Rotation Spotlight: Smart Grid
Wednesday, January 27, 2010 at 6:00AM Share Article 
Juan, 3rd Rotation IMLPOne of our Energy IMLPs, Juan, worked with the Transmission & Distribution IT team to design and provision the hardware, network, and software to support the first European Smart Grid Demo Lab, a fully featured demonstration room that shows the GE Smart Grid product portfolio. The lab was launched at the end of November 2009.
To enable this demo lab, Juan and the IT team designed a dedicated product network environment that hosts the whole demo. This network interconnects over 20 PC clients, 2 virtualized servers, a virtual center server (for centralized administration) and a shared clustered storage area of 3 Terabytes that is accessed by all the devices present in the room. Remote access is also available so all the teams involved can access and configure their clients and virtual servers remotely.
This is a state-of-the-art demo room, including a Smart Board which works as a touch screen, Intel vPro technology in all the clients to remotely switch on and off all the PCs, and audiovisual technology to show any of the PC clients' screens on two 50" projector screens.
Showcasing the GE product suite, the Smart Home is undoubtedly the booth that visitors enjoy the most. There you can see how GE technology allows you to switch on and off the lights of your house by sending an SMS message to your Smart Home system. You can even open the door or lower the blinds of your windows in this way. The Smart Meter booth is another favorite, in which you can visualize your consumer profile by hour, week or month and also get some tips on how to reduce your utility bill by the end of each month.
Juan's work with the GE European Smart Grid Demo Lab is just one example of the kinds of exciting technical projects that IMLPs have the opportunity to work on.
Energy, Technology, UK, jobs, rotations, smart grid in International Rotations, UK Bloggers
Reader Comments (1)
The smart home is an interesting concept that seems to have always been around. One of my final projects at school was looking at the market for home automation in the US. The idea is growing, but I didn't see anything to suggest it would be found in every home in the near future. It seems to have a lot more traction in Europe. Any insights on why there is such a difference?
I think it could be a combination to two things. My first thought is it has something to do with the cost of energy. I've never lived in Europe, but I've been told energy costs more, so it is more advantageous for a person to have an easy way to monitor, control, and automate their consumption. Have you made any estimates how much someone can save? Does it outweigh the costs of upgrading & installing the technology in a home?
Secondly, and somewhat related, is that home automation is so broad and diverse it is hard to comprehend and simply integrate everything. Can you start with smart meters, and then add your media and entertainment, and then security, or should you do it all at once? In each of the areas that can be automated, what is the incentive to invest time and money into getting it all installed and working.
Thanks for the update on this project, it is a really interesting topic. I'll be curious to see how things move forward in this market.