On Wednesday, as Itron reported mixed earnings, the Liberty Lake utility technology maker and service provider also announced it's taking part in an East Coast smart grid demonstration project.

Itron and National Grid, a northeast U.S. utitlity, announced they will be partners on a project to build and evaluate advanced smart grid systems in Massachusetts.

Here's where the geeky tech stuff shows up in the story: the two firms will field-test the multi-application capabilities of the new Itron-Cisco IPv6 based smart grid solution, including advanced metering, home area networking (HAN) and distribution automation (DA). That “stuff” is the typical and more or less standard set of tools the smart grid depends on.

OK, then, what's the key news here?  The press report says the system will use Cisco technology that allows a utility to exchange information with its residential and business customers without requiring them to all use just one proprietary set of equipment or applications.

As designed, that makes the smart grid more open-standards based, sort of like the way the Web is designed.

It's a big deal because this allows an electric utility do have a grid system across a diverse set of customers, including large industrial customers, or when dealing with a dispersed group of home customers, some of whom may be using different home metering products than others across the utility map are using.

If you really want all the other details, here's the official Itron release.

Itron and Cisco not long ago announced they had a similar deal for BC Hydro, one of Canada's largest electric utilities. Here's a summary of the project being done in British Columbia.

After a bumpy 2010 and 2011, Spokane Valley contract manufacturing firm Servatron Inc. hopes to boost annual sales to the $30 million mark, in part by moving to a newer building this spring.

The company will move into about 50,000 square feet of the former Itronix building at 12825 E. Mirabeau Parkway. It’s been at its current site, near the Spokane Business & Industrial Park, since 2000 when it was spun out of Itron as a specialty contract manufacturer.

Company President Tod Byers said that privately held Servatron hasn’t had a loss during its 12 years in business. But its current building — roughly the same size as the Mirabeau facility — has fewer advantages than the new site, Byers said.

“The new location just shows better,” Byers said. Winning new contracts depends in part on good impressions when prospective customers make visits to Spokane. Itronix, which made rugged computers, occupied the building from 2005 to 2009.

Servatron expects to move in by the end of March.

Servatron’s headcount is about 190, down some from 230 in the peak years in 2007 and 2008.

The Exchange Club of Downtown Spokane  is seeking donations and contributions for this year's 45th Annual Crab Feed and Auction, set for Dec. 2.

With less than eight weeks to go, the event sponsors are seeking donations and support for the benefit event, which raises money for three area child abuse prevention agencies.  

Additional corporate sponsors are also being sought.

The Vanessa Behan Crisis Nursery, Children’s Home Society of Washington and SCAN share the proceeds.

This year's auction and dinner will start at  5:30 p.m. at CenterPlace, at 2426 N. Discovery Place in Spokane Valley. 

Sponsors this year include Universal Funding, SCAFCO, Itron Inc., D.A. Davidson & Co., Allprint,  and Luigi’s. 

Corporate tables and individual tickets can be purchased from www.dsxc.org. Additional info at this link.

For information on donations, call  Meri Berberet at 509-226-2448 or Dianne LaValley at 509-747-2058. Or email crabfeed@dsxc.org.

Landis+Gyr is a Swiss company that does what Itron does, except in Europe: it develops and sells advanced utility meters.

It's another company that is busy figuring out how to develop “grid” devices that can make the distribution and consumption of energy smarter and more efficient.

L+G is already a very large competitor in Europe to Itron, Spokane's own major producer of smart metering devices and other utility products and services.

A Wall Street Journal commentator noted that Toshiba has spent $2.3 billion to acquire the Swiss meter (maid?) company.  The story noted global power use will grow 60 percent by 2030. The utility industry has to make major investments to keep up with that demand, and that's why you hear so much about smart grid.

Only 10 percent of European Union households have smart electricity meters. Clearly, Toshiba sees great potential by acquiring L+G, and this poses a direct threat to Itron's role in taking a share of the future market.

The WSJ story also notes Toshiba paid a premium for the company, by spending 11 times historic earnings for L+G. The other main Euro electricity meter competitor is Germany's Elster Group.

