Author: Katie Fehrenbacher

There’s good and bad when it comes to all that geothermal activity in Iceland. Yes, the volcanos with unpronounceable names can spew ash and shut down air travel. But there’s also an abundance of electricity from geothermal power, which combined with hydrothermal power, means Iceland runs off of pretty much 100 percent clean energy. That’s the backbone for an entrepreneurial idea to create a green computing cloud courtesy of Icelandic startup Greenqloud.

Greenqloud, which is one of the startups that will present at our cloud computing event Structure on June 23 and 24 in San Francisco, was created by Internet innovator Eirikur Hrafnsson (who is the CEO) and his co-founder Tryggvi Larusson and has been under development for about a year and a half. The idea is to rent space in data centers based in Iceland and sell cloud computing services to web companies and individuals all over the world that want to manage their carbon footprint and embrace clean power. The cloud computing services include virtual server hosting, data storage, scientific data processing and software as a service infrastructure.

For those not familiar with cloud computing, it’s basically scalable computing services on demand; companies like Amazon are selling such services to startups and large web firms alike. Cloud computing will also contribute to a growth in the power consumption of IT and as Stanford Professor Jonathan Koomey pointed out at our Green:Net ’09 event, and Google’s Green Energy Czar Bill Weihl discussed at Green:Net 2010, there’s been an increased effort by Internet companies to add clean power and energy efficiency into the equation.

Hrafnsson told me during an interview on Thursday that Greenqloud plans to launch its beta service by the fourth quarter of this year on a small scale. After that, Greenqloud wants to launch on a much larger, public scale in 2011. The company plans to hit break-even by year two of operation and become profitable by year three. It’s raised about a half a million dollars from angel investors in Iceland and is looking to raise another round of funding to launch its service on a wider scale.

There are a few companies in the U.S. that have been working on somewhat similar ideas to combine clean power and computing, though they’re mostly straight green web hosting companies, while Greenqloud is offering green cloud computing. AISO.net offers solar-powered data center space, Greenest Host offers green web hosting, and companies like GoGreen Hosting, Sustainable Web Sites and ecoSky offer green web hosting based largely on carbon offsets. None of them seem to be printing money, suggesting the market for clean-powered web services isn’t exactly large at this point.

But Greenqloud’s service could be more attractive than some of these green web ideas, largely because Hrafnsson says that the service can save cloud computing users money. While the majority of these green web companies offer a premium service– using the marketing of the green aspect to charge higher rates — Hrafnsson says that both clean energy and data center space in Iceland is actually quite cheap and abundant so the company can charge the same or lower rates.

A large data center operator in Iceland like Verne Global (which Greenqloud is in discussions with) is able to offer a competitive 20-year fixed electricity rate, which protects the customer from volatile energy prices, and that is 100 percent clean power. Greenqloud plans to work with several data center operators, and Hrafnsson says there has been a recent “gold rush” in data center construction in Iceland — a combination of the devalued Kronor, the IT history of the country and the emission-free power grid.

Hrafnsson says Iceland can also act as the hub between web companies offering services in Europe and the U.S. Web operators commonly pay for two cloud computing services — in Ireland for Europe, and in the U.S. for the U.S. — but because of Iceland’s go-between location it can offer one cloud computing service for both continents.

If international carbon legislation does go into effect, the value of the Greenqloud service will rise dramatically. Already the UK’s Carbon Reduction Commitment has doubled energy operating costs and stopped people from building data centers in the region, according to Mike Manos, the VP of service pperations at Nokia. Koomey has said that if there was a carbon price of $19 per ton under a cap-and-trade system, a 130,000-square-foot data center that was powered by a coal-sourced utility could have to pay an additional $5 million.

Clean-powered data centers have also started to become more important in terms of PR for web companies. Greenpeace launched a campaign to try to stop Facebook from using coal power for data centers, and recently released a report on how cloud computing companies need to play more of a leadership role for legislation around IT and energy.

Overall the idea of Greenqloud is novel, but I see a few hurdles. There’s not much barrier to entry or a technology differentiator. So a data center operator, for example, or others could offer a similar service. So ultimately bringing in users to Greenqloud will be about marketing and branding, which can be expensive and daunting for Internet founder types. Also, we’ll see if cloud computing users will be willing to work with a startup in order to have a better carbon footprint. The majority of web companies just don’t care that much about clean power yet.

For more research on clean power and the cloud check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Clean Energy and the Cloud, Redux

Hot Topic: Green Data Centers

Facebook’s Coal-Powered Problem

Images courtesy of Greenqloud and courtesy of Ben Husmann’s photostream.

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What if the energy needed to power data centers could be like the latest episode of “True Blood” — on demand? That’s the idea behind Power Assure, a startup founded three years ago that makes a software-as-a-service product that can ramp up and down the power consumption of data centers to coincide with the demand of its web company users. So, say, in the middle of the night, when few people are pinging its customers’ websites, Power Assure’s service can reduce energy consumption appropriately, and when there’s a sudden spike of traffic in the morning, the service can quickly ramp capacity back up.

Power Assure’s CEO Brad Wurtz tells me that the company built from scratch the software platform to manage server capacity in delicate balance with demand. It’s a novel, if utterly simple, concept given that most data centers are typically using just 10 percent of their capacity, yet running servers and the data center at full power, explains Wurtz. Google has also been working on this problem and published a paper last year that calls for servers to be redesigned and enhanced with software so that they can be as energy efficient when used lightly as they are at maximum use (see my article Google: Servers Should Be More Like People, GigaOM Pro, subscription required).

The key to Power Assure’s technology is the smart algorithms it’s created to monitor and control energy usage in the data center in real time. The company starts out by installing one or two appliances in its customer’s data centers. Those appliances sit on the company’s management network and gather information about the demand of its websites, as well as the power usage of the servers, cooling system and networking gear. Power Assure’s system then uses its algorithms to, in essence, dynamically match the website demand in whatever metric is available (such as cost per click, number of users or number of sessions per minute) to an appropriate level of utilization for the servers, cooling and networking gear.

Of course the first question that springs to mind — both mine and Power Assure’s customers, according to Wurtz — is will the system be able to accommodate a rapid, unanticipated spike in traffic? But Wurtz says that the software also monitors traffic in real time and keeps a buffer of capacity available so that the system has enough time to wake itself up to full capacity. The company lets customers test it out to see that there’s no problem with traffic peaks, says Wurtz.

