A Palo Alto company is introducing today a smartphone application that you can use to not just monitor how much energy you’re consuming in your home, but actually control it. People Power is launching People Power 1.0, a free software application that allows you to turn on or off appliances in your home, compare electricity use to state or national averages, shop for energy-saving appliances and even boast about how much electricity you’ve saved on Facebook.
In conjunction with People Power 1.0, People Power is also releasing a reference design for a GreenX Powerstrip and a GreenX Hub that would, together with the app, work to control energy use. People Power doesn’t sell to consumers directly; other manufacturers would build the products based on People Power’s design. The Hub is a wireless device that controls the Powerstrip, cutting power to plugs to turn devices on or off based on commands from the smartphone app.
People Power 1.0 gives homeowners a tool to control energy usage that they haven’t had before, said Gene Wang, CEO of People Power.
“People are more eco-aware but there’s really no way to get started. We need to make [energy efficiency] easier, more convenient and we need to get people engaged,” Wang said.
Surprisingly, half of the typical monthly energy consumption of a home is from appliances -- refrigerators, washers, dryers, TVs, set-top boxes, computers and more -- up from 25 percent years ago. The New York Times reported Sunday that set-top boxes can consume more energy than a refrigerator.
The People Power 1.0 app, available for download today on Google Android smartphones and in July on Apple iOS smartphones, shows you how much energy you are using -- tracking your costs in real time -- and compares your usage to state, national and even worldwide averages.
Wang says managing electricity use based on real time data can produce energy savings of as much as 12 percent while managing use based only on the previous month’s electric bill yields savings of only 3.8 percent to 8.4 percent.
The app also allows you to shop for energy-efficient appliances. New refrigerators that earn the EPA’s Energy Star label are four times more energy efficient than the typical seven to 10-year old models. If we could replace all the old refrigerators in the world with energy-efficient ones, we could collectively save $270 billion in electricity costs and reduce carbon emissions by 1.7 trillion pounds,Wang says.
The app also allows you to remotely shut off appliances as well as thermostats, air conditioning systems and lights. That’s where the Powerstrip and Hub come in. Many modern thermostats are programmable to shut off heat or A/C when you’re away but turn them on just before you return, but Wang says many people don’t know how to program them.
Lastly, People Power 1.0 allows users to share their success at energy savings through social media by posting a message to their Facebook page from their phone.
People Power 1.0 will get its biggest test in Palo Alto as its municipal electric utility will promote the app to its customers to get them to use it.
Here’s a link to download People Power 1.0 to your Android phone; again, it’ll be available on the Apple iPhone (and presumably, the iPad) next month.
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