The commentary noted Toshiba, with yearly revenue of $77 billion, sees this purchase as its way to catch up Elster and Itron.

Russ Vanos, who is Itron's vp for marketing, said Itron's reaction is a positive take-away.

“The bottom line is Toshiba is a large, deep-pocketed strategic investor who paid top dollar for L+G which should give some indication of the level of strategic interest in this space,” Vanos said.

Itron Inc. will license an Internet protocol developed by Cisco to create what the companies said today will be a more reliable and secure smart grid.

Itron, the Liberty Lake-based company that has developed and sold automated metering systems for more than 30 years, will incorporate Cisco technology into its Open Way meters. Itron will also distribute Cisco networking equipment and software.

The new partnership will give utilities a better way to access more energy  resources, and respond to customer demand for more control over their energy use, a joint news release says.

“The alliance between Cisco and Itron represents a major step forward in the realization of a modern, more intelligent energy infrastructure,” Cisco Senior Vice President Laura Ipsen said.

Itron shares climbed $3.65 to $57.65, an increase of almost seven percent, after the alliance was disclosed. Cisco shares climbed 27 cents to $20.26.

Liberty Lake-based Itron Inc. said this week that they’ve just helped install their millionth OpenWay smart meter at Southern California Edison (SCE), one of the nation’s largest electric utilities.

What is striking is that the media folks at Itron went out and even found who the lucky customer is.

And it is …. drumroll … an unidentified customer who lives in Redondo Beach. Several dignitaries were on hand to commemorate the event, including U.S. Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice), 36th Congressional District; Theodore F. Craver Jr., president, chairman and CEO of Edison International; Lynda Ziegler, senior vice president of customer service for SCE; and Malcolm Unsworth, president and CEO of Itron. The photo above, with two dignitaries and an unindentified technician, came by way of Earthtimes.com.

Does it seem odd that we get the full list of the honchos who showed up, but not the name of the customer? (We have a feeling he or he is not running for office.)

Now you will want to ask, what is an OpenWay meter? One way to think of it is, it’s like an HTC Droid Incredible or iPhone 3GS meter compared with your grandma’s cell phone. The OpenWay is Itron’s answer for utilities needing lots of ways to deliver data down the grid to the homes and businesses and customers, and to eventually allow demand-response control of a customer’s energy use.

Installation of the one millionth meter took place July 12. Southern California Edison”s crews began installing the first bunch of OpenWay meters in September 2009, and installations will continue
through 2012.
 

This goes into the Smart Grid file, in the subfolder on home monitors that track residential power consumption.

Cisco has unveiled a new home device. It’s the Cisco Home Energy Management Solution. Like other devices coming to the market, it provides a network hub to manage and track one’s home energy system and tracks consumption. The emphasis, over time, as more “smart” systems go into the home, will be on MANAGING energy, not just tracking use.

Cisco is such a giant that once it focuses on a business niche, it usually makes its presence known. 

The device pictured is supposed to become available this summer, and the official list price is $900 per home. List price, we hope, is way different from what it will cost consumers.

It’s unlikely anyone within 300 miles of Spokane or Coeur d’Alene will be able to use it.

Aside from Wi-Fi, the controller can communicate with smart meters and appliances via Zigbee and also via a proprietary protocol (Encoder Receiver Technology, or ERT) used by well-established home-automation player Itron, based in Liberty Lake.

It will also interact with so-called smart plugs — peripherals that you can plug your existing appliances into that will send data to the Home Energy Management device.

Itron CEO Malcolm Unsworth, along with other representatives of U.S. energy companies, met with President Barack Obama today (April 30) at the White House. (Associated Press photo found on www.whitehouse.gov)

Unsworth, who became CEO last year of metering-system powerhouse Itron last year, stands to the left of the president in this shot from a meeting in the Rose Garden. With Unsworth were two Itron manufacturing workers at the event, James Morris and Carla Reysack (far left).

The event saluted companies using federal stimulus money to help improve the country’s energy infrastructure.  A transcript of the proceedings is here.