I had a lot of ideas about what might happen when Google’s PowerMeter read my TED 5000 data. All that data, from so many people, so many opportunities.
I installed the update last night, with some significant anticipation … what would I get?
Looks like I’ll need to be impatient a little longer.
The good news is that enabling PowerMeter via the TED is as simple as can be. It took about a minute once I had the firmware update (even that was quick).
The bad news is that there’s not that much of an incremental improvement over what you can already get on the TED. You can see your data in 15-minute increments as a “gadget” on iGoogle, your Google account home page. You can also see how your usage compares to others. While there’s a “Share” option on the widget, it doesn’t seem to work, so I am not sure what it’s supposed to do. And, you can see your usage data anywhere on the Internet, not just at home.
But my bigger disappointment is that this data, for now, seems to be private. An engineer at Google told me that they have big plans, and I believe that they’ll come through. I want:
- to be able to publish my widget on my blog,
- to be able to join up with others and compare our usages,
- to be able to get at my data from a Google API so I can show the data however I like.
- Oh, and a climate change bill would be nice, too.
Not yet.
In some ways, this is a huge step, and unexpected in some ways. We’ve been told to imaging a world of smart meters and all that we’ll get from that … through the utility companies? Instead, there’s a new channel for helping tackle by far the lowest hanging fruit of the climate change problem: conservation — if any company was going to get this working in a smart, extensible way, it would be Google.
So today’s step is small. And also huge. Thanks, Google, and Energy Inc.
I’ve often thought that what is needed is a repository of utility bills. The number of things that could be done with these data is limitless. Imagine a website where you enter some basic information such as the zip code, number of people in the household, etc., and the billed kWh for the past month, and get a percentile score: The energy use for this household was in the 79th percentile for similar households in the area.
There are a couple of ways you could do this already, using a simulation program or the RECS data, but imagine the information that could be gleaned from the monthly gas and electric bills of 111 million households.
Maybe Google Power Meter will eventually make something like this possible.
Comment by John S. — October 10, 2009 @ 7:56 am
John S — I know of at least three people that are working on something like this. The big missing piece today is heating data: oil, natural gas. These could be measured in kWh so we could see all energy using a single scale.
But the comparison to like houses is something that the Google PowerMeter widget seems to do already. But I bet more is coming along the lines you suggest.
It’s a brave new world.
Tom
Comment by Tom Harrison — October 10, 2009 @ 8:56 am
I wonder if you have seen this site: http://hes.lbl.gov/.
Comment by John S. — October 12, 2009 @ 6:02 am
One more of potential interest: http://www.microsoft-hohm.com/.
Comment by John S. — October 12, 2009 @ 6:05 am
Thanks, John S –
I have seen these sites. I wrote about my disappointment with Microsoft’s warmed-over energy calculator. The opportunity is to have a utility bill automatically imported — it would provide a simple aggregation of an individual’s monthly data, normalized against location and other characteristics of the house and it’s occupants. But I think these calculators have failed on several counts:
I don’t mean to discount the value of home energy calculators — they can be a good reality check, but having completed at least four of them, I have not found as much information as I did this morning from the TED 5000, where I realized that when my heat comes on (which it did for the first time this year this morning) I am not only using gas for heat, but using 250W to 300W of electricity for circulator pumps, and perhaps other things as well. It makes me glad my house doesn’t need heat until the outdoor temperature is 40° at night :-)
Anyway, thanks for the links. I don’t mean to be a wet blanket, just seeing that what TED offers could easily be applied to gas and oil heat also. Another huge small step.
Comment by Tom Harrison — October 12, 2009 @ 8:48 am
Thanks Tom, I have just started reading your blog and didn’t see your post on Microsoft. I kind of figured that coming from them it would promise more than it actually delivered, but hope springs eternal.
Comment by John S. — October 12, 2009 @ 9:05 am
John — the link to HOHM is in the comment above :-). I also figured it would deliver more than it did.
Comment by Tom Harrison — October 12, 2009 @ 9:14 am
Not to hijack your comments, however, what you noticed about the electric use of your heating system is evident in my electric bills too. You can see nine years worth of them here. Scroll down to “Is the Power Company Ripping Me Off?”. You can click on the graphic to see a larger version. I submitted this graphic for a visualization contest — didn’t win, though I apparently got honorable mention.
The summer peak is obvious (I live in the Southeastern US), but you can also see the smaller winter peak that occurs most often in January. This is because I have a forced air system, and when the gas burners ignite, a fan comes on to supply heated air to the house.
Actually despite the title, I never claimed the power company was ripping me off. If they are too high in their estimate, it’s made up for in the bill for the following month when they do come and read the meter.
As you can surmise from the graph, I have developed a pretty sophisticated regression of my monthly electric usage based on heating and cooling degree days. Still, our monthly electric usage is variable enough that I can only estimate to within about 175 kWh of the total.
Comment by John S. — October 12, 2009 @ 10:16 am
Hi Tom,
I work for the Google PowerMeter team and wanted to thank you for trying our product and for sharing your thoughts about the experience! First of all, we’re listening. I appreciate your enthusiasm for more features and we’re anxious to roll them out for you, too. Google PowerMeter is all about making energy data available so people can save energy and money. What you see today is just the start. We are working hard to implement many of the features you mention in your post. Stay tuned!
Niki
Comment by Niki Fenwick — October 13, 2009 @ 1:06 pm
Hi Niki –
Thanks very much for your reply. I do software engineering for my paying job, and I am a big fan of the way G does software: fast, in little chunks, and moving forward as needed. No matter how fast or well you do things, it seems the customer always wants more, sooner.
(I used to hate that part of the business, then realized that having no one care what you do is far more painful)
We’ll all stay tuned :-)
Thanks again,
Tom
P.S. Other than friends I know who “say” they work at Google, and Matt Cutts, who says he’s an actual human, I was under the impression that Google was actually just a really sophisticated bit of software. Assuming you can pass the Turing Test, it’s nice to know real people work at Google. :-)
Comment by Tom Harrison — October 13, 2009 @ 2:40 pm
Hello Tom,
I just discovered your blog, and I already spent quite a lot of time going through your articles and comments.
I am indeed very interseted in your blog and I m definetely tempted to acquire the TED 5000 device.
BUT, as there is a back order of something like 6 weeks, I bite my tongue, hold my breath and try to hold my raging VISA in my pocket for few more weeks.
I have 2 questions,
My First question is:
could you recommend any book to understand and pinpoint the energy consumption in my house?
An Energy Audit charges 150 $ for an audit by depresurizing you house, then an additional 200$ for an Audit using a ThermoCamera.
I actually am in Montreal, Canada, and I am having an Energy Audit on my house by RenoClimat.
http://www.aee.gouv.qc.ca/en/my-home/renoclimat/
My second question is:
Is it worth having an Audit using a Thermo Camera?
By the way, I just bought a 2004 house last July 2009 and my electricity bill is just making me cry :)
Thanks
Comment by Eric — December 10, 2009 @ 2:55 pm