Look. If we’ve learned nothing else from the last two years of the global COVID pandemic, it’s that the global supply chain is problematic. It wasn’t always thus, and to many people, it really shouldn’t be in this day and age. As I see it, the problem is the fault of so-called lean manufacturing practices. For the...
Political turbulence in Afghanistan means the cost of lithium-ion batteries will skyrocket. The Taliban now controls one of the world’s largest lithium deposits. With the global demand for lithium (and lithium extraction) expected to grow 40 fold by 2040, the grim reality is dawning for owners of electric vehicles (EVs). Future lithium battery replacements will come at an exorbitant...
On Aug. 16, the U.S. federal government declared a Colorado River water shortage for the first time. This unprecedented action was triggered by the precipitous drop in Lake Mead’s water level: It’s at 1,067 feet above sea level, or about 35 percent full. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation expects the lake’s water level to remain about 1,066 feet...
Some of the biggest domestic mega-corporations believe the Biden administration will decarbonize the nation’s power rapidly. And it’s not only Americans who think this way. Companies around the globe are buying more renewable power than ever — by statistically huge amounts. Wind and solar have become the big players, the VIPs of renewable energy, but...
What’s With the Colorado River Basin? The Colorado River Basin (CRB) and, in general, the American West, is in the midst of a water crisis. This crisis has been in the making for a long time as the watershed is over-allocated, infrastructure is outdated and underfunded, and the impacts of climate change are taking a toll....
Investment in renewable energy continues to grow at a rapid pace. In this article, we’ll look at the current state of the grid storage investing marketplace and future investment prospects for that space. Where Grid Storage Investing Is Right Now In the United States, utility-scale electric power generation totaled more than 4.1 trillion kilowatt-hours in 2019. Of...
There are two global markets that drive the demand for energy storage: stationary (old-school power) storage and electric vehicles (EVs). For the short term — through 2025, which is only four years out — energy storage deployment is targeted to grow over 40% per year. Two factors are converging that are responsible for the uptick in demand...
Entrepreneurs To Solve Wicked Water Problems While water scarcity, poor quality, lack of access to safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene and inequity of water services are a global problem, the solutions are typically at the local scale: the watershed. Framing water challenges and solutions at the watershed scale provides the potential to engage local...
Low-carbon fuel standards (LCFS) are rules enacted by states to reduce carbon intensity (CI) in transportation fuels like gas and diesel. In layman’s terms, carbon intensity is the weight of carbon released into the environment per a given amount of fuel. For the sake of readability, we won’t get too deep in the technical aspects of CI...
The digital transformation of the water sector, both the utility and industrial sectors, was well underway before the pandemic. The digital transformation trend has accelerated over the past twelve months as the public and private sectors come to realize that analog solutions to managing water, from the river basin to manufacturing, or from treatment to the...
Security in IoT development and deployment has sometimes, I think we can all admit, been an afterthought. It has been neglected, ignored, and what’s worse — treated as irrelevant, all too frequently as the industry developed. It’s the worst-kept secret in IoT. This is, thankfully, changing across the industry. Security (and privacy) are becoming early...
When we were born, our world mainly was our mother, but it became our immediate family in short order. Our data exchange was minimal, and that worked just fine. By the time we entered pre-school or kindergarten, our interactions expanded to a larger group, mostly our young classmates, the teachers, neighbors, and family. As we grew, those...
Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 is highly questionable, as the status quo is difficult to disrupt. Difficult, that is, but not impossible. A report from 2019, “Digital With a Purpose: Delivering a SMARTer2030”, authored by GeSI and Deloitte, framed the value of the information, communication technology (ICT) sector in achieving the SDGs. It...
Data is the lifeblood of modern business, providing valuable business insight and supporting real-time control over critical business processes and operations. Companies are always looking to optimize how the data is used, which is where the edge comes into play. Focused on optimizing data driven capabilities by bringing data collection, processing, and reporting as close...
The energy the world uses to keep things turning ten years from now is still somewhat of a wild card. With so many divisions still existing over what the model should become, it brings wild speculation about what the next few years will bring. It’s still worth exploring what innovators continue bringing to energy transformation....
