Schneider Electric's Bradford Wills talks with Green Builder Media's Sara Gutterman about home decarbonization, explaining how circuit-level energy monitoring, demand side management and virtual power plants cut emissions while improving comfort. He also details how the Energy Center manages grid, solar, battery and generator power in a single connected panel.
00:00:11:27 - 00:00:25:07
Sara Gutterman: I'm here today with Brad Wills at Schneider Electric. Brad, welcome. Thanks. So today we want to talk about decarbonization and electrification, demand side management and energy monitoring.
00:00:25:08 - 00:01:05:00
Bradford Wills: Decarbonization obviously is important for for us to reach our goals as as a planet around climate and climate change. And what a lot of folks don't realize. You know, when they think about CO2 emissions, they instantly think about big smokestacks and factories and whatnot. But what they don't realize is that 34% of that carbon is actually coming from homes in the United States, so it is a significant footprint for our CO2 emissions, and one that's actually growing because of, you know, the work from home movement has shifted.
00:01:05:01 - 00:01:28:10
Bradford Wills: A lot of folks that used to use that energy at their office is they're now only using that energy at their home, but they're also losing the opportunity for setbacks of their HVAC because now they're home. Right. So that 34%, I anticipate that's going to start to creep up toward 40% over time just because of the work from home movement.
00:01:28:11 - 00:02:01:14
Bradford Wills: And then from an energy monitoring standpoint, I think it's the evolution of the smart meter has been really interesting to see homeowners now with smart meters able to go to their utility and sign in and see, okay, yes, there's my total usage today, but that's it. Where am I using it? Right. So with the solutions we're providing now, we're providing that granularity that allows them to see, you know, here's exactly where I'm using it.
00:02:01:14 - 00:02:32:03
Bradford Wills: And really in a lot of ways debunking the myth of it's the lights. It's not the lights, right. It's the heck. It's it's your dryer oven and some of those other loads. So just, you know, giving the homeowners the ability to see where am I actually using my energy and when am I using it is going to give them a lot of capability to just make simple behavior changes and save energy that way.
00:02:32:06 - 00:02:39:08
Sara Gutterman: Tell me about some of the trends that you're seeing in demand side energy management and energy monitoring.
00:02:39:15 - 00:03:03:25
Bradford Wills: This is going to be a really exciting space going forward in terms of, you know, we think about managing demand and that typically is more on the commercial industrial side of our segments because they're big users. Any individual home is a small user. So there hasn't been a practical way until now to say, how do I aggregate that?
00:03:03:26 - 00:03:32:18
Bradford Wills: How do I take a whole community and turn it into a virtual power plant? And now with the evolution of technologies that we're seeing in the marketplace, that can happen and businesses are are starting to pop up that are serving as a virtual power plant. So they're going out to communities and they're providing technology that allows them to, first of all, just see what the usage is.
00:03:32:20 - 00:03:53:03
Bradford Wills: But more importantly, cut that back or tell that and have an agreement with that homeowner that says, hey, I'll give you this technology. In some cases, it may involve a great deal on their solar system and give them the ability then to come back and say, okay, in exchange for that, I get to curtail your use at certain points.
00:03:53:03 - 00:04:18:16
Bradford Wills: And now that company can aggregate that and take that back to utility and say, I can cut X kilowatts, megawatts from, from your demand within almost instantaneous time period. Right. Which allows the utilities then to not turn on their peaker plants, which are more costly from both a financial standpoint as well as a CO2 emission standpoint.
00:04:18:17 - 00:04:38:21
Sara Gutterman: Very interesting. So, you know, there's a clear connection between what you're talking about and reaching our climate goals. But talk a little bit more about how this type of kind of interaction, load management, demand side energy management actually helps to improve the occupant or homeowner experience.
00:04:38:24 - 00:05:18:00
Bradford Wills: Yeah. So I think, you know, the in the past, some of these demand response programs of the past were pretty blunt, right? They were they were the utility had a device to turn off the HVAC or turn off the electric water heater, etc.. Now it's a little bit more elegant in that it allows the with the technology we have now through smart thermostats and load control, we can prequel home earlier in the morning and then allow it to drift during the peak, right?
00:05:18:02 - 00:05:48:02
Bradford Wills: We can set we can use that to set back a temperature instead of just turning it off, which that really enhances the homeowners experience and really their their acceptance of someone else controlling their electrical usage. Right. So I think our time, what you're going to see is that companies that are offering to manage your energy are going to, to morph into I'm going to manage your energy, but I'm also going to I'm going to manage your comfort.
00:05:48:02 - 00:06:15:01
Bradford Wills: I'm going to I'm going to make this simple for you so that you don't have to think about it, and you won't be inconvenienced. Right. And that that's going to be a major change in the homeowners mindset of, oh, I'm not giving up control. I'm, I'm I am paying for convenience. Right. So that I don't have to become the operational manager, facility manager of my home.
00:06:15:01 - 00:06:18:14
Bradford Wills: I can just live in it and enjoy it, which is what I want to do as a homeowner.
00:06:18:15 - 00:06:27:10
Sara Gutterman: So enhancing comfort, reducing costs and increasing convenience. It's a pretty great value proposition.
