Smart Grid technology worth $20billion
1 min read
Cisco has announced a new line of Smart Grid technologies designed to allow utility companies and their customers to manage power supplies and energy consumption more efficiently.
The company plans to establish a complete communications fabric designed to link electricity generators and business and domestic energy users and expects the Smart Grid market to be worth $20billion by 2015. In theory, a single home could link to large power stations using the customised IP based network. Cisco also announced plans to partner with energy companies as they attempt to undertake Smart Grid layouts.
Inbar Lasser-Raab, senior director of network systems at the company, said: "The technology exists from when we built IP networks, so we're taking technology in house to create a new physical product that would have our security capabilities, our routing and switching capabilities, as well as new standards to support the smart grid. We can provide security to protect the substations based on standard IP. It's the only way the industry can manage so many vendors plugging in so many solutions."
