前往日本横滨采访 2011年嵌入式技术展会(Embedded Technology 2011)时，笔者不由自主地发现到，日本电子产业的发展走向在311大地震之后出现了很大的改变，厂商们不约而同将焦点集中在“智能家庭(smart home)”这个议题。
像智能家庭、智能城市…等等概念，已经不再只是日本学界为了申请补助而提出的天马行空想象，也不是日本官方经济产业省(Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry，MEITI)主导推动的产业项目。当然，学界与官方并没有放弃这个发展方向，远非如此。
从这场嵌入式技术展会上可明显看出，基于震后复兴需求以及危机意识，科技业者正以前所未有的严肃态度看待“智能家庭”这个概念，因此他们积极寻求能让民众在家中或社区中，智能地“控制、保全、储存与分配能源”的嵌入式技术。
根据EETimes日本版编辑石田(Masaya Ishida)的观察，日本的“智能家庭”概念不同于美国由公用事业机构主导的“
智能电网”相关议题；虽然在这个概念之下，也包含了由公用事业机构所提供的不间断能源，但进一步诠释所谓的“智能家庭”，更好的说法可能是具备“能源独立(energy-independent)”或是“永续性能源(sustainable-energy)”能力的家庭。
也就是说，赋予每个装置与系统“
智能控制”的功能，让一般消费者能为家庭或工作上使用的每一台嵌入式系统，实现自己订定的能源消耗量与节能标准。此外，所谓的“能源独立”家庭，则是构想能把每天节省下来的能源，储存在电动车的燃料电池里。
石田提醒我，有很多日本人是住在大城市里的，因此他们只会在周末开车出游，平日上班通勤则是搭乘大众交通运输工具；这样的生活习性衍生了将能源储存在家用车的概念，也就是在用电离峰时间进行充电，然后在用电尖峰时间将能源智能分配至家里的所有装置。
从震灾后用电吃紧所学到的教训
今年夏天，日本实施了限电措施(原因之一是福岛核电厂停摆)，让日本企业、工厂、零售商店与一般消费者学到了关于“坚持不懈”的宝贵经验(因为尖峰时间限制 用电，禁止开启街上的霓虹灯招牌，公共场所的手扶梯也关闭，并要求办公室与商店减少日光灯管的使用，工厂生产线也得在假日运转)，以及如何身体力行、节省每一毫瓦用电。
在日本民众自豪于今年夏天达成了全国“节能目标”的同时，也积极为冬天的来临作准备；在这个季节对能源的需求量肯定会比夏天更高。而这一次，当地电子产业的新目标是让节省能源对每个人来说都“轻而易举”，而不是要求每个人“坚持不懈”。
产业界发现，解决问题的答案可能在于嵌入式技术；他们要将每一种想象得到的智能元素嵌入家庭、办公室与社区应用的各式电子装置中，包括智能能源控制、智能节能以及高效率能源储存，还有智能能源分配技术等等。
本文下一页：智能屋
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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• 英特尔：传统嵌入式系统正逐渐智能化yr5esmc
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智能屋
福冈智能屋联盟所展示的“智能屋”模型yr5esmc
上图是福冈智能屋联盟(The Fukuoka Smart House Consortium)所设计的“智能屋(smart house)”模型，屋顶上装有太阳能板以及风力发电机；显示在计算机屏幕上面的图片，描述智能屋内所有能源控制系统之间的关联。
下图则是福冈智能屋的组成功能区块，需要有许多关键接口标准与技术的支持，包括电力线通讯、开放性网络网关计画，以及电动车与家用网络连结的标准等等(请注意，在图中电动车所扮演的角色就是储存能源)。
“智能屋”功能区块yr5esmc
智能家庭的能源使用模式
是福冈智能屋联盟成员之一的公司Aval Nagasaki，藉由提供包括智能电力装置、智能电源模块以及智能电源管理设备等产品，扮演了一个关键角色；该公司经理西川(Wataru Nishikawa)在谈到福冈智能屋实地试验的经历时表示，不同于消费者使用一般IT设备的模式，不同的家庭与个人在日常生活的能源使用习惯会非常不同。
这种在能源使用模式上的差异，会让家中的能源/电源管理系统带来难以预期的压力：“要在现实世界进行管理，难度会变得更高。”西川指出。
Aval Nagasaki所提供的智能屋相关产品yr5esmc
本文下一页：村田制作所的无线网关器
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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村田制作所的无线网关器
村田制作所(Murata Manufacturing)以及子公司SyChip Electronic (上海)合作，为智能家庭开发了一个传感器网络系统，支持家庭自动化以及能源管理系统(Energy Management System，EMS)；该系统搭配了一个无线网关器，在村田制作所的摊位上进行实际展示。
村田制作所的家用无线网关器yr5esmc
这套系统是透过 ZigBee 网关器来收集由传感器所侦测到的信息，然后将这些信息透过Wi-Fi或以太网络传送到网际网络、平板装置终端上。该系统结合了村田制作所的传感器与通讯技 术，提供一个包含无线网关器、ZigBee传感器节点，以及原创使用者接口的全套解决方案。
村田制作所智能家庭传感器网络系统示意图yr5esmc
本文下一页：新奇的水流发电设备
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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新奇的水流发电设备
除了太阳能与风力，一般小溪或是河流的规律水流也能成为电力来源；一家日本厂商Star Group展示了一款叫做「Spin Flow」的产品，藉由让该装置在流动的水中(例如河流、小溪或是农业灌溉渠道)上下摆动，就可以发电。