With the recent rise of digitalization, Session Border Controller (SBC) technology has become more commonplace throughout various industries. Special-purpose devices protect and regulate IP communication flows while deployed at network borders to control IP communications sessions. SBC technology was originally conceived to protect and control VoIP networks but is now used to regulate all forms...
Digital technology has transformed transportation, healthcare, education, energy, and entertainment. Those industries provide valuable lessons for the digital transformation we are now witnessing in the water sector, where we work. However, the realities of this transformation can be challenging. Roadblocks include the readiness of the workforce for training and a company’s culture of innovation (or...
All over the world, renewable sources are being explored for energy. Today, we see them as alternative options; however, the future goal is to shift completely to clean, inexhaustible, and increasingly competitive energy sources. Advantages of renewable energy use include causing little to no damage to the environment, unlike fossil fuels. The switch to renewable...
It is estimated that currently 844 million people live without clean water, and 2.3 billion people do not have access to basic sanitation, according to water.org. Water scarcity affects more than 40 percent of the world’s population, and this figure is projected to rise due to increased demand and the impacts of climate change. Climate change...
In recent years, the adoption of digital transformation within educational institutions has rapidly increased, primarily out of necessity. Due to the global pandemic, learning institutions were forced to adapt to remote teaching and learning, as 100% virtual instruction was implemented during government lockdowns. While the industry has been on a steady path towards digitalization for...
Digital technologies are transforming humanity’s relationships with water, but to accelerate the adoption of digital solutions, we must challenge the status quo and provide our workforces with the strategy, culture, and tools to succeed. It should come as no surprise that I am an advocate for the digital transformation of the water sector. Actually, I...
The focus ESG frameworks place on climate change runs the risk that we fail to solve the problem of ensuring access to water and sanitation for all. We need to change the way ESG frameworks are structured – beginning with their consolidation. Here are the three most urgent changes we need to make. Environmental, social...
Unlike large infrastructure initiatives, including the New Deal, which helped raise the US out of the Great Depression, the 2021 legislation comes at a time when the lines between the physical and digital worlds are becoming increasingly blurred. This notion that we can more broadly define what infrastructure means today, compared to the natural understanding...
It is estimated that currently 844 million people live without clean water, and 2.3 billion people do not have access to basic sanitation, according to water.org. Water scarcity affects more than 40 percent of the world’s population, and this figure is projected to rise due to increased demand and the impacts of climate change. Climate...
We are now witnessing the emergence of one of the most significant trends of this century: vertical farming writes Will Sarni. We need an agricultural revolution The world population is expected to reach nearly 11 billion by 2050. Representing an increase in agricultural demand of approximately 70 percent, we will need a revolution in agriculture...
One of the biggest vertical industry winners to benefit from the passage earlier this year of the U.S. Infrastructure Bill is the automotive industry, which is already the second-largest in the world. According to government statistics, in 2018, U.S. light-vehicle sales reached 17.2 million units, the fourth straight year in which sales reached or surpassed...
While American politics continue to prove more polarized than ever for manufacturers and the supply chain, including innovators developing improved ways to build better and more efficiently, the advent of the related Jobs Act as part of the Infrastructure Bill passed last month is a welcome breath of fresh air. U.S. Senators Chris Murphy (D-Conn.),...
Corporate water stewardship is dominated by water footprint strategies such as replenish, water neutral, water positive, etc. While carbon and climate strategies lend themselves to a strategy to become “neutral” or “positive” with respect to emissions across a company’s value chain, this does not translate well to water. The reasons are straightforward: Carbon is fungible...
Technology doesn’t sell itself Digital water technologies are here to stay and will only increase in adoption. The digital transformation of the water sector was taking off before the pandemic, yet this unprecedented event has been a trend accelerator. However, now more than ever, it is too easy to fall in love with innovations and...
An abundance of new devices and applications that are adding ease and efficiency to daily processes are turning factory floors into digital havens. Known as “Industry 4.0”, or the fourth industrial revolution, the growth of technology in manufacturing is accelerating at a staggering pace. Just a few years ago, in 2019, the industry 4.0 market...