00:06:27:12 - 00:06:35:21
Sara Gutterman: Those a little bit more specifically about what Schneider Electric is doing in terms of your suite of solutions to solve for.
00:06:35:24 - 00:07:02:00
Bradford Wills: It's quite frankly, it's inevitable that that the electrical distribution system of the home is going to be connected. And as a result of being connected, we can do so many things now for the homeowner. So we have technology that allows the homeowner to see not only what their energy usage is within plus or -2% of a utility grade meter, but they can see all the way down at a device level.
00:07:02:00 - 00:07:45:13
Bradford Wills: They can see my HVAC, I can see my dishwasher, I can see my coffee maker. Right. And the brilliance of it is it doesn't require anyone to do commissioning. It is simply technology that, once installed, is a learning technology and uses AI machine learning to see that usage and to report it to you. So again, very little effort up front to start and use it, but it has a robustness about it in that you don't have as you change what's in your home, you don't have to go back and say, oh, I need to add this device to the system, right.
00:07:45:14 - 00:08:16:11
Bradford Wills: It's going to see that until, you know, we see it. Here it is. And here's how much you're using. And then what's really exciting from that. Just from beyond the the pure energy side is okay if I can see what's on or off at any given time. I can see if abnormal things are happening in the home. So we have users that are actually using it so that they can see their parents coffee maker go on every morning, and that's their sign that okay, my parents are okay.
00:08:16:12 - 00:08:38:02
Bradford Wills: They got up and started the coffee maker. Right. So the implications of that data that can be harvested from the electrical distribution center to solve so many other problems beyond energy usage, it's just really exciting. And I think, you know, the the other aspect of that is you can begin to see those things and it's in a lot less obtrusive way.
00:08:38:03 - 00:08:55:23
Bradford Wills: It's not a video, it's not an audio feed. It's something much more subtle that I think will make people a lot more comfortable if that makes them feel better. Right. But I don't have a camera sticking there in my face, so the implications of how it can be used going forward is just really exciting for us.
00:08:55:23 - 00:09:23:26
Sara Gutterman: So as we shift to full scale decarbonization and electrification, clearly renewable energy smart energy systems are pivotal. But one of the bottlenecks to scaling up to renewable energy systems has been storage and storage costs. But with your system, not only do you have into storage, but you can offer multiple energy sources in any given home. That's one of my favorite.
00:09:23:28 - 00:09:27:28
Sara Gutterman: Yeah, your of your system. So can you tell us a little bit more about that?
00:09:27:29 - 00:09:50:02
Bradford Wills: Yeah. So what we've done with the the introduction of the Energy Center, I guess the best analogy is, you know, we used to live in this world with a one way street, meaning we have a grid, and we had power coming from a utility to our house. And it was and that was it. Simple one way. Right. Then as time went by, people start adding generators.
00:09:50:02 - 00:10:12:15
Bradford Wills: So now all of a sudden that needed to be a two way road that it's regulated and make sure it's safe, but still like one road. Now though, we're talking about I've got grid. Maybe I have a generator, maybe I have a battery, maybe I have a new Ford F-150 lightning that I'm going to use to charge my house.
00:10:12:16 - 00:10:43:14
Bradford Wills: Right. So as well as solar. So I've got all those different systems or sources of power. So it's really kind of like we're moving away from a simple two lane road to an interstate highway system and all that's coming into the house, and it has to be managed safely and in conjunction. So we have created a solution that allows all those sources to come in and be managed in a safe way.
00:10:43:20 - 00:11:08:21
Bradford Wills: And, and then with the connected technology, allow the user to simply manage wind, which source they want to use, and wind, and also just basically future proof the home. So the energy center allows for provision for a generator. It's a split bus system, so you don't need a backup panel. So when you put it in you're already putting in a backup panel.
00:11:08:21 - 00:11:25:03
Bradford Wills: So even if even if you're not bringing all those sources of power in at that time by putting in the energy center your future proofing your home for a time in which you decide you do want to do that, you're not going to have to really disrupt the home. You're not going to be tearing up the walls and whatnot.
00:11:25:03 - 00:11:38:15
Bradford Wills: In order to to retrofit these solutions into home, it's going to be more simple, you know, by a generator, plug it into the generator interlock that's already in, in the energy center and you're off and running.
00:11:38:16 - 00:12:04:09
Sara Gutterman: Wonderful. Thank you Brad. Well, thank you so much to you for the work that you are doing to come up with innovation, innovative solutions to make our homes and our built environment smarter and more resilient, more sustainable. And thank you also to Schneider Electric for just being none on the leading edge of invasion. We really enjoy working with you and appreciate all of the incredible solutions you're providing to the marketplace.
00:12:04:10 - 00:12:34:12
Bradford Wills: Oh, and thank you. And you know the form you're providing us to to get the word out. Because this is not a this is not a category of product that builders or consumers for that matter, really think about being smart and connected. And so just, you know, helping helping those audiences understand that it's there's real value in this solution being connected and really bringing helping them simplify their life going forward around how they use energy.
00:12:34:13 - 00:12:37:07
Bradford Wills: It's a great opportunity for us and I really appreciate it.