When most guys play pool, they talk about girls, music, sports; but when Drexel University electrical engineering grad students Ryan Buchert and Dr. Michael Balog gathered to shoot stick in their basement in 2003, the conversation was a bit more complex. Just as a stick is used to strike one ball against another into the pocket, the pair posited, what if all our tools could be controlled wirelessly, for simpler device management?
Those late-night pool games became the vision for
BuLogics, a green gadget firm allowing for wireless control of everything from lights to smoke detectors. This week, the Greenworks Pilot Energy Technology Program--the first pilot program for the
Greater Philadelphia Innovation Cluster--announced an award of $175,000 to help these energy-efficient electricians bring light controls and metering technology to the Navy Yard in South Philly and the Inn at Penn in University City.
"Energy costs keep going up and small businesses are suffering because of that," says BuLogics CEO Mirka Walczak. "Everyone is on the bandwagon of reducing parasitic power and we have a solution in place will offer better control and allow them to really keep an eye on that usage."
For these two commercial institutions, BuLogics starts with the Smart-Grid controller--"the glue that holds it all together" says Walczak--that allows all devices to run through the same command center and be monitored for energy consumption. This, along with metering power strips and wireless transponders, gives office and hotel managers the power to run a more efficient business.
"When you lock up the door for the last time, you can punch in a code that shuts off the power to all the devices and lock the doors and the thermostat gets set back," says Director of Operations Jennifer Doebler. " I think that automation piece that makes energy management so much simpler is what makes our technology a little more comprehensive and a little more desirable, especially in commercial applications like the Navy Yard."
Source: Mirka Walczak, Bulogics
Writer: John Steele