The narrative of successful companies is ever-changing. The length of time the average company stayed on the Dow Jones Industrials list is roughly half what it was 50 – 60 years ago, and the tenure continues to decline. Time plows forward, as does the related technology. The rate of acceleration of the technology continues to...
COVID-19 pandemic has compounded the slow progress of achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. Mass adoption of digital technologies, and increased engagement from the private sector, have the potential to reignite action. Our ability to rapidly adjust highlights our willingness to collaborate and rebuild a more resilient, sustainable world. Did anyone really believe...
One of the most commonly asked questions (typically meant to act as a “gotcha” moment when the discussion comes up) about green energy is: What’s going to happen when the source of the energy isn’t available, but there is still a demand that needs to be filled? What happens when the wind stops blowing, the sun...
Noting compatibility with leading heat pumps from Vaillant, Daikin, Kensa and Samsung, is Sunamp, a thermal storage company based in Scotland. Last month, Sunamp announced the rollout of its 4th generation compact thermal batteries for what the company describes as “instant, fast flowing hot water in homes.” The new extended Thermino range, which cuts carbon...
On December 2, ZEDEDA hosted the second episode of their ZEDEDA Transform Digest series. In this series, leaders from across industries discuss topics from the ZEDEDA Transform 2021 event held earlier this year that brought together experts from the edge computing and IoT landscape. Moderated by Jason Shepherd, VP of Ecosystem at ZEDEDA, episode two...
As the public sector worldwide continues to struggle to solve economic, environmental, and social challenges, the private sector is now being called upon to fill the gap. Yet this falls outside of the role that business has traditionally played. Instead, the private sector is just one of many stakeholders that must come together to solve...
If you read my last piece about RFS, then you know the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) missed the November deadline for establishing Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) minimums for 2022 and beyond. While obligated parties — refineries and importers of petroleum fuels — weren’t completely surprised about it, thanks to COVID-19, it leaves the renewable fuel and biofuel...
Welcome to the second article on Renewable Energy Credits (also known as RECs and SRECs.) Previously, we discussed what RECs are, how clean energy producers generate them, and how they’re traded among organizations and individuals for a profit. A Quick Intro to RECs If you didn’t read the first article, know that Renewable Energy Credits (RECs)...
Water insecurity and low resiliency revealed by the Covid-19 pandemic make it clear that stewardship is not enough: We need greater collaboration, innovation, and engagement with public policy June 19, 2020 — As the coronavirus pandemic sweeps the world, health professionals constantly remind us to wash our hands and practice good hygiene. Simple enough …...
Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) are a way to represent your investment in renewable, clean energy. Buying RECs is not the same as purchasing electricity, paying a power bill, or investing in a cleantech startup. RECs aren’t like stocks or bonds, either (though they might be represented that way, wrongly, by marketers or brokers.) Instead, they...
“If climate change is the shark, then water is the teeth.” This catchy saying has gained traction over the past several years, which is problematic. The saying appears to have originated from James P. Bruce, a Canadian hydrogeologist and is repeated often in climate and water discussions. Increasing greenhouse gas emissions and a resulting changing climate does impact water...
The digital transformation of the water sector was ongoing before the COVID-19 pandemic. Digital technologies have now emerged as essential tools in solving water quantity and quality challenges. They’re also helping to vastly improve monitoring of water supplies (surface and groundwater) and how infrastructure assets are managed, as well as communication with customers and consumers...
Qualcomm has been a major player in technology and, especially since the company was so early in seeing the potential for IoT and mobile processing, it’s been growing in leaps and bounds. Of course, that’s because the company refuses to rest on its laurels — literally ever. Qualcomm’s long-standing and aggressive partner program is a...
World Water Day was Sunday, March 22, and now more than ever it is time to address head-on the global crisis of water. Water is our most precious resource. We can no longer afford to manage it the old way. It simply isn’t working. But there is hope in new digital approaches to water management....
Tick-tock. No, that isn’t the sound of a Chinese video-sharing platform. It’s the sound of time running out as the deadline for Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) passed by without meaningful action by the EPA. “Small” refineries — those that produce 75,000 barrels of crude oil per day or less — can sigh in temporary relief. Many...