If it works as advertised — saving 50-60 percent in energy costs and not having a negative impact on service — it could be a killer product. That’s one reason why the company was able to raise a seed round of funding from Draper Fisher Jurvetson (see DFJ Managing Director Steve Jurvetson talk about the company in this video clip), and has scored $5 million in grants from the Department of Energy.

Wurtz says the DOE funding was very beneficial in getting other funding and gaining customer trials. The company has also more recently boosted its funding to $10.75 million and is looking to raise another $2.75 million on top of that, according to an SEC filing.

At this point Power Assure has no customers that it will announce publicly, but Wurtz says it has a handful it’s doing trials with government, financial services and Internet firms. And over the next year the company will be working on scaling its technology into commercial deployments.

You might be wondering why data center energy isn’t used on demand already. Well, that’s what I was thinking. Wurtz explained to me that with the growth of data center energy consumption, the problem of energy cost and environmental responsibility has just started to come into the mainstream over the past year. The market for energy efficiency enterprise and computing products has changed dramatically recently, says Wurtz.

To learn more about data center and Internet infrastructure energy use, come to our Structure event on June 23 and 24 in San Francisco, Calif.

For more research on green data centers check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Google: Servers Should Be More Like People

Is Software the Key to Green Data Centers?

Report: Green Data Center Design Strategies

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If you’ve been wondering (like we have) what exactly networking giant Cisco planned to sell to utilities for the smart grid, ponder no longer. Cisco announced its first smart grid-specific products on Tuesday, including a router and grid switch, which are based on its traditional networking products but have been built specifically for the utility environment.

Cisco’s new smart grid gear — dubbed the Cisco 2000 Series Connected Grid Router (CGR 2010) and the Cisco 2500 Series Connected Grid Switch (CGS 2520) — gives utilities another option for deploying smart grid networks, and offers them the security of having the deep pockets and extensive supply chain of a big company. Utilities are risk averse by nature, have to abide by very specific regulations for maintaining service and for the most part, prefer to work with a big company with decades of experience under its belt.

Cisco says utilities, including Germany’s E.oN Westfalen Weser, Enel in Italy and Spain, and U.S. utilities Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric have already been testing out the new gear. Cisco has previously announced smart grid deals with Duke Energy, Florida Power & Light, Germany’s Yellostrom, and Canada’s Enmax, and Cisco’s senior VP of smart grid, Laura Ipsen, previously told us that it’s been selling a build-buy-partner model.

Cisco says the new smart grid products are “ruggedized” for the electrical network, can tolerate higher and lower temperatures than its traditional network gear, include a high level of security, and can help integrate renewables, detect network outages and migrate older proprietary gear to IP network gear.

Cisco’s new products will also give a solid boost to a smart grid that’s based on Internet Protocol (IP), the language upon which the Internet and information technology is built. Cisco’s strategy to embrace everything IP is similar to those of younger smart grid network firms Silver Spring Networks and SmartSynch, with its GridRouter, which it says can run over any network.

Cisco also recently made an investment in Grid Net, which builds smart meter software based around IP, and its first products have been based on the wireless standard WiMAX. Cisco’s Ipsen told us the company would likely make additional investments or acquisitions in the smart grid space, from electricity generation to consumption.

But when it comes to the smaller smart grid networking firms that had been moving faster than Cisco — like Silver Spring Networks or SmartSynch — Cisco’s announcement this morning is not such good news. While Cisco has been slow, it’s clearly ready to be aggressive. Ipsen told us at our Green:Net event that Cisco sees the smart grid market opportunity as “bigger than the Internet” (video clip).

For more research on smart grid check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Smart Algorithms: The Future of the Energy Industry

New Opportunities in the Smart Grid

The Developer’s Guide to Home Energy Management Apps

Images courtesy of Cisco.

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Talking and texting on cell phones while driving might be banned in many states, but will it some day be the norm to use social networks and communication applications on screens embedded in vehicles? If the work recently created by the students at University of Michigan, in conjunction with Ford, Microsoft and Intel, is any indicator, there will be as many innovative social applications connecting us in our vehicles as there are on our Internet-connected laptops.

Take the Caravan Tracker, an application made by Team Bob Cat from the University of Michigan, which enables multiple cars to connect while on car trips in order to share information about how much gas is left in the fuel tanks, competing fuel economy between the cars, shared routes, and land marks and gas stations on the route ahead. Team Bob Cat has been testing out the application on their very own road trip this week, which will end on Friday with an appearance at the Maker Faire in San Mateo, Calif.

Other applications made by the students use in-vehicle social networking to help cut fuel consumption. The Fuel Tracker, made by Team Armadillo at the University of Michigan, records the real-time fuel economy of a vehicle and then compares that fuel economy to peers. The in-vehicle dashboard enables the driver to see other drivers that have driven the same, or similar routes, and suggests the best route for the best fuel economy. Another student team created an in-vehicle social ride-sharing platform, which can encourage on-the-go carpooling, and provides a rating and recommendation system for its users.

A fourth interesting app that’s a twist on in-vehicle traffic data is the crowd-sourced traffic mapping system called NostraMap, made by another group of students. Drivers can update the service in real time by noting where accidents or traffic backups have occurred, and the touchscreen system allows the driver to, for example, scrawl a quick “A” for “accident” on the screen with a fingertip.

The video below gives some quick interviews with the teammates and professors who were involved in the class, and you can check out this Facebook page for videos on all of the students’ applications. Is this the future of our connected vehicles?

For more research on connected cars check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Report: IT Opportunities in Electric Vehicle Management

The Developer’s Guide to Home Energy Management Apps

Why Microsoft’s Electric Vehicle Deal With Ford Matters

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As a big fan of car-sharing networks — I ditched my car last year and am a City CarShare customer — I absolutely heart this idea: Spride Share, a car-sharing network where regular car owners can rent out their vehicles to drivers, is coming out of stealth today. The startup is being led by one of the earliest greentech investors out there: Sunil Paul, who founded early-stage investment firm Spring Ventures and was an early investor in Nanosolar (here’s a Q&A I ran with Paul when I launched Earth2Tech three years ago).

The company also has an advisory board that a who’s who of Internet and transportation innovators, including Reid Hoffman, founder and chairman, LinkedIn; Mark Pincus, CEO, Zynga; Dan Kammen, director, UC Berkeley Institute of Transportation Studies; and Rick Hutchinson, CEO, City CarShare. The company says it will be able save car owners money on the cost of owning a vehicle and will enable people who don’t own a vehicle to have another car-as-a-service option. The company will use the web and social networking to deliver this distributed model of car sharing.