该公司表示，这种 Spin Flow 装置会自己漂浮并在水面上转圈，不需要改变水流的方向或是让水位下降；在每秒流速1.0公尺的水上使用两个Spin Flow模块，能在24小时内产生264Wh的电力，足够供应露营、户外照明灯或是农业用帮浦所需的电力。
Spin Flow水流发电装置yr5esmc
本文下一页：NXP的智能照明解决方案
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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NXP的智能照明解决方案
智能照明(smart lighting)是恩智浦半导体(NXP)大力关注的领域，其目标是让照明设备能透过无线控制器进行遥控或是自动开启；下图所显示的NXP模块，包含可为智能灯具提供高效益与调光控制的芯片组。
NXP的智能照明应用模块yr5esmc
该 GreenChip模块还包括一个超低功率的备用电源控制器，具备10mW无负载能力；以及一个支持IEEE802.15.4标准的整合式RF收发器与无线微控制器，Tx/Rx电流低于17mA；还有以开放性JenNet-IP连网软件实现的低功耗、基于IP的无线连结功能。这款模块能嵌入照明灯泡的底 座。
本文下一页：嵌入汽车内的可视智能元素
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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嵌入汽车内的可视智能元素
东芝(Toshiba)开发了一款硬件IP “FocusNavi ”，旨在将更多智能功能嵌入汽车中；该硬件IP利用了该公司专有的动作侦测(motion detecting)算法，能藉由在数据库提供“支持向量机(Support Vector Machine)”，来判别移动的物体是否为人类。下图中的迷你火车车头装置了一个微型摄影机，当火车开始跑，摄影机就会精准判别人类与其它物体。
装置了智能摄影机的小火车模型yr5esmc
下面图片内的摄影机所显示的影像，就是摄影机实际所“看到的”；东芝的硬件IP可以整合到任一款ASIC、FPGA或SoC，以提供上述功能。据东芝表示，该装置只会侦测需要侦测的物体；而除了保全摄影机之外，该FocusNavi IP的最主要应用就是车用摄影机。
智能摄影机会辨别人与物体yr5esmc
本文下一页：会喂你吃东西的聪明机器人
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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会喂你吃东西的聪明机器人
在日本各大电子展会上，很难不遇到可爱的机器人；在这场展会中也不例外。上图的机器人虽然仍是原型(所以看起来不太可爱)，配备了Microsoft Xbox游戏机的体感装置Kinect作为眼睛，设计宗旨是能喂身障者吃东西。
这款机器人能在喂食对象不须移动头部的前提下，一杓杓地递送味增汤或是米饭、豆腐到对方嘴里，而且不会弄得一团糟或是掉落。这套机器人系统的开发者是来自日本九州的厂商Core Group。
会喂你吃东西的聪明机器人yr5esmc
本文下一页：瑞萨的混合动力/电动车马达控制MCU
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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瑞萨的混合动力/电动车马达控制MCU
日本半导体大厂瑞萨(Renesas)展示了一款针对混合动力/全电动车辆所设计的新型马达控制MCU；以该公司的SH-2A CPU (160MHz)为基础，瑞萨的工程团队在这款新型SH72AY组件中，整合了R/D转换器与马达控制单元(EMU)。
瑞萨的混合动力/电动车马达控制MCU yr5esmc
这款组件的硬件整合，有助于CPU处理卸载，使其适用于混合动力/电动车所需的高速马达控制需求。目前该组件已可提供样品，瑞萨表示，其它竞争厂商如Freescale则是通常将R/D转换器或EMU功能以软件形式添加在MCU中。
本文下一页：智能公寓
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
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智能公寓
Tokyo Gas正在日本横滨打造一座全新的智能型多住户单位(multi-dwelling)住宅，估计在明年可提供公司员工进住。这种新式公寓设置了数个该公司 的“Ene Farm”住宅用燃料电池，藉由结合这些燃料电池以及住户的电动车，可用以储存“过剩”的能源(包括由屋顶的太阳能板所收集到的电力)，并透过一种机制将 这些能源分配给公寓里的住户。
所以，“智能家庭”这样的新概念，是不只会消耗能源、还会产生能源的新时代家庭！
智能公寓yr5esmc
编译：Judith Cheng
本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载
参考英文原文： Image gallery: Japan bets on embedded，by Junko Yoshida
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Image gallery: Japan bets on embedded
Junko Yoshida
While covering the Embedded Technology 2011 show in Yokohama, I couldn’t help but notice one big shift in the Japanese electronics industry’s agenda since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami: the industry’s collective focus on the “smart home.”
