The HomeGrid Forum (HGF) and ZigBee Alliance have agreed to extend their collaboration on ZigBee Smart Energy standard development.
This work, say the two organisations, will pave the way for consumers and utilities to use ZigBee Smart Energy version 2.0 wireless or wired networks to further advance Smart Grid programs and deliver new energy, financial and environmental savings.
Both organisations will collaborate on ensuring ZigBee Smart Energy version 2 and HomeGrid Forum’s ITU-T G.hn and G.hnem standards can be deployed in a wide variety of smart grid usage models.
“ZigBee Smart Energy is a leading home area network and AMI standard that helps consumers gain greater control of their energy use,” said Bob Heile, chairman of the ZigBee Alliance. “Working with HomeGrid will give energy service providers, utilities and consumers another wired choice when implementing either wired or wireless home area networks or utility links to smart meters.”
Matt Theall (pictured), president of HomeGrid Forum, added: “HomeGrid Forum has teamed with ZigBee to help create a greater choice of networking technologies that could be used for smart grid applications in the home and for utility links to smart meters. Through the inclusion of G.hn’s high-speed data networking and G.hnem’s lower-speed smart energy applications, network designers, appliance manufacturers and consumers have the tools available to build robust, ‘service anywhere’ networks. The ZigBee liaison further underlines HomeGrid Forum’s commitment to collaborate with other industry-leading organizations to combine forces, and develop leading, best-in-class solutions that speed the mass deployment of the Smart Grid.”
The announcement follows the recent news that 100 smart energy products have now received ZigBee certification. Products manufactured by 49 different companies are available today in every product category needed to implement a robust ZigBee Smart Energy home area network, including energy service portals, meters, displays, programmable communicating thermostats and smart plugs.
ZigBee Smart Energy products are branded with the ZigBee Certified logo and the ZigBee Smart Energy icon on product packaging and advertisements to communicate interoperability to the marketplace.
“Continued ZigBee Certified product growth reflects market confidence that ZigBee Smart Energy is the right standard for utilities looking to help consumers be smarter about their energy use,” said Bob Heile. “Growing market adoption of ZigBee Smart Energy is evidence that findings in reports by influential industry leaders, like AHAM and GE, meet market reality.”
www.ZigBee.org/SmartEnergy
www.homegridforum.org
