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FINALISTS (in their own words…) Please note that this information is correct at the time of publication (June 2014) but Finalists’ ideas are progressing rapidly.
Hestia powered by Demand Shaper Exergy Devices have a successful history of innovation in domestic energy management. Our smart heating control project, WattBox, generated significant IP for the company and was acquired in 2011 by AlertMe, and now forms part of Hive Active Heating, the British Gas smart home device. Our new product, Hestia, is a smart home controller specifically designed for electrically– heated homes, and could save these households over £200 per year. Using our Demand Shaper technology, Hestia implements a time–shifting algorithm to subtly alter domestic heating schedules in a way which gives precedence to the consumer’s comfort but is able to modulate electricity demand according to the needs of electricity suppliers, or National Grid. Our technology offers clear financial, comfort, and convenience benefits to households while providing a valuable service to our increasingly strained and vulnerable national power grid.
The Team Dr Peter Boait: invented the Demand Shaper concept and originally entered this competition. He founded Exergy Devices Ltd in 2006 as a consultancy and research company. He is also a part–time Senior Research Fellow in the Institute of Energy and Sustainable Development at De Montfort University. He is the named inventor on five patents relating to domestic energy controls and management (GB2432016, GB2446530, GB2446972, GB2446418, GB2448896). Dr Suyeon Kim: has developed the demand shaping application for storage heaters and is the named inventor on two patent applications that are key to the practical use of the demand shaping concept. Dr Matthew Parsons: brings expertise in community energy and project management, and has developed the code for the prototype evaluated in the Dynamic Demand competition.
Performance The National Physical Laboratory found from analysis of our Hestia prototype and simulation of its operation, a potential annual carbon reduction of 2.8–3.8 tonnes of CO2 per installation. This results from an energy saving of 25 per cent giving the consumer a saving of £200 per annum. By 2020 we can reasonably expect 60 per cent penetration of electrically heated
