Amazon and Google are planning to enter the energy market
Apparently, the two largest technology companies in the world plan to expand their business at the expense of the electricity market. True, this is not about generating and selling electricity, but about creating specialized devices and systems for controlling energy consumption. Information of this kind is very valuable for everyone - both producers and consumers, so that it can be sold.
And if not the information itself, then the devices that generate it. Experts believe that in the future, when the smart home becomes a reality, the developers of smart software and hardware solutions for delivering energy to consumers will play an increasingly significant role. So, the ex-executive director of the energy company NRG Energy saidIn just a couple of decades, Amazon or Google will become one of the key players in the market of energy delivery and management solutions.
It all started small - with IoT gadgets that allow you to manage your home. Smart speakers are becoming increasingly popular, selling both Google and Amazon, plus companies are developing new solutions. In 2014, Google Corporation acquired Nest Labs, a manufacturer of smart thermostats and other smart home devices, to get its market share. The deal cost the corporation $ 3.2 billion.
Amazon acquired Ring, which produced smart doorbells, and also took patronage (of course, not for free) at Ecobee, a startup that specializes in smart thermostats. The latter received not a billion, but also quite sufficient for the prosperity of the business amount of $ 61 million US dollars.
Google Corporation is now negotiating the supply of its smart devices with suppliers of utilities services in various European countries, as well as in the United States. Google believes that the company's development can be useful both for suppliers and consumers of energy, as well as for the environment (here, I guess, it means that saving electricity can save resources).
Amazon is not far behind with its Amazone Home Services. The service provides services to utility providers, as well as other companies that are in some way connected with utilities. One example of close cooperation is a partnership with Arcadia Power, which sells sets of equipment to improve the energy efficiency of homes. After signing a contract with Amazon, this company began to offer, in addition to smart thermostats, sockets and light bulbs, Echo Dot smart speakers and Ring smart door bells.
Smart systems allow you to monitor energy consumption, synchronize the work of various devices (climate control, washing machines, etc.) with energy tariffs with a minimum price.
The more smart devices put into operation, the more efficient the savings. Google Inc. demonstrated this in 2017, during a solar eclipse. Then the corporation offered Nest users a specialized mode of operation of smart thermostats, which cooled the air temperature in the room a bit before the eclipse, and during the eclipse they allowed the temperature to rise. The program was attended by almost a million people, which reduced energy consumption by 700 MW.
An example of how modern technologies allow IT companies to save, Google has shownsome years ago. The corporation has installed in its data center a smart system based on a neural network, which reduced the cost of electricity by 40%. To control, experts identified about 120 different parameters of the data center, including the management of air conditioners, closing or opening windows, fan speed and much more.
This was preceded by work on the analysis of information work data centers for five years. As a result, Google managed to create an effective predictive model of energy consumption by the data center. Artificial intelligence has processed a huge database with information about the temperature of the equipment, the speed of the pumps, weather conditions outside the data center. Similarly, will be trained and systems that manage energy consumption in utilities.