Comcast’s MachineQ Unveils a Power Monitoring Solution Enabling Companies with Consumption Data to Manage Energy Use

MachineQ, a Comcast Company, today announced the launch of an IoT-based power monitoring solution designed to assist enterprises in monitoring and managing their energy consumption, leading to operational efficiencies, proactive maintenance, managed costs, and sustainability efforts.

The solution also helps enterprises understand asset utilization, providing actionable data to optimize asset use.

The power monitoring solution is particularly relevant for high-energy consumers, such as food service companies, laboratories, and hotels, which consume more energy than typical commercial buildings due to their energy-intensive equipment and asset-intensive operations. For example, according to a recent Energy Star report, fast food restaurants and convenience stores consume nearly 900 BTU of energy per square foot of space. This is about 2.5x more energy than in any other commercial building.

“We’ve seen increased demand from current and prospective customers seeking ways to understand power consumption and obtain executable data to help them reduce energy utilization,” said Bryan Witkowski, Head of Product & Strategy, MachineQ.

“This solution offers customers flexible options to help not only monitor but also help manage their energy usage. Plus, with many companies focused on sustainability initiatives, this solution can help play a vital role towards measuring and achieving those efforts.”

One industry where sustainability efforts are top of mind is life sciences, where pharmaceutical companies have asset-heavy, power-intensive lab operations. A power monitoring solution can provide lab managers with valuable insights by tracking the energy consumption of equipment, such as centrifuges, and correlating that data to its frequent or infrequent use. Linking consumption and utilization data can help identify opportunities to reduce energy (e.g., turn it off when not in use), aid sustainability efforts, and help determine whether to reallocate the asset to another location, decommission it, or make better purchasing decisions.

Additionally, the solution can help aid in predictive maintenance for critical equipment, such as an ultra-low temperature freezer. By detecting anomalies in power consumption, which often indicate equipment issues, lab managers can proactively service or replace units before they fail. For instance, if a freezer starts using more energy to maintain its set point temperature, this could signal the need for maintenance or indicate that the unit is nearing the end of its life.

MachineQ’s solution offers various ways to monitor power consumption accurately using IoT sensor devices that can extract data at the receptacle, equipment, or breaker level. The MQpower CT is a wireless, self-powered current transformer that can be clamped to electrical conductors at the breaker or asset level to measure real-time current consumption in a simple, non-invasive way.

The MQpower SP is a smart plug load device that enables businesses to plug in equipment and assets to extrapolate energy data, including daily energy usage, instantaneous current, voltage, active power, and power factor. It supports a variety of plug types, including US (type B), UK (type G), EU (type F), and FR (type E). The MQpower SP and MQpower CT both support regional LoRaWAN® frequencies globally.

The power monitoring solution complements smart metering capabilities by providing a holistic view of energy consumption and actionable insights to monitor, control, and manage consumption more intelligently. Plus, like all MachineQ solutions, these use cases run on the same scalable network infrastructure, helping customers to lower the total cost of ownership of their IoT investment over time.

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