Amber Solutions’ Energy Traffic Controller Promises Better Building Electrical Efficiency

Amber Solutions, the Silicon Valley company that is working to make the digital control of electricity in solid-state architecture a commercial reality, has added a solid-state based Energy Traffic Controller with embedded intelligence that enables on-the-fly switching of building electricity sources. The new capability relies on the company’s digital control of electricity to provide better electricity management.

“Amber’s solid-state upgrade to 1950s-era building electrical is much more than a modernization of outlets and light switches,” said Amber founder and CEO Thar Casey. “It is the fundamental integration of state-of-the-art intelligence throughout a building’s electrical grid and endpoints. Our new Energy Traffic Controller application is a leading example of the technology’s disruptive nature, enabling the ability to intelligently and, automatically, alternate sources of power to reduce costs, maximize efficiency and guarantee steady power.”

Related: Amber Solutions Paper Makes Case for Solid-State Electrification

The small footprint device would be installed next to the circuit breaker box to enable understanding of a building’s energy demand and available electricity sources, thereby supporting autonomous source optimization.

It would empower data crunching for dynamic decision making, using metrics such as the price and stability of grid energy during peak hours, the availability of solar power, and the current charge level on any connected battery backups.

The Energy Traffic Controller would also work in concert with a range of planned Amber-powered solid-state building electrical solutions, especially Amber’s retrofittable smart solid-state circuit breaker.

Bi-directional Current Regulation

Amber’s Energy Traffic Controller design enables bi-directional current regulation and adaptive line synchronization to manage multiple simultaneous input sources. An internal energy discriminator uses real-time data to determine the best current source of power based on data available from each source, such as current grid energy cost and current usage demand.

Energy Traffic Controller in Combination

When combined with the full range of Amber’s planned solid-state electrical devices, whole-building intelligence enables buildings to be automated, tracked and optimized directly from the building electrical grid. Such an Amber-powered portfolio would include products like solid-state circuit breakers, light switches, outlets, and LED lighting solutions – essentially every electrical endpoint in buildings.

According to the company, leveraging the intelligence of multiple Amber-powered electrical end points would enable significantly more intelligence and capabilities. This approach would then have the potential to generate more energy and environmental data insights and enable even better autonomous and human-driven decision making and control.

“Amber’s mission is to disrupt building intelligence as profoundly as smartphones disrupted the use of flip cell phones by upgrading such single-use tools to offer a transformative array of advanced functions,” Casey added. “Similar to how autonomous vehicles will communicate in real-time to make proactive decisions that can avoid collisions, increase safety, decrease jams or improve fuel efficiency, the Energy Traffic Controller enables buildings to more intelligently source and allocate power to eliminate waste and maximize utilization.”

Amber is working with strategic manufacturers of building electrical products and silicon chip makers to productize its technology breakthroughs into hyper-intelligent products like the Energy Traffic controller and other building electrical products that these companies sell or support.