Spride Share is looking to grab ahold of the recent surge in car-sharing networks. According to Frost & Sullivan, the number of drivers using car-sharing networks increased 117 percent between 2007 and 2009 in North America. Within five years, the firm expects to see 4.4 million people in North America and 5.5 million people in Europe signing up for services like the one from Zipcar, more than tripling membership from 2009.

However, the big hitch right now for Spride Share is that current insurance law isn’t too friendly when it comes to people renting out personal vehicles (a startup called RelayRides that’s working with a similar idea for distributed car sharing has taken out a $1 million insurance policy to supplement a car owner’s coverage in case a user damages their car). So the service isn’t available now and might not be available until the law changes. On that end, the startup, along with City CarShare, has been working with California State Assembly member Dave Jones (D-Sacramento) to create Assembly Bill 1871, which would change insurance law to permit remuneration for personal vehicle sharing. The company asks you to support the bill on its site and is holding a press conference on the subject today.

If the service becomes available, Spride Share says it is free for vehicle owners to join, and they can make an estimated $2,000-$7,200 per week depending on how many hours per week their cars are rented out. Spride Share plans to use a similar style communications service as Zipcar and City CarShare, with a key fob to open up the door and log in the user (the key fob system takes four hours to install, says the company), and the service sounds familiar as well with penalties for dirty cars and late returns.

For more on vehicles and IT check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Report: IT Opportunities in Electric Vehicle Management

Mobility on Demand Takes Aim at Transport Networks’ “Last Mile”

Electric Vehicles Give “Mobility as a Service” a Jumpstart

Green:Net is almost sold out! The only conference dedicated to the intersection of Internet technology and green has just a handful of tickets left; they’re available on a first-come, first-serve basis. GigaOM readers can get a $75 discount — just follow this link to register now.

The speakers at Green:Net 2010, which will take place this Thursday, will be focused on one thing: how software, computing and the web can be leveraged to save the planet. At the same time, attendees will glean insights into huge new technology markets that will spearhead the green economy.

A selection from our speaker list includes:

• Jerry Brown, California Attorney General and Gubernatorial Candidate
• Vinod Khosla, Founder, Khosla Ventures
• Steve Jurvetson, Managing Director at Draper Fisher Jurvetson
• Bill Weihl, Google’s Green Energy Czar
• Bill Gross, Founder and CEO of Idealab
• Dian Grueneich, Commissioner for the California Public Utilities Commission
• Laura Ipsen, SVP and GM, Smart Grid, Cisco
• Eric Dresselhuys, EVP, Silver Spring Networks
• Michael Harrigan VP of Electric Vehicle Services, NRG Energy
• Pedro Pizarro EVP, Power Operations, Southern California Edison

Companies represented include Ford, IBM, Nissan, General Motors, Cisco, Silver Spring Networks, SAP, Reliant Energy, Microsoft, Greenpeace and many more.

So join us this Thursday, April 29th in San Francisco as we uncover new opportunities for entrepreneurs to shape the future of greentech.

• Green:Net 2010
• April 29, Mission Bay Conference Center, San Francisco

For exhibit opportunities call Mike Sly at (415) 235-0358 or email events at gigaom dot com.

Image courtesy of bisonblog’s photostream.

Two years ago we launched our first 25 Who Ditched Infotech for Cleantech list, where we profiled 25 entrepreneurs and investors who had taken their dotcom and broadband-based winnings in tow, and plunged into the energy and cleantech markets. Now in light of our upcoming Green:Net conference — which looks at the intersection of IT and green — we’ve decided to revive the list for its second edition.

Some of those original innovators are still the best candidates, so we brought them back for the second time around. But there’s also quite a few new comers we’ve added on. And, like in the inaugural year, some of the execs are finding more success than others. Also several of these innovators will be speaking at Green:Net on April 29 in San Francisco. Here’s our second edition of the 25 Who Ditched Infotech for Greentech:

1. Bill Gates, Philanthropist, Investor, Chairman Microsoft
2. William D. Watkins, CEO, Bridgelux
3. Vinod Khosla, Founder Khosla Ventures.
4. Lee Burrows, Partner, VantagePoint Venture Partners
5. John Doerr, Partner, Kleiner Perkins
6. Thom Siebel, Founder, Chairman of C3
7. Elon Musk, Chairman, Tesla, Chairman, CEO SolarCity
8. John Steinberg, Founder, CEO, Ecofactor
9. Steve Jurvetson, Partner Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
10. Bill Gross, Founder Idealab.
11. Ray Lane, Partner Kleiner Perkins.
12. Steve Westly, Founder The Westly Group.
13. Ric Fulop, Founder, A123Systems
14. Bob Metcalfe, Partner, Polaris Venture Partners
15. Scott Lang, CEO, Silver Spring Networks
16. Shai Agassi, Founder, CEO Project Better Place
17. Richard Lowenthal, Founder, CEO, of Coulomb Technologies
18. Frank Varasano, Founder, Former CEO V-Vehicle
19. Al Gore, Chairman Generation Investment Managment, Partner Kleiner Perkins
20. Bernard Tse, Founder, CEO, of Atieva
21. Bill Joy, Partner Kleiner Perkins
22. Scott Faris, CEO Planar Energy Devices
23. Trae Vassallo, Partner, Kleiner Perkins
24. Rob Ferber, CTO of KLD Energy Technologies
25. Warren Weiss, Partner Foundation Capital

The second annual Green:Net conference, the only event that examines the intersection of greentech and IT, will be held next Thursday, April 29th at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco. From the entrepreneurs that make up the backbone of America’s innovation economy to the leaders of forward-thinking U.S. utilities to the investors that funded the Internet revolution, the speakers at Green:Net 2010 will be focused on one thing: how the Internet and IT can be leveraged to save the planet. At the same time, attendees will learn how to create huge new technology markets and spearhead the green economy.

Friends of GigaOM receive a $75 discount. So hurry and get your discount ticket now!

To preserve our future, we have to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption. The Internet, computers and communication networks are ideally suited to help with this task, including via the smart grid, connected cars, software for resource management and greener data centers. Following a sold-out first-year event, we’re proud to once again be gathering together the brightest minds, ideas and entrepreneurs for Green:Net 2010.

