IBM targets electricity providers with smart grid communications services

If you follow the energy sector, you’d be aware that the word “smart” gets bandied about quite a lot. Smart meters, smart cities and smart grids are all the rage. New South Wales based retailer and distributor EnergyAustralia has picked up a neat $100M as the winning bidder for the "Smart Grid, Smart City" project.

GE, in conjunction with a group of venture capital funds, has pledged to invest $US200 million in the best ideas to accelerate the development of a smart electricity grid.

Victorian electricity companies Origin Energy and Jemena have launched smart meter compatible web portals to enable customers to access their usage data online and track their consumption.

Logica has followed up its October 2009 survey the smart grid industry in Australia with new survey that shows significant progress in the last 12 months but identifies massive challenges for the energy sector in developing the more intimate customer relationships and developing the new business models that smart grids will engender.

Cisco has formed an alliance with smart metering company, Itron to incorporate IPv6 based communications technology in products for the smart grid market.

Integrating Renewable Electricity on the Grid report urges for solutions regarding energy storage, long-distance transmission and forecasting

While there’s a vigorous debate in Australia about the rising cost of electricity, and the introduction of smart meters, the global smart meter industry continues to gain steam, with meter manufacturers shipping nearly five million meters in the first quarter of this year.

Written by: Graeme Philipson | Published in: NetworkingA new IDC report predicts a nearly $2 billion annual spend on ICT by Australia’s utility sector by 2015, boosted by Smart Grid investments.

The CSIRO has debuted, at the CeBit show in Sydney, a smart metering system that it says can be installed at low cost and enable residential and small business users to remotely control their electricity usage via a web interface.