We all know the Biden Administration is dedicated to climate issues, leading to ideas like the AIM Act. Cutting emissions and reducing greenhouse gases (GHGs) are on the top of their list of priorities. If you read our discussions about renewable energy credits (RECs), low carbon fuel standards (LCFS), and renewable identification numbers (RINs), you have a clue of...
After a few months of processing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global economy and business, it is now a bit easier to start to draw conclusions and pose questions on what the future may hold for digital water. One my favorite quotes is from William Gibson, author of Neuromancer and credited with creating the...
Access to water is one of the greatest challenges to business continuity and growth. Businesses across a range of sectors – from energy to agriculture to food and beverage – are discovering the importance of water use across their value chain. They are investing in access to water supplies as well as improvements in the...
Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Development Programs, otherwise known as Skunk Works, was responsible for several innovative aircraft designs. Will Sarni believes the water sector can learn a lot from the development. Innovation is lumpy One of my favourite quotes is from William Gibson, Author of Neuromancer: “The future has arrived – it’s just not evenly distributed...
While digital twin technology was first pioneered in 2002, the digital twin market is rapidly expanding. The global digital twin market was capped at USD 3.1 billion in 2020, while some analysts predict the market will grow at a CAGR of 58 percent, projecting a market size of USD 48.2 billion by 2026. The vast...
Qualcomm Technologies’ Snapdragon Ride ADAS platform is beginning to look like a Magic Dragon as the company extends its long-standing partnership with BMW Group. As part of Qualcomm’s Investor Day, Cristiano Amon, president, and CEO of Qualcomm Incorporated unveiled the Vision Perception, Vision System-on-Chip, and ADAS Central Compute System-on-Chip offering BMW selected as fundamental to...
As more industrial companies implement more connected solutions, the concept of federated networks is taking off as an opportunity for entrepreneurial exploration and a strong alternative to legacy “telecom” providers who are fighting to maintain their “walled gardens.” According to VMWare, a federated network “is a network model in which a number of separate networks...
For most people reading this, water is just a turn of the tap away. As we go to press alarming headlines about water scarcity in Texas are in the news, underlining just how precious and precarious water is as a resource. Many of the articles in this ConWatch highlight daunting problems with the world water...
There are many elements to the Internet of Things, and in a broader sense, cyber-physical transformation. It can be complicated. From sensors to security, communications choices to power sources, from governance to the curation of the data, and more, there are numerous complexities and interdependencies. The progression is towards increased interaction of these solutions. It...
Today, as businesses of all sizes across all industries look to digitally transform to keep up with the competition and consumer expectations, no application is becoming more essential to these companies than edge technology. The explosion of data is driving a necessary increase in processing at the edge for reasons including latency, bandwidth savings, security,...
Over the last two decades now, cloud computing has dominated the business technology space, revolutionizing how companies operate and do business when it was introduced, as computers that were hundreds of miles apart in distance are now just milliseconds away in terms of communication. With the rise of IoT, 5G, and our never-satisfied need for...
For nearly three decades, the United Nations has been bringing together almost every country on earth for global climate summits – called COPs – which stands for Conference of the Parties. During that time, climate change has gone from being a niche issue to a global priority. Taking place in Scotland, as part of the...
Who had the edge? Who claimed the Digital Twin Smackdown title and took away the championship belt? “Digital Twin: SMACKDOWN,” was held November 11, and pit Rob Tiffany, VP and Head of IoT Strategy at Ericsson, and Aaron Allsbrook, Co-Founder, and CTO of ClearBlade, against each other. Moderator Jason Shepherd, VP of Ecosystem at ZEDEDA,...
The “edge” is expanding and accelerating as companies of virtually every size and industry continue to adopt and leverage many of the new, innovative devices and applications that help bring ease and efficiency to the operations of everything. IoT has advanced well beyond its origins, as sensors and devices connected to secure and increasingly fast...
The current electricity grid we’ve set up today is a complex and incredibly important system and one of the most impressive engineering feats of the modern era. It transmits power generated at a variety of facilities and distributes it to end-users, often over long distances, providing electricity to buildings, industrial facilities, schools, homes, and more....