Topics include:

• So the Smart Grid Will Be Huge, Now What? — Who are the innovators, and what software and network technologies will usher in the next generation of the power grid?
• The New Networked Car — Is the next major mobile technology platform for green applications your car?
• Carbon Policy Is Coming, and Software Is Gonna Save You — Will we see the emergence of new software giants in this space?
• How the Internet Giants Are Moving Into Energy – Google and Microsoft have slowing moved into offering energy services; what’s the attraction and what are their plans?
• Switching Atoms for Bits: The Web and Dematerialization — Did you know that a Kindle can reduce carbon emissions?
• Dot-com Investors Turn to Cleantech — Get a map of the opportunities and the funds chasing deals at this session.

Green:Net 2010 speakers include:

• Jerry Brown, Attorney General for the State of California
• Vinod Khosla, Founder of Khosla Ventures
• Steve Jurvetson, Managing Director at Draper Fisher Jurvetson
• Bill Weihl, Google’s Green Energy Czar
• Mike Harrigan, NRG Energy’s VP of Electric Vehicle Services
• Pedro Pizarro, Southern California Edison’s EVP of Power Operations
• Dian Grueneich, Commissioner for the California Public Utilities Commission
• Laura Ipsen, SVP and GM, Smart Grid, Cisco
• Eric Dresselhuys, EVP, Silver Spring Networks

Companies include:

• Ford Motor Co.
• Microsoft
• Google
• Nissan
• General Motors
• SAP
• IBM
• Cisco
• Greenpeace International

And many, many more. For a full listing of speakers and topics visit our Green:Net 2010 web site.

Act quickly now to lock in the lowest price and get your seat. We look forward to meeting you at Green:Net 2010!

Every time you send out 140 characters over the social application Twitter, how much energy does that consume? According to some back of the napkin calculations from Raffi Krikorian, a developer for Twitter’s Platform Team, each tweet sent consumes about 90 joules. That means each tweet emits about 0.02 grams of C02 into the atmosphere.

For the roughly 50 million tweets sent on average per day, that’s the equivalent of 1 metric ton of CO2 per day. (1 metric ton of CO2 looks kinda like this).

That’s actually not bad at all — in comparison one Google search query has been found to consume about 1 kilojoule per query, which emits 0.2 grams of CO2. And according to a recent study each spam email message emits 0.3 grams of carbon.

However the research does remind us that IT takes energy to run and the energy consumption — and carbon emissions — footprint of IT is just growing bigger every day. For example, Greenpeace recently put out a report that said that the energy consumption and carbon emissions of cloud computing are already significantly higher than previously thought. Folks in the developer community like Krikorian are acknowledging the problem, and as he says in the video clip: “We can do better.”

Here’s his slides from the talk:

While Google has been a strong supporter of green data centers (GigaOM Pro, subscription required), the search engine giant, along with a group of tech companies, are protesting one specific data center efficiency standard: the recently updated 90.1 building efficiency standard from the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE). The objecting tech group, which also includes Microsoft, Amazon, Nokia, Digital Realty Trust, and Dupont Fabros Technology, says that because the standard is “too prescriptive” (it details specific technology that has to be used) it could cramp innovation.

Urs Hoelzle, Google’s senior VP of operations, writes in blog post on the subject this morning that the ASHRAE standard calls for specific types of cooling methods to be used “instead of setting a required level of efficiency for the cooling system as a whole.” He points out that while the ASHRAE standard requires use of outside air (called an economizer) for data center cooling, this technology can have varying degrees of efficiency, and future data center technology might not need economizers at all.

Far better than the technology-specific standard from ASHRAE, Google says the industry needs an overall data center efficiency standard, where companies can pick and choose what technology they want to use. The debate over so-called “picking winners” when it comes to technology and standards, mandates and regulations, is about as old as the tech industry itself. For example, the federal biofuel mandates dictate that a certain portion of the biofuel supply should come from cellulosic ethanol. But the problem with standards bodies and policy makers picking technologies is that in nascent industries — like green data center tech, biofuels or alternative energy — the best technologies are not always known and in particular not known by standards groups and policy makers.

Google and the group are asking ASHRAE to replace “the proposed prescriptive approach” with an “overall data center-level cooling system efficiency standard” that will “allow data center innovation to continue.” In particular, they like the Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) metric, which Google has been using to support claims that its data centers are some of the most efficient in the computing world.

For more on green data centers from GigaOM Pro:

Report: Green Data Center Design Strategies

Clean Energy and the Cloud, Redux

Image courtesy of Flickr user ~Bob~West~’s photostream.

It’s probably not too hard for carbon-focused startup C3 to raise funds. Despite the fact that the company is in stealth and hasn’t released a product or game plan, it was started by Thomas Siebel — the guy who sold Siebel Systems to Oracle for billions of dollars — and counts former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and former Senator and Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham as directors. (You know about as much as I do about how this group came together on this project). Well, according to an SEC filing, C3 is looking to up its funding by around $4 million to a total of $30 million.

While C3 isn’t speaking publicly right now, last year Siebel gave some clues into C3 and what the company would be doing during a speech at the Alliance of Chief Executives meeting. Enterprise software to help companies manage their carbon footprint, according to two people that attended the speech (Dave Kellogg, the CEO of Mark Logic, and Drue Kataoka of ValleyZen). Both reported that C3 would be focused on helping companies “monitor, mitigate and monetize” their carbon footprint.

The company, which explains itself only as “Energy and Emissions Management,” is run by Oracle veterans Patricia House (who co-founded Siebel Systems), Ed Abbo and Lenley Hensarling. According to several things I’ve heard (but I haven’t confirmed with the company), I think C3 stands for “Carbon Conscious Consumers.” Board members beyond Rice and Abraham, include S. Shankar Sastry, the dean of engineering at University of California, Berkeley.

At the end of the day, if the company is working on enterprise software for carbon management, I really want to know what makes its idea so compelling as to recruit so many high profile execs and board members. There are already over 22 different carbon management firms, including Hara, which has its own high-profile backers with political connections. (We’re looking at carbon management software at our Green:Net conference on April 29, with execs from SAP, Hara and AMEE.)

Oracle itself and SAP have also moved into the carbon management space. I don’t think carbon management software is about innovative technology at this point, though any innovation would be welcome. The market is more focused on getting big, getting customers and getting ready for Congress to pass a climate bill with a cap and trade system in it. The climate bill is looking more and more difficult to pass as of late, but the carbon management market is still really large (with international carbon markets and voluntary compliance) and will only grow larger over the coming years.

For more research on cleantech financing check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Cleantech Financing Trends: 2010 and Beyond

Images courtesy of C3 and darthdowney’s photostream.

