABLIS is to allow the development of cost effective intelligent powerline sockets based on the European Home Systems (EHS) powerline communication technology. Two types of appliances will be supported: receiving only appliances, and transmitting/receiving appliances. CHABLIS will demonstrate them by a number of applications which will have the effect of creating an immediate market offer: - a load shedding system for the Italian market with powerline sockets provided by BTicino. This application has a potential market of more than 2 million households in Italy. - an HA system based on JEEVES, a general purpose controller marketed by Smart, an Australian company. JEEVES is designed to support all typical HA applications such as security, energy management, lighting, teleaction (a PSTN modem option is provided) in SOHO. An EHS powerline interface will be developed allowing JEEVES to control EHS devices in the home. - a DIY kit based on a PC with EHS powerline interface. The DIY kit approach is the necessary step to appeal to installers and qualified consumers.