The social media craze has hit building automation, as the campus at the University of Mississippi will soon be broadcasting its energy consumption via Twitter and Facebook updates.
The social media craze has hit building automation, as the campus at the University of Mississippi will soon be broadcasting its energy consumption via Twitter and Facebook updates.
In partnership with smart grid company SmartSynch, Ole Miss has created online feeds (also via RSS) detailing several of its main buildings' energy use, ostensibly to "alter behavior to reduce electricity consumption and carbon emissions." The UMiss project will study consumption from lighting, temperature controls, and appliances. The organizations have created an online application to monitor and report the energy draw so that building operators can learn where energy is being wasted and implement new conservation strategies.
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Ole Miss' extending the data from grid to the public web showcases (albeit in questionably productive manner) the merger of energy and IT worlds. Let's just hope that some computer science student with hacking skills doesn't think it's cool to set the gym temp to 95 degrees.
Companies such as SmartSynch are adding IP technology to energy management equipment as part of the massive smart grid upgrade that is now beginning. These companies are unleashing data management tools crafted during the digital music era on an industry that by comparison functions with the sophistication of electricity innovator Thomas Edison's cylinder phonographs.