Whether you see Apple’s tablet the iPad as the catalyst of a digital media revolution, or just another gadget that Steve Jobs wants you to spend your hard-earned cash on, it’s hard to avoid the black hole that is the iPad buzz this week. But beyond possibly affecting the digital consumption of books, magazines, blogs and newspapers, I think the iPad will have an effect on a less obvious market: home energy.

The home energy market is a nascent ecosystem that’s made up of: utilities that are trying get their customers to consume less energy, startups building smart energy software and energy dashboards that will manage energy data in the home and help customers consume less, large manufacturers dabbling in connected appliances, and investors looking for ways to make money (a dose of skepticism here).

If you’re never heard of the market, it’s because from a consumer perspective it really doesn’t exist yet. According to Texas-based consultants KEMA, 68 percent of Americans haven’t heard of the smart grid, and exuberance in the home energy market “should be tempered to account for the challenge of engaging large numbers of residential customers.”

The preliminary stage of the market is one reason why the iPad could possibly have such a large effect. As Glen Mella, the President and COO of Control4 — a home automation and energy management startup that created a free iPad app — put it to me in an interview yesterday, think of the millions of people that could suddenly have access to a power display with rich media for home energy management. “We’re excited to embrace the iPad as another way to bring home automation and home energy management to the mainstream,” explained Mella.

The iPad has a real chance of playing a key role in “the digital home,” a long-discussed market where consumers are supposed to use a fourth screen to manage home digital entertainment, security, lighting, and heating and cooling. In recent months home automation players like Control4 have added on energy management as another feature, (see Is Energy Management the Killer App For the Home Automation Market?, GigaOM Pro, subscription required).

But the iPad could offer a few unique characteristics specifically for home energy management in comparison to an energy-specific dashboard gadget — like those made by Tendril, EnergyHub and Control4 (yep they make a gadget too) — mobile interfaces with smaller screens like the iPhone, or a website on a computer. Those advantages include a large screen, the ability for rich media and the fact that the device can do an unlimited amount of other tasks. “People aren’t buying the iPad for energy, but now they have this sleek and capable energy device,” says Mella.

So, say iPad buyers do one day embrace home energy apps like Control4’s on the iPad, it could certainly change the newly forming energy management ecosystem. More specifically, it could cause stand-alone energy devices to stall. To that, Mella says “Sure the iPad could replace some of the sales, but let’s do what the consumer wants.”

Other entrepreneurs that make both energy management software and hardware have similar thoughts. Marco Graziano, CEO of energy management startup Visible Energy, which has an iPhone app for energy management and plans to make a native iPad app, explained to me in an email:

I never thought specialized displays were a good idea for monitoring energy consumption. They don’t have any sex appeal and are too expensive anyway as freebies for utilities to give away. We found that interactivity is really a plus when it gets to visualizing energy consumption and to engaging people in energy awareness. In this respect the iPad is a breakthrough.

Seth Frader-Thompson, CEO of energy management company EnergyHub, which makes both an energy dashboard that has rich media, and is also developing an iPhone app, says:

We think it’s important to offer consumers a choice of how they interact with their home energy management system. That includes dedicated devices like our Dashboard for people who don’t have a multi-purpose “Fourth Screen,” as well as apps for the iPhone and iPad, Android phones and tablets, and other platforms that gain significant market traction. Our key value is really in making software that makes personal energy management easy for consumers, and delivering that software in a way that’s accessible to as many people as possible.

The bottom line is that it’s still early days for these startups, which means that they can pretty easily adapt, change business models, and, say, start pushing more software than hardware, if a dominant energy hardware platform emerges. And if the iPad ever does help the energy management market break out into the mainstream, it will also mean that the energy management market has moved solidly into the domain of the consumer, as opposed to being a product distributed by a utility. That will ultimately mean a lot bigger market and a lot more opportunities for these startups.

Easter Sunday was a minor blip over the weekend that will now be remembered as the official launch of the iPad — who cares about Easter egg hunts when there were lines snaking around city blocks, and gadget-fans fiercely giving their early impressions of the device. While there could be a variety of effects of the success of Apple’s iPad on the energy consumption associated with computing (Greenpeace’s and other’s takes here), applications developed for the iPad could also play a role in promoting low-carbon lifestyles like better fuel economy and home energy efficiency.

We’d been hoping that some of the iPhone apps developed for next-generation connected cars and home energy efficiency would be available for the iPad launch, but there’s actually very few. The lone official one we’ve seen that touches on home energy is Control4’s, which enables the user to control a thermostat and lighting (as well as audio, video, security) via the iPad device.

Apple says that most of the current 150,000 iPhone and iPod touch apps will be viewable on the iPad, but those are unofficial versions and won’t necessarily be formatted well for the expanded screen or work exactly the way the iPhone versions work. But there’s already over 1,000 official iPad applications available from some of the eager adopter app makers. And I’m expecting a lot more official iPad applications when the 3G (connected to cellular networks) and GPS-embedded iPad versions come to market.

Here’s 1 official green application you can already get on the iPad, and 4 more green iPhone apps that we’re looking forward to checking out the iPad versions:

1). Control4: Control4’s iPad app was the only green-leaning official iPad application I could find as of iPad launch time. The free app basically turns the iPad into your central home dashboard, enabling the user to control a connected thermostat, lighting, entertainment systems (video, audio), and home security. To get this to work properly, of course you need to buy — and have a dealer install — the Control4 connected home system. An iPad app really plays into the sweet spot of Control4’s offer: a high-end home product, slick design, and a dashboard offering rich media around energy.

2). Tendril: We’re not sure if Tendril has an official iPad app in the works (we’re waiting to hear back on that), but the six-year-old home energy management startup plans to release an iPhone app to both select utility customers and consumers this year. Dubbed Tendril Vantage Mobile, the iPhone app will enable users to see home energy consumption in real time, view dynamic pricing changes, and control connected appliances and thermostats remotely. Like with Control4’s application, the iPad, more than the iPhone, could offer a superior centralized dashboard for home energy management.