Today, numerous cities across the US and the globe as well, are quickly adopting and leveraging innovative technologies, transitioning into what has been deemed “smart cities.” Harnessing digital technology and intelligent design to create a sustainable city, services like power or public safety are seamless, efficient, and provide for a high quality of life for...
Today, all forms of smart technology are rapidly being adopted by industries of all types, thanks to the myriad of benefits they offer for optimization and efficiency. While pinning down a definition for something as diverse as smart technology can be quite an arduous task, the word “SMART” refers to “self-monitoring, analysis, and reporting technology.”...
With every passing day, digital transformation begins to truly seep into every industry. Innovative new devices and applications are adding ease and efficiency to a myriad of daily processes for businesses of every size, with IoT, 5G, the edge, and other new technologies revolutionizing the way we interact and the way work is done. One...
The current electricity grid we’ve set up today is a complex and incredibly important system and one of the most impressive engineering feats of the modern era. It transmits power generated at a variety of facilities and distributes it to end-users, often over long distances, providing electricity to buildings, industrial facilities, schools, homes, and more....
Today, automation has already transformed industries in which complexity and performance demands must meet the challenges of scarce resources, narrower profit margins, and expanding product volume. And now, thanks to the rapid growth of innovative technologies, such as 5G, AI, and IoT, industries are inching ever closer to fully autonomous technologies. While current automation involves...
Today, the implementation and use of the internet of things (IoT) has transformed industries in the way that they operate, communicate, and utilize data. In manufacturing, those changes have come at a rapid pace, and an industry that was once slow to evolve is now digitizing at lightning speed. With the rapid convergence of fixed...
There is fast – and there is superfast – and when it comes to mastering wireless communications in industrial settings, leaders in Industry 4.0 are investing not only in 5G generally, but in the leading-edge versions of 5G, including 5G New Radio (5G NR) protocol which is new to the market, but which has been...
There are and will continue to be, no shortage of lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic. What sticks and transforms society, business and the public sector is up to us. We can focus on attempting to return to what we believed was “normal” or we can learn to rebuild and redesign society and businesses in a...
The United States doesn’t have a national water strategy. It has no shortage of local, state, regional and federal regulations but ultimately no federal strategy. The country is a ship without a rudder. The U.S. federal system of government leaves it vulnerable to issues such as inadequate funding of infrastructure, fragmented authorities that govern this...
Today we see an ever-expanding range of devices that connect to the internet, as the Internet of Things (IoT) becomes more common and prominent in our everyday lives. These devices range from ordinary household objects to sophisticated industrial tools that are embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies for the purpose of connecting and exchanging...
Today we see an ever-expanding range of devices that connect to the internet, as the internet of things (IoT) becomes more common and prominent in our everyday lives. Many, if not all industries are now turning to the power of IoT technology to optimize their daily processes, leveraging devices that range from ordinary household objects...
In a recent announcement, Flowfinity Wireless, a no-code Industrial IoT (IIoT) platform for business process automation, released its Flowfinity M1, an IIoT Controller that is designed to integrate with the company’s Flowfinity Actions mobile data collection and workflow automation platform. “Embracing IoT provides organizations with ‘on the floor’ insight around the clock,” said Marc Simms,...
According to a recent report by ResearchAndMarkets, the size of the Digital Twin market is expected to reach $63.5 billion by 2027, rising at a growth rate of 41.7%. The “Global Digital Twin Market By Type, By Application, By Industry, By Regional Outlook, Industry Analysis Report and Forecast, 2021 – 2027” includes coverage of digital...
David Walsh, an Internet pioneer, and developer of the first global financial extranet, connecting over 2,000 banks, looks at nearly everything as an exchange. In the early 1990s, straight out of college, Walsh began working on Wall Street building trading floor technologies and contributing to the growth of the public markets and innovation in platforms....
Stellantis (NYSE: STLA), TIM Brazil (NYSE: TIMB) and Accenture (NYSE: ACN) have announced some of the outcomes of their joint 5G pilot program at the Stellantis automotive manufacturing plant in the Automotive Centre of Goiana in northeastern Brazil, which launched in July. Since the network’s launch, Stellantis says it has improved its manufacturing productivity, safety...
