What are the emerging technologies that reduce energy consumption in plug-loaded equipment?

We all know about energy consumption, but who knows how to reduce the energy consumption of plug-loaded equipment? On August 15, the California Energy Commission held a webinar on "Emerging Technologies: Mobile Efficiency of Plug-loaded Equipment." In this seminar, Vojin Zivojnovic and Davorin Mista from Aggios present a research project that combines mobile device design practices with hardware and energy management software to reduce the energy consumption of set-top boxes, televisions, computers and game consoles. Energy consumption of plug-loaded equipment.

In order to find the reasons and methods to reduce the energy consumption level of mobile devices, the Aggios team conducted in-depth research and found that the focus on energy conservation is directly integrated into the design process of products that rely on battery power. According to the U.S. Department of Energy's Quadrennial Technology Assessment (2015), after 2020, the remaining energy saving opportunities are closely related to other electronic loads (MELs). Therefore, significant energy savings can be achieved by adopting an energy-saving oriented design flow for such plug loads.

Based on the design characteristics of mobile products, the project focuses on design principles that enable engineers to achieve greater energy savings at lower costs. The project seeks to lower technical barriers and help make more efficient design decisions by providing guidance on software and hardware methods. Also understand the importance of the ability to independently monitor power supplies, such as placing a power meter on each engineer's desk. Hardware and software descriptions that enable energy-oriented designs come from virtual prototypes used to model energy behavior.

By taking an energy-oriented design approach, simulating energy behavior and measuring performance metrics, engineers can estimate the annual energy savings potential of different applications based on actual Energy Star usage data. For example, a basic statistic for personal computers is that the greatest energy saving potential lies in short periods of idle mode. Likewise, the biggest opportunity for efficiency improvements in gaming consoles is in standby power consumption.

Although low-power states are included in device specifications, they are not fully utilized. By simulating and implementing reference designs for product applications such as smart TVs, computers, set-top boxes and game consoles, real energy-saving opportunities can be identified.

The next steps in the project will be to add descriptions of complete systems such as buildings and further investigate how power-related information is exchanged in the design flow, beyond chips, circuit boards and products. Finally, the Aggios team will promote IEEE P2415 energy modeling for every device sold in California. IEEE P2415 is a non-regulatory standard for "Unified Hardware Abstraction Layer for Energy Proportional Electronic Systems" that determines the energy characteristics and characteristics of devices. The above are the relevant technologies for reducing the energy consumption of plug load equipment. I hope it can be a reference for everyone.