3). ZipCar: ZipCar created a free iPhone app that enables ZipCar members to find, reserve, and lock/unlock ZipCars via iPhone. For the iPad version, ZipCar’s service could use the larger screen to integrate more rich media, including navigation, directions, entertainment for, say, touring, and even syncing with audio and visual content. (We’re waiting to hear back on if ZipCar will add more iPad functionality to its app)

4). Nissan LEAF: Nissan has been working on an iPhone app that can connect with the information technology system of its electric vehicle the LEAF and can monitor battery charging and temperature controls (on/off). The LEAF doesn’t go on sale until the end of December, so it’s safe to expect to wait that long for the iPhone app, too. For an iPad version, Nissan could use the larger screen to better incorporate navigation, and entertainment. (Nissan’s Mark Perry, Director, Product Planning and Strategy, will be speaking about connected cars at our Green:Net conference on April 29 in San Francisco). (We’re waiting to hear back on if Nissan will add more iPad functionality to its app)

5). Visible Energy: Young startup Visible Energy (which launched at our Green:Net 2009 conference) was an early advocate of turning to the iPhone for home energy management. And recently the FCC mentioned the company’s iPhone app as an example of how IT can help the environment and global warming. As for Control4 and Tendril, an expanded screen and more rich media could help a Visible Energy iPad application make the consumer experience more interesting and more connected with the consumers digital content and the web. (We’re waiting to hear back on if Visible Energy will add more iPad functionality to its app)

For research on the iPad see GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Web Tablet Survey: Apple’s iPad Hits the Right Notes: We asked 1,000 early adopters about their interest in owning a tablet. Find out who’s likely to buy and why.

Forecast: Tablet App Sales To Hit $8B by 2015: A detailed look at iPad and other tablet sales, as well as app purchasing behavior, volume and revenue forecasts.

Image courtesy of Chris Albrecht.

Green technology will soon be getting a player with a pedigree born out of one of the most successful gadgets of all time. Tony Fadell, one of the original developers of the iPod at Apple tells the New York Times that he will be leaving the company to pursue advising and investing in consumer-focused green technology companies.

Welcome! The world of greentech sorely needs top-notch consumer-focused design, and more innovation to draw disinterested consumers into the fray. As Joel Makower put it in a blog post this week looking back on the 20-year anniversary of his book The Green Consumer, one thing that hasn’t changed over the last two decades has been the green consumer itself: “[T]here don’t seem to be that many more than today in 1990, in terms of people making significant changes to their shopping and consuming habits in ways that move markets toward greener products and services, never mind actually ’saving the earth.’”

Perhaps Fadell can help shake up the world of consumer greentech, the way he did so successfully with the digital music player almost a decade ago at Apple — he joined Apple as its director of the iPod in 2001. Fadell has been working on his move to leave Apple for awhile, and back in 2008 said he would be leaving the company for personal reasons.

It’s also not the first time that Fadell would be going out on his own (we’re looking into whether or not Fadell will be joining a firm and also more details of what he will be focusing on). Before joining Apple, he tried to start his own Silicon Valley consumer electronics company called Fuse which reportedly failed to get financing. It’s tough being an entrepreneur but it’ll probably be a little easier to pave your own path with the name recognition the second time around.

Despite the relatively small market for consumers that care about how green their electronics are, making gadgets more sustainable seems to have generated more attention from the manufacturers themselves. Dell, Nokia, and heck, even Apple (with its greenest laptop claims) have been investigating how to offer greener products (my Green Guide to CES this year).

For more related content read GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

Interview: Tim Brown, CEO and President of IDEO

Report: Monetizing Digital Content

Image courtesy of Brianfit’s photostream

The launch of Apple’s iPad this weekend represents a lot of firsts for the tech industry: a device with some of the most media attention of all time, and the start of an $8 billion tablet application market. But the iPad also represents one of a wave of media-consuming mobile devices that increasingly depends on “the cloud” — basically the Internet and data centers — to deliver hosted services and digital content, and will help contribute to a massive growth in energy consumption and carbon emissions associated with so-called cloud-computing over the coming years.

According to a report published Tuesday from the environmental researchers at Greenpeace , the energy consumption and carbon emissions of cloud computing are already significantly higher than previously thought. Using data from The Climate Group’s Smart 2020 report, which came out in 2008 and relied on carbon emission projections from McKinsey, Greenpeace added in the energy consumption info for data centers reported by the Environmental Protection Agency. The result is that Greenpeace says that the energy consumption of cloud computing in 2007 was 622.6 billion kWh, which is 1.3 times larger than reported by the Smart 2020 report.

This new, larger estimate of energy consumption associated with cloud computing emphasizes just how big the problem will be as the sector grows over the coming years. Cloud computing is a trend that has just started (see our Structure 2010 conference) and business-focused cloud computing initiatives like Microsoft’s Azure platform have recently launched. Using the more aggressive cloud computing energy footprint, Greenpeace says that cloud computing will consume 1,963.74 billion kWh of energy by 2020.

All of this isn’t to say that cloud computing companies need to curb their growth. Rather, they need to focus on making data centers and servers more energy efficient and increasingly look to source more clean power. Greenpeace points to Facebook’s decision to build its first-ever data center in Prineville, Ore., which will primarily be powered by coal (GigaOM Pro, subscription required), as a major missed opportunity.

Instead, Internet giants like Google, Yahoo, and Apple should use their energy buying power to demand more access to economic clean power and to support policies that will help drive the proliferation of low-cost renewables. Greenpeace says:

The potential of ICT technologies and cloud computing to drive low-carbon economic growth underscore the importance of building cloud infrastructure in places powered by clean renewable energy. Companies like Facebook, Google, and other large players in the cloud computing market must advocate for policy change at the local, national and international levels to ensure that, as their appetite for energy increases, so does the supply of renewable energy.

We’ll be looking at the issues of energy consumption and the carbon footprint of information technology, data centers and servers at our Green:Net conference. Google’s Green Energy Czar Bill Weihl will be discussing some of the search engine’s industry-leading green data center work, and Greenpeace’s Casey Harrell, one of the authors of the report, will be discussing how the Internet leads to dematerialization, or replacing atoms with bits.

Networked digital technology can lead to energy efficiency and reduced carbon emissions. That’s the underlying notion from two sources this week — a report from the Progressive States Network, Communications Workers of America, Sierra Club and the Blue Green Alliance, as well as a call to action from Hans Vestberg the CEO of telecom gear maker Ericsson. Both sets of voices are lauding broadband as the backbone for creating a green economy, and calling for more federal policies and incentives to help boost the buildout of broadband infrastructure.

The report, called Networking the Green Economy, focuses on how investment in information technology can help the economy and reduce energy consumption (and carbon emissions) by developing a smarter grid, smarter buildings, and using broadband to boost teleconferencing and telehealth services. (We’re covering all of these themes at our Green:Net conference on April 29 in San Francisco).

As most of us know by now, adding digital intelligence to the power grid can make the grid much more energy efficient, and it’s becoming a booming industry. The world’s utilities spent $25 billion on both traditional IT and smart grid technology last year.

