What we have here is a failure to communicate...and so it has been with utility meters. But in the new environment of deregulation, conservation and rising energy costs it is becoming important to know energy usage and rates in order to reduce costs. To get a grasp on the big energy picture you must get a hold of the data from all the facilities. Corporations, municipalities, universities and other entities are doing this through multi-campus energy aggregation data collection. The trick is to get the data from the utility meter which has been a closed black box to everyone but the utility. Well, things are a chang'in. Companies such as Appliance-Partners are coming out with communications gateways to bridge meter data on to LANs. Appliance-Partners EnergyMatrix collects data from the meter and provides open Internet Interfaces for IT professions and enterprise level software to access the data.

EnergyMatrix collects data off of meters either through a digital I/O interface or through the serial port. It has a standard set of 3 digital I/O interfaces called a KYZ pulse counter. It counts digital pulses coming across this interface and converts it to corresponding energy usage values. It also collects data through a serial port using protocols such as PSEM, DNP3 and Modbus. EnergyMatrix can store up to a months worth of energy data.

The EnergyMatrix can either be set up to transfer data to other systems or act as a server to send data after a request has been. Data is sent at intervals specified through a command scheduler service that can be adjusted by the user during setup. It can post data directly to enterprise level databases through web servers using formats such as XML for SQL. EnergyMatrix comes standard with a 10BaseT Ethernet port to connect to corporate LANs. It also has optional wireless interfaces to communicate using 802.11b, CDPD, CDMA or GPRS.

A flexible data page template server is available to configure the output format of the data that the EnergyMatrix exchanges with other systems. Through the use of special ID tags that correspond to data stored in the unit, any format such as XML, MV-90 and DNP3 can be used. An email service is also available to send alarms or data.

Another unique feature of the EnergyMatrix is that it is built on an XML framework. The framework is configured through the use of XML files so that users can modify the system by adjusting attributes in the XML files. This feature along with its XML output interface allows meters to step into the new world of web services.

Pricing and Availability

The EnergyMatrix EM-101 is available with a starting price of $999.

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