Google Powermeter
Google Powermeter
Google Powermeter - an online tool to track your home or office electricity consumption in real time online
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Over the years we have covered numerous domestic power meters starting with the original Electrisave. The one shortcoming of these power meters was once the inability to download and view the collected data on a PC. That all changed with the Wattson Energy Meter and the latest OWL CM120 USB, but they were still had their limitations and required a technical whizz to analyse the data. That is all going to change now with the launch of the new Google Powermeter here in the UK.
Google Powermeter
Google Powermeter is offered free of charge as a Google.org philanthropic project. It is designed to be used with the smart electricity meters which will be fitted into all UK homes over the next decade. Currently only first.utility provide free smart meters to their customers with 30,000 customers signed up and waiting for their meters to be installed starting in November 2009.
For everyone else, it is necessary to purchase a kit comprising a meter reader, wireless transmitter , and Nano Hub. from AlertMe Energy. This kit costs £69 plus there is a £2.99 per month subscription charge (10 months for the price of 12 if you pay for one year in advance).
The meter reader, which is simply clipped around one of the cables coming out of the electricity meter, accurately measures realtime electricity consumption. This is then transmitted to the Nano Hub which in turn transmits the collected data over your broadband internet connection to the AlertMe service.
The data collected can be accessed online from anywhere in the world via your iGoogle account. Thanks to Google's speedy number crunching and expertise in displaying complex data as clearly and simply as possible, Google Powermeter is going to be a very powerful tool for anyone who wants to understand and reduce their electricity consumption.
Click here to visit the official Google Powermeter web page for more information.
Article Last Modified: 13:23, 29th Oct 2009Comment on this Article
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