The report also points to how home and business broadband connections can reduce the number of miles people travel (cutting emissions in the process) via teleconferencing and web-based health services (using the Internet, video conferencing and email to replace doctors visits). At Green:Net we’re having a panel that will focus on dematerialization — replacing atoms with bits — and will look at video conferencing with a discussion from Saul Griffith founder of Squid Lab, Jonathan Koomey, Scientist for Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and Stanford, Molly Webb, Analyst with The Climate Group and Casey Harrell, IT Analyst for Greenpeace International.

The report, quoting numbers from The Climate Group, says that information and communication technology can help the U.S. “reduce carbon dioxide emissions by an estimated 13 to 22 percent by 2020.”

Ericsson’s CEO Hans Vestberg made similar remarks at the Earth Institute’s State of the Planet conference in New York on Thursday. Vestberg said:

“[E]conomic growth and environmental protection do not need to be in conflict. On the contrary, investments in broadband can help to stimulate both and bring a new era in green economy. Broadband will be a pre requisite for a 21st Century low carbon economy, and will enable services such as smart grids, intelligent transports, e-health, all of which have significant contributions to reduce CO2″.

So now computing and Internet companies, the greentech industry, environmentalists and policy-makers can all have a common goal: to promote the proliferation of broadband as much as possible across the U.S. Both the report and Vestberg called for more government incentives for broadband infrastructure to help the U.S. boost broadband users. In some areas of the country (particularly in low-income and rural areas, and among some minority populations), less than half of the population uses broadband.

Image courtesy of the report Networking the Green Economy.

Wow, a smart grid powered by the wireless standard WiMAX has made major strides in the U.S. this week. First General Electric, which makes smart meters, announced this morning that it would work on one of the first smart grid pilot programs based on WiMAX in the U.S. with Michigan utility Consumers Energy. At the same time, WiMAX smart meter startup Grid Net announced that networking giant Cisco has taken an equity investment in the company.

WTF is WiMAX? It’s a high-speed wireless technology that service providers are using for the next generation of broadband services. It competes with a high-speed wireless technology being deployed by cell phone companies called Long Term Evolution, or LTE. The benefits of WiMAX for the smart grid are that it can provide a lot of bandwidth for applications like mobile workforce and can potentially be really cheap in the future because it’s an open standard and has a growing ecosystem of large manufacturing partners including GE, Motorola (MOT) and Intel.

Four-year-old smart meter software maker Grid Net has been one of the chief proponents of a WiMAX smart grid, and the company tells us it has been working on the Michigan pilot with GE and Consumers Energy for some time. We should probably get ready to see more of these utility deals from Grid Net. Last week Grid Net brought on a high profile hire: Former Austin Energy CIO Andres Carvallo, architect of one of the first smart grids in the U.S. and the man who says he coined the term “the smart grid” itself.

The news that Grid Net has received an equity stake from Cisco, changes the landscape of the smart grid infrastructure players. Cisco moved into the smart grid networking infrastructure market last year and at the time CEO John Chambers told the Wall Street Journal that the company had an unlimited budget for smart grid initiatives.

But it has been unclear exactly what Cisco would be selling for the smart grid — at the GreenBeat conference last year Cisco’s Senior Vice President of the Smart Grid, Laura Ipsen, said that Cisco planned to launch some products directly in the smart grid market early this year. However, Ipsen acknowledged at that point at the end of 2009 Cisco was “zero for zero” in terms of smart grid products and revenue. (Laura Ipsen will be speaking at our Green:Net conference on April 29)

Cisco’s investment in Grid Net gives it another tool in its arsenal as a way into the smart grid network market. It’s interesting that Cisco has seemed to move away from WiMAX in other parts of its business, confirming with reporters earlier this month that it would quit the WiMAX radio access network business and would no longer make WiMAX base stations, but would still sell WiMAX edge products like Wi-Fi and femtocells to WiMax customers.

The company that could be the most affected by the Cisco/Grid Net move is smart grid infrastructure player Silver Spring Networks. As the first to move into the smart grid networking space Silver Spring has been dominating the market, snagging utility deals and planning on an IPO this year. Cisco has been one of Silver Spring’s chief rivals, despite the fact that Cisco has been a sleeping giant in this market.

There’s a long history between Grid Net and Silver Spring. As I explained in this early post on Grid Net, Grid Net’s founder and CEO Ray Bell was a former Cisco networking exec, an entrepreneur-in-residence at Foundation Capital, and became Silver Spring Networks CEO in 2003. Bell hired current Silver Spring CEO Scott Lang, but then left Silver Spring in 2005 over what he told me was “a different strategic opinion for how the smart grid should evolve.”

Grid Net has been on a tear as of late and the WiMAX smart grid seem as close to reality as ever. Last week the Federal Communications Commission announced recommendations to Congress, which included that the smart grid should embrace commercial networks and broadband, and be able to provide real-time energy data to consumers.

For more related research on GigaOM Pro check out (subscription required):

New Opportunities in the Smart Grid

The Developer’s Guide to Home Energy Management Apps

It’s that time of year, folks! We’ve selected 10 companies — all of which are using information technology to fight climate change — to launch or unveil interesting new products at our Green:Net conference in a session we call the LaunchPad. On April 29th you’ll be able to hear from these innovative companies as well as speakers including California Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown, investor Vinod Khosla and many more. Drum roll, please…

1) People Power: Wireless energy management startup People Power just released its software developer’s kit called SuRF (Sensor Ultra Radio Frequency), which is based on the open-source platform OSHAN (Open Source Home Area Network). When open source meets home energy management, the potential is massive. At Green:Net, the company plans to reveal new details about its strategy, plans and products.

2) Vecarius: Vecarius is using power electronics, energy harvesting, energy storage and advanced materials to increase the energy efficiency of vehicles. As co-founder William Sanchez explained to us recently, at the end of the day vehicle energy efficiency can be boosted through chips, software and computing. Vecarius says its patent-pending technology can “recapture a large portion of the 75 percent of energy lost in internal combustion engine and hybrid vehicles.”

3) ecoATM: Cash for high-tech trash. That’s the basic concept for the recycling kiosk — or “Automated eCycling Stations” — from startup ecoATM. You drop off old electronics at one of these machines, it calculates their value, then pays you on the spot, in cash or coupons.

