David E. Culler
Department of Computer Science
University of California, Berkeley
"LoCal: Rethinking the Energy Infrastructure from an IT Perspective"
Abstract:
In this talk, we describe LoCal, a new research project at Berkeley that applies lessons of the Internet, i.e., design principles for building distributed and robust communications infrastructures, to develop an architecture for a cooperative energy network that promotes reduction in use and penetration of renewable sources. The project's objective is to understand how pervasive information can improve energy production, distribution and use. The design of a more scalable and flexible electric infrastructure, encouraging efficient use, integrating local or non-dispatchable generation, and managing demand through awareness of energy availability and use over time, is investigated. Our approach is to develop a cyber overlay on the energy distribution system in its physical manifestations: machine rooms, buildings, neighborhoods, isolated generation islands and regional grids. A scaled series of experimental energy networks is being constructed to demonstrate monitoring, negotiation protocols, control algorithms and Intelligent Power Switches integrating information and energy flows in a datacenter, building, and campus. These will be generalized and validated through larger scale simulations. We seek to understand broadly how information enables energy efficiencies: through intelligent matching of loads to sources, via various levels of aggregation, and by managing how and when energy is delivered to demand, adapted in time and form to available supply. Bi-directional information exchange is integrated everywhere that power is transferred.
Bio:
David Culler is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley, CTO of Arch Rock Corporation, and Associate CIO for the College of Engineering. Professor Culler received his B.A. from U.C. Berkeley in 1980, and M.S. and Ph.D. from MIT in 1985 and 1989. He has been on the faculty at Berkeley since 1989, where he holds the Howard Friesen Chair. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, an ACM Fellow, an IEEE Fellow and was selected for ACMs Sigmod Outstanding Achievement Award, Scientific American's 'Top 50 Researchers', and Technology Review's '10 Technologies that Will Change the World'. He received the NSF Presidential Young Investigators award in 1990 and the NSF Presidential Faculty Fellowship in 1992. He was the Principal Investigator of the DARPA Network Embedded Systems Technology project that created the open platform for wireless sensor networks based on TinyOS, and was the founding Director of Intel Research, Berkeley. He has done seminal work on networks of small, embedded wireless devices, planetary-scale internet services, parallel computer architecture, parallel programming languages, and high performance communication, and including TinyOS, PlanetLab, Networks of Workstations (NOW), and Active Messages. He has served on Technical Advisory Boards for several companies, including Inktomi, ExpertCity (now CITRIX on-line), and DoCoMo USA.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
3:00 - 4:15
Heilmeier Hall
100 Towne Bldg.