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The last decade lay the foundation of several seminal concepts, that although
natively composite and complex, amply demonstrate the potential of 21st
century technology to affect important societal trends. Among notable candidates,
the convergence of information and energy related technologies, has revealed
the potential to reform conventional modes of operation towards a sustainable
and more rational way of resources utilization. Perhaps the most profound
example of this technological integration, will be met in forthcoming planning
of residential and industrial building design, where the rapid advance
of co-generation technologies and respective legislation follow-up, pave
the way for a vast growing market. The rational behind this blooming market
becomes directly apparent, considering that the international power authorities
and vendors, must –among many other issues such as power network safety-
urgently address the gross imbalance between central power generation (93%
global share), which is characterised by high losses from transmission
and distribution (T&D) systems and inefficient power plants. Electricity
losses are running at a minimum of 13.4% a year from developing countries
T&D systems, while the efficiency of central power plants is only around
33%. This waste of energy, which is directly associated with the traditional
model of central power generation -but can be largely stopped by the use
of building-level cogeneration, is dragging along massive social, economic
and environmental damage -particularly to the world’s poor countries. Millions
of people are failing to receive a supply of electricity as a consequence;
national fuel bills are billions of dollars higher than they could be,
and pollutant emissions are causing untold additional health and environmental
harm. Among many potential side benefits, an enormous number of employment
vacancies is wasted.
Howsoever strange, several complementary aspects of this forthcoming revolution,
are not directly apparent. Among plenty in a long list of issues, we may
array the enabling importance of residential telemetry and remote control
(often termed as Domotics), the crucial importance of renewable
energy technology implementation, and, the introduction of a new chain
of services and financial activities generated by the new income -as incurring
via the renewable resources. However, clear paths and definite guidelines
leading to a feasible and commercially attainable migration path for widespread
adoption of residential co-generation, do not yet exist, and, partial
solutions demonstrated so far, classify rather as expensive research case
studies.
The COGENVAD initiative, capitalizes on the breakthrough development efforts of DAEDALUS
Informatics, along with those of a group of knowledgeable industrial and
academic partners under a UEDP (University / Enterprise Development Partnership)
scheme, as to provide standardized methodologies, products and thoroughly
researched paths, for applying co-generation at the building-level. The
building level is to become a strategic focus of attention for strategic
and commercial planning, for energy co-generation Today, co-generation
schemes (which include high efficiency co-generation and decentralized
renewable energies) hold only a 7% share of the world’s power generation
market. This compares to a 17% share for nuclear power and a 36% share
for coal-fired electricity. The "DE 2012" challenge is to move to a 14%
share by 2012 -which in turn is far less from the potentially feasible.
Already, three countries (Netherlands, Finland, Denmark) have a DE share
in excess of 40%. A key aim of international power vendors should
be to promote the use of clean, efficient and low cost energy solutions
in developing countries. The most realistic way -at least by means of commercialisation
dynamics, extend of supplementary services and sustainability- to achieve
such high cogeneration percentages penetration, is via the building level
market.
Under a totally innovative approach, COGENVAD introduces an assembly of
enabling methods, products and know-how, able to offer a direct implementation
of co-generation benefits in residential and industrial buildings. The
open architecture and adoption of already established standards, bridged
with innovative hardware and software products under COGENVAD, offers
not only a commercially attractive solution for the present, but guaranties
a directly extensible and usable solution along future evolution and development.
Under a global evaluation approach introduced for the first time under
a similar concept, COGENVAD examines the role of all operational
participants besides the Residential Property Owner, such as the
Energy Services Providers (Utilities), the Financial Vendors required
for equipment leasing, the Third Party Services Providers that will
open the gateway to a great wealth of marketable services, and, even the
supervisory role of State Institutions, Organizations and Policy
Makers. Under the concise works of the COGENVAD initiative, three
major building-related cycle categories are being investigated and standardized
under a common procedural schema: the overall energy flow cycle,
the operational integrity and safety cycle, and, the complementary
services cycle. The rational and immense spread of these cycles could
be easily realized, since around 40% of the energy consumption in Europe
is building-related and if this is to be reduced through improved design,
the complex dynamics of the building as an energy system must be properly
understood. The energy flow paths are extremely complex and derive from
the combined behavior of the heat transfer mechanisms and the electric
power consumption patterns. The fact that these assets are non-linear,
interactive, and, dependent on numerous design parameters which, in turn,
can change with time, further magnifies the efficiency control challenge.
Daedalus Informatics is developing a complex functional and information
processing Software model (codenamed B.A.I.I.M. - Building
Automation Infrastructure Integration Manager) that enables any energy provider
to install, monitor and exploit energy derived from several solar devices
and an innovative breed of multi-purpose small wind turbines (WECON
PDP), installed at residential or office buildings. In addition to
this, a number of highly value adding services can be simultaneously offered
by the same infrastructure. As an indication, these may include full home
automation services, Internet connectivity, connection to third party services,
etc.
The proposal has far reaching business implications, made even more apparent
when the rapid deregulation of the energy sector is taken into account.
The aim is to address, via an integrated, solution oriented mode,
emerging markets in the renewable energy, power distribution and information
technology sectors. The core message is that in the open residential
space, a serious income in terms of wind and solar energy,
escapes almost completely from all possible and serious exploitation. In
addition to this, the particular COGENVAD solution offers, at a
limited marginal cost, a radical and extensive set of add-on services,
of an impressive commercial and social impact.
On the long term endeavors, COGENVAD may decisively present a new
perspective of sustainable growth in complementary and sensitive areas
of social concern, such as labor and education, which may be realized via
the introduction and rationalization of a universal network (i.e.
data and power), as it is currently the case with the existing power-line
network -where current utilization is only partial. The latent potential
of such a network as a social reformer and true initiator of the home-domain
introduction and a major breeder towards establishment of the home-business
realm, has been already speculated long ago. However, a truly ratified
working ground and a clear implementation approach have not been delineated.
The COGENVAD proposal stems from long term research and development
activities of Daedalus Informatics and is technically based on the rapid convergence
of a number of technologies, such as IT, home automation (domotics) and energy management
in the wider sense of the term (including aspects of production, storage,
and intelligent remote management).
Daedalus Informatics is currently in the position to complete the remaining R&D
towards a number of key-products and enabling know-how, and, in collaboration
with the appropriate industrial and financial vendors, to articulate a
fully-fledged solution with a commercially wide implementation scope.
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Renewable Energy and Environmental Technologies