Solving basic challenges associated with distributed energy systems by adding sensors that make it possible to manage hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of pieces of equipment can drive the most value and the fastest return on investment. Consider electrical meters in homes and businesses, and the shift from sending out a “meter reader”...
Thermal Energy Storage (TES) is a technology that stocks thermal energy by heating or cooling a storage medium so that the stored energy can be used later for heating and cooling applications and power generation. Despite efforts to reduce our dependence on fossil fuel, analysts continue to forecast a rise in consumption of up to...
The global manufacturing industry has much to gain from implementing 5G connectivity into their Industrial IoT (IIoT) operations. This isn’t a secret to folks already embedded in IIoT and 5G, but many in the manufacturing space have been slow to adopt, nonetheless. The largest and most important companies in manufacturing, however, are fully invested and...
Hitachi Astemo Americas, Inc., a newly created 90,000-person-strong company, manufactures and markets engine management, electric powertrain, and integrated vehicle controls for major automotive manufacturers worldwide, as a leader in adhering to ISO/TS:16949:2009 industry standards. In part spurred by challenges created by the global pandemic, including work-from-home and supply-chain problems, Hitachi Astemo is accelerating its move...
According to the United Nations Population Fund, more than half of the world’s population now lives in urban areas, and it is predicted that approximately 66 percent of the world’s population will live in an urban environment by 2050. Massive efforts are underway today, designed to address the consequences of this surge, which, left unmanaged,...
The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is growing in size, sophistication, and sustainability, as billions of dollars of investment, are paying off for market leaders who for years have recognized the tremendous value of the data sensor-based systems generate, consume, and act upon. This week, at the Frontier Conference, a virtual gathering this year that...
The “Starship Enterprise” is the nickname of fictional spacecraft, some of which were the main craft and setting for various television series and films in the Star Trek science fiction mega franchise. The most notable were Captain James T. Kirk’s USS Enterprise (NCC-1701) from the original 1960s television series, and Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s USS Enterprise...
Like Gorilla Glass for smartphones, the application of Advanced Materials has the potential to revolutionize products, and this is driving an increasing level of interest in finding, experimenting with, and designing from the next generation of Advanced Materials. The pace of innovation and investment is staggering, as is the variety of options and continuous evolution...
As investment in industrial innovation grows, and with the U.S. economic recovery strategy coming into focus – with trillions of dollars set to be distributed to improve cities and towns across America – the importance of blending the physical and digital worlds to improve outcomes, control costs, and create sustainable improvements across the environment, education,...
These past weeks have been a perfect storm for the clean energy industry. The cyberhack of the Colonial Pipeline shut down gas stations from Houston to New Jersey, highlighting how fragile our digital infrastructure really is. Not even a week later, Ford announced that their best-selling F-150 pickup truck would be available as an electric...
It is no secret that the electric grid in the U.S. (and other countries) is not only fragile but failing. For example, extreme weather in Texas earlier shut down millions of homes and businesses. As the U.S. Congress accelerates the negotiations around a massive infrastructure bill, which as part of the economic recovery could be...
The prospect of hydrogen as a fuel source is on the rise. Looking into the future, hydrogen may very well challenge other popular fuel sources for dominance. Even now, companies are exploring different methods of hydrogen production, new applications, and how to build energy infrastructures around hydrogen fuel. Hydrogen Fuel in the Present Since hydrogen...
Rystad Energy released a press release in March forecasting record-breaking renewables spending in 2021, to the tune of $243 billion this year. This narrows the spending gap with oil and gas providers, which they project will remain flat but still a significant $311 billion. Today, we’re going to digest that press release a bit and take a...
Thermal Energy Storage (TES) is a technology that stocks thermal energy by heating or cooling a storage medium so that the stored energy can be used later for heating and cooling applications and power generation. Despite efforts to reduce our dependence on fossil fuel, analysts continue to forecast a rise in consumption of up to...
At the end of 2020, the market capitalization of Tesla was roughly equivalent to that of the nine largest automakers in the world combined. In 2019, over 3 million Electric Vehicles (EVs) were sold, and with a forecast CAGR of 21% until 2030, it is expected that nearly 27 million EVs will be sold in...