4) Building Solutions: Building Solutions has developed “Home Performance Pro,” an easy-to-use, detailed and accurate home testing software “built by energy auditors for energy auditors.” The stimulus package has allocated billions of dollars for weatherization, or making buildings more energy efficient through things like upgrading insulation, heating and cooling systems, air filters and windows. The first step to knowing if a home needs to be weatherized is an audit.

5) GE: OK so General Electric isn’t exactly a startup, but the company plans to announce an innovative new product for energy-efficient backup power. We’ll hold the details for the launchpad event.

6) energics: You may have only just learned about the smart grid, but get ready for Smart Grid 3.0, says the team at energics. The company’s software can develop patterns to dynamically drive process models, build context and relevance, and progressively “learn” and automate smart grid systems. If there’s something the smart grid sorely needs it’s automation deep within the network of the grid (see New Opportunities in the Smart Grid, on GigaOM Pro, subscription required).

7) ecoVouch: ecoVouch is a free web-based application for the iPhone that helps users find eco-friendly products and services close by. At Green:Net, the folks behind ecoVouch plan to launch a platform that enables sustainable businesses to communicate effectively to participants through display ads, vouchers, or a loyalty program, in a new and social way.

8) Soneter: “Know your flow.” That’s the motto behind Soneter’s meter technology, which modifies water consumption behavior in the multifamily housing sector. The company’s product, which doesn’t require a retrofit or pipe cutting, tracks individual unit water use in real time and automatically bills based on consumption.

9) Carbon Voyage: Carbon Voyage’s web site enables users to compare travel options based on both cost and environmental impact. The service will find opportunities to fill empty journeys (taxis), share trips and help customers move onto low-carbon transport alternatives. Right now the London-based team is focused on the UK, but plans to expand into other markets.

10) ecoDomus: ecoDomus’ software and services provide intelligent analysis of a building’s performance, including helping with LEED compliance, and leading to better maintenance practices that result in significant energy savings. ecoDomus’ product integrates a Building Information Model, a 3-D representation of a facility, and real-time facility operations data acquired via sensors.

Will Attorney General and former Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown be able to clinch a victory in his second California gubernatorial race and leverage his long history of supporting clean power and energy efficiency to get him there?

The election won’t be until November, but you’ll be able to hear from the man himself at our Green:Net conference. We’re excited to announce that Brown will be speaking at Green:Net 2010, which will be held in San Francisco on April 29, and will focus on how information technology — software, computing, communication networks — will be used to fight climate change.

As California governor more than three decades ago (in his thirties), Brown was an early proponent of using policy to kick-start the deployment of renewable power and energy efficiency technology. He delivered the country’s first building and appliance energy efficiency standard and passed tax incentives for homeowners to install solar panels. In terms of embracing information technology, Brown famously called for California to use a satellite for the state’s emergency communications system, a move that helped solidify the nickname “Moonbeam,” and a technology that is widely embraced nowadays (that’s GPS folks).

As Mayor of Oakland, between 1999 to 2006, Brown was able to help Oakland transform into a top-ranking green city, formerly known on the national stage largely for its high crime rates.

Now as California Attorney General, at age 71, Brown is still as aggressive as ever on fighting climate change and using his position to support clean power and clean air. His Attorney General’s office reportedly has no fewer than 15 attorneys working on climate change issues, and has been using the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to help cities battle global warming. He’s also been a strong proponent of using the Clean Air Act to enforce California vehicle emissions standards.

Given Brown only announced he was running for California Governor less than three weeks ago, the details of his positions on the state’s specific energy issues have yet to emerge. But Brown’s advisors have indicated that he will continue to support the state’s climate change bill AB-32. In contrast his chief opponent former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, has called for a moratorium on some of the rules in the global warming bill.

It will be a fierce race — Whitman is a strong candidate that is using her fiscal background to convince voters that only she can help California clean up its $20 billion budget deficit. While polls had been showing Brown has been slightly leading the race for some weeks, just this weekend polls are showing that Whitman has a tiny edge.

If Brown wins the governor office, it would make him the oldest governor in California history and the first to hold the office in nonconsecutive terms. Brown also ran for the Democratic Presidential nomination several times (one of his campaign slogans was “protect the earth, serve the people and explore the universe”) and he has about four decades of political experience.

Get ready to come to Green:Net to ask him the hard questions about the future of California and green technology — April 29 in San Francisco. Don’t miss it.

Another small step for empowered and open access to energy data. Search engine giant Google announced on Wednesday that it has released the API (application programming interface) for its energy tool PowerMeter. Opening up the API means that gadget makers can now freely integrate with PowerMeter — previously Google had only been working with a small amount of select device manufacturers for PowerMeter like Energy Inc’s The Energy Detective.

Google had been planning on opening up the PowerMeter API since the energy tool’s inception a year ago, but the process often takes some time to make sure the tool is ready. Srikanth Rajagopalan, PowerMeter Product Manager, told me in an interview that the PowerMeter API has been ready for awhile but that the team had been collecting and incorporating feedback from the first device partners.

Rajagopalan tells me that Google has put a strong emphasis on security and privacy into the API. For example, there are specific steps for authorizing a home energy device so that it can “talk” to Google PowerMeter. The device makers will also need to educate the end user on how to feel comfortable with connecting the energy data with third parties like PowerMeter, said Rajagopalan.

Google’s decision to release its PowerMeter API is representative of a small number of companies that have moved into the home energy management space from the web and are looking to tap into the innovation of the Internet and the ecosystem of third party developers for energy. Microsoft released its software development kit for its energy tool Hohm to developers recently and is expecting to have the first Hohm-integrated devices this summer. (At our Green:Net conference on April 29 in San Francisco, I’ll be interviewing Ed Lu Program Manager in Advanced Projects for Google and Troy Batterberry Product Unit Manager for Microsoft Hohm, on stage about why the Internet giants are getting into energy. Super saver ticket sales for Green:Net end this Friday).

Energy dashboard makers like Tendril are also offering open APIs that will enable third-party developers to make innovative applications based around energy data. At the AlwaysOn Going Green conference in mid September Tendril CEO Adrian Tuck briefly discussed a computer game that was being built around Tendril’s API that will use a character whose powers will be based on how much energy the players saves in his/her daily life.

For Google, releasing PowerMeter’s API will hopefully bring in more end users via new gadget partners. PowerMeter only has “a few thousand users at this point” Google told us recently. And opening up the API will also allow third party developers to “innovate in the field,” as Rajagopalan explained it. The mantra of Internet development is that the developer community will be able to create innovation far beyond what the companies can do in house. It will be the same for innovating around energy data.

Related articles on GigaOM Pro:

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