HP Labs creates the HP Home Energy Manager to demonstrate how it could happen
    惠普实验室创造的惠普家用能源管理系统将向你证明这一切如何实现.

   

                

 

     Homes are a prime opportunity to improve energy management. In a pilot project, HP Labs has deployed sensing technology and a cloud-based application that provides unprecedented visibility and insight into a home’s energy use. Through an intuitive, customizable dashboard, homeowners can monitor and manage energy consumption of everything from their dishwasher to their TV, and learn how to save power in a room or throughout their entire house. By making home energy management easy and fun, HP is helping consumers make choices and change behaviors to save energy and money.
    家庭是改进能源管理的一个主要方向。在试点项目中，惠普实验室在家庭环境中部署了传感器和一个云应用，因此我们将以前所未有的可视性和洞察力来监测家庭能源的使用。通过一个直观、可定制的显示器，业主可以监测和管理从洗碗机到电视机等任何设备的能耗，并且了解如何在一个房间或整个家庭中节约能源。通过把家庭能源管理变得轻松和有趣，惠普公司正在帮助消费者做出正确的选择，通过改变行为来节省能源和金钱。

 

    "Energy awareness in the home is about to undergo a transformation," says Martha Lyons, a project manager with HP Labs’ Sustainable Ecosystems Research Group.
    “如今，家庭中的节能意识正在发生转变，”惠普实验室可持续发展生态系统研究集团的项目经理Martha Lyons说。

 

    "We’re already seeing SmartMeters being installed in homes," she notes, "and they will enable the creation of services that help people better understand, and as a result reduce, their energy consumption."
    “我们看到，智能电表（SmartMeter）已经安装在一些家庭中，”她指出，“它们将会提供一些新服务，来帮助人们更好地理解，进而减少他们的能耗。”

 

    To that end, a team led by Lyons spent the last year developing the HP Labs Home Energy Manager, a proof of concept for just such a service. Our research in home energy management gives individual awareness into their home’s energy use by monitoring everything from the dishwasher to the TV.
    为了达到这一目标，Lyons领导的团队花费了一年时间，开发了惠普实验室家庭能源管理系统（HP Labs Home Energy Manager），用服务证明了上述概念。我们对于家庭能源管理系统的研究，将让每个人通过监测从洗碗机到电视机等家庭中的电器，来认识到他们家庭中的能源使用情况。

 

    The project deployed sensors in seven residential homes around California that measured the energy consumption of individual appliances and "activity zones" within each house. An HP server in the homes received readings from these sensors every 3 seconds, which it then sent to the cloud in an aggregated data set every 2 minutes.  Over 20 million sensor readings were collected in all.
    这个项目在加州的7个居民家中部署了传感器，用以测量每个家庭中的每个电器的单独能耗和“活动区域”。这些家庭中的惠普服务器，每3秒钟从这些传感器中接收数据，然后每2分钟把汇聚好的数据集发送到云中。总共搜集了超过2千万个传感器数据。

 

    Those data were analyzed in real time to produce messages displayed back in the home, offering recommendations the homeowners could act upon easily – such as shifting usage to optimize costs, or not leaving the TV on overnight.
    通过实时分析这些数据，结论将被发送回家中的显示器，为业主提供可以轻松采纳的建议——例如转换使用方式以节约电费，或不要把电视整夜开着。

 

Energy consumption information at a glance
能耗信息一目了然

 

    While the team was able to use commercially-available sensors, they built almost every other part of the service from scratch.  Of particular note, says Lyons, was software that let them take readings from a specific power strip and figure the energy consumption of multiple devices plugged into it.
    虽然像传感器这样的硬件都可以在市场上采购到，但相关服务中的每个部件都是他们一点一滴制作出来的。“特别是软件，”Lyons表示：“软件使得他们可以从特定的电源插座上获取数据，并计算出连接在插座上的多个设备的能耗。”

 

    "So if you had a DVR, a TV, a PC and an Xbox all running off one strip," she explains, "we were able to build a model of when the appliances were going on and off and then break out the energy consumption for each."
    “你也许在一个插座上接了硬盘录像机、电视、电脑和Xbox游戏机，”她解释，“我们将通过构建一个模式，来了解当每个电器打开和关闭时，其所消耗的能量。”

 

    This disaggregation was performed on a purpose-built, cloud-based server, and then relayed back to the owners of each home via a novel user interface that visualized their specific patterns of use.
    这一服务构建在一个专用的、基于云的服务器上，然后通过一个全新的用户界面，传送给每位业主。该界面可视化了业主们使用能源时的具体模式。

 

    Rather than display historical data in graphs and pie charts, says Lyons, the team opted to foreground how much power the different devices and zones within the house were consuming and to alert users to any unusual activity. Home owners might, for example, see that a new appliance had increased or lessened their overall consumption.  The interface could also issue alerts when specific appliances were behaving abnormally. Indeed, one participant found out he needed a new fridge as a result of using the service.  Another discovered that she was wasting a lot of energy by leaving appliances running long into the night.
    不同于用图表和饼图显示历史数据，Lyons说，这项服务可以突出显示在房间中的不同设备和区域消耗了多少能量，并提醒用户任何异常现象。比如，业主可能看到一个新电器增加或减少了他们的总能耗。当特定电器表现异常时，这个用户界面还将发出警报。事实上，一位参与者在使用了该服务后发现，他需要更换一台新冰箱了。他的另一个发现是，让一些电器整晚工作，将浪费很多电力。

 

    "We wanted to create an experience that conveyed information at a glance," Lyons adds.  "If you do that, you make it easy for consumers to not just be informed, but also be engaged and motivated to optimize their energy consumption."
    “我们希望大家能有一个全新的体验，所传递的信息一目了然，”Lyons补充说。“节省能源对消费者而言将变得更加容易，他们不仅仅接到通知，还可以参与其中，积极地对家庭能耗进行优化。”