The Home Gateway Initiative (HGI) is to use its Chicago meeting next week to look at applications of Zigbee profiles for its home energy management (HEM) service specifications.
The event will run from 6 to 9 September and key among the items on the agenda is the meeting on Wednesday, 7 September, between HGI’s Energy Task Force and executives from the Zigbee Alliance. The two groups will discuss the application of Zigbee standards to the HEM services under specification within HGI.
This comes as HGI is on the verge of publishing the use-cases and overall architecture for HEM as agreed among the broadband service providers and the HGI manufacturers. In the next phase of the work, now underway, HGI will set specific requirements on the home gateway for support of these services.
“Zigbee has accumulated vast experience through the development of our Zigbee Smart Energy and Zigbee Home Automation standards, and this work will facilitate HGI’s work on their home energy management services,” said Bob Heile, chairman of the Zigbee Alliance.
HGI’s HEM work builds on already published material aimed at reducing the energy footprint related to broadband service. The Chicago meeting will continue the discussions established with industry stakeholders at the special HGI meeting on HEM in March 2011 in Italy.
“HGI’s requirements work on HEM will enable broadband customers to better manage and control their household’s energy consumption,” said Oliver Lamparter, chairman of HGI’s Energy Task Force.
“We are very pleased to welcome the Zigbee Alliance to our meeting to discuss the latest developments in Zigbee Smart Energy and Zigbee Home Automation, so that we can understand their potential application to the HEM services.”
The meeting also includes other items aimed at enhancing the broadband experience. New for the Chicago meeting are dedicated discussions on next-generation communications, key performance indicators for home networking technologies and power state management of home network connected devices. The Chicago meeting will also see a focus on preparing the 2011 Home Gateway test event, scheduled for later this year.