While covering the Embedded Technology 2011 show last week in Yokohama, I couldn’t help but notice one big shift in the Japanese electronics industry’s agenda since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami: the industry’s collective focus on the “smart home.”
Concepts like the smart house, city or society are no longer a pie-in-the-sky schemes dreamed up by Japanese academics applying for grants. Nor is this something concocted by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (MEITI) to promote Japanese industry.
Not that academia and MEITI have given up. Far from it.
It was clear at the show that technology suppliers are taking the “smart home” idea far more seriously than ever before, with a renewed interest and sense of urgency. They are pursuing embedded technologies that allow people to intelligently “control, conserve, store and distribute energy” within the home or community.
Unlike the U.S., where utility-led “smart grid” discussions dominate the conversation, Japan is reframing the debate around designing the “smart home,” observed Masaya Ishida, publisher of EE Times Japan, our sister publication based in Tokyo. While the concept includes the continuous flow of energy from utility companies, a “smart home” in this context could be better described as “energy-independent” or as a “sustainable-energy” home.
The idea is to embed the smart “control” functions in every device and every system, enabling consumers to achieve desired levels of energy consumption and conservation for every embedded system they use at home and at work.
Further, the notion of the “energy-independent home,” envisions a day when energy conserved can be stored in fuel cells in electric vehicles. Ishida reminded me that many Japanese living in big cities, for example, only drive on weekends, preferring public transportation for the daily commute. This leaves energy stored in the family car – which charges at low-peak hours -- to be intelligently distributed throughout the home to a host of devices during peak hours.
Lessons learned over the past summer
The rolling blackouts implemented in Japan this summer (due to the catastrophic nuclear power plant failures in Fukushima) taught Japanese companies, factories, retailers and consumers invaluable lessons in “perseverance” (limiting energy usage at peak time, banning neon signs on streets, turning off escalators in public spaces, removing a few fluorescent tubes from light fixtures in offices and stores, running factories on weekends) and a myriad of tricks used to save every milli-watt by manually manipulating power consumption.
While the Japanese are all feeling good about having met national ‘energy conservation’ goals this summer, they are girding for the upcoming winter. Energy demands are certain to exceed those experienced in summer.
This time around, though, the electronics industry’s new goal is to make energy saving “effortless” for everyone, rather than asking every consumer to “persevere.”
The industry sees that the answer may lie in embedded. They want to embed in devices every conceivable smart element – smart energy control, smart energy consumption to efficient energy storage and intelligent energy distribution technologies – at home, at work and in communities.
Smart house
The Fukuoka Smart House Consortium built a “smart house” complete with solar panels on its roof top and a wind turbine. The mock-up on display here illustrates how it all ties into the energy control system (shown on the computer screen on the photo) built into the house.
The diagram below shows all the building blocks for the Fukuoka Smart House, which needs to be supported by key interface standards and technologies, including power line communication, open services gateway initiative, vehicle to home standard and others. (Note the electric vehicle in the diagram – to store energy.)
Click on image to enlarge.
Energy usage pattern in smart home
Aval Nagasaki Corp., one of the many partners of Fukuoka Smart House Consortium, is playing a pivotal role by offering the company’s products such as smart power units, smart power modules and smart power managers. Asked about the lessons it has learned from the field trial of the Fukuoka Smart House, Wataru Nishikawa, manager of Aval Nagasaki, said: “Unlike the way consumers use IT systems, different families and consumers use energy very differently in real life. Such vast variables in their usage patterns can bring unexpected stress to the energy/power management system at home. Things are a lot harder to manage in the real world.”
Murata wireless gateway
Murata Manufacturing and its subsidiary SyChip Electronic Technology (Shanghai) Ltd. have developed a sensor network system for smart homes that supports construction of home automation and Energy Management System (EMS). With a wireless gateway system displayed at its booth, Murata showed off the sensor network system for smart homes. The system gathers information detected by sensors via the ZigBee Gateway, and it transmits this information via Wi-Fi or Ethernet over the Internet or to a tablet terminal. The system combines Murata's sensor and communications technology, offering a package consisting of the wireless Gateway, ZigBee sensor nodes and an original user interface.
Spin Flow
Beyond sun and wind, regular water flow in a stream or river can become the source for generating power.
Star Group of Japan demonstrated a product called “Spin Flow.”
By bobbing the Spin Flow unit on flowing water – rivers, streams, water that’s used for agricultural fields – power can be generated, according to the company. The Spin Flow floats on its own and circulates on the water’s surface by itself. There is no need to change either the directions of water flow, nor does it require falling water. When two Spin Flow modules are used on water running at a speed of 1.0 meter per second, the device can generate 264Wh in 24 hours, enough for camping, lighting the outdoor lamps or running agricultural pumps, the company claims.
NXP smart lighting
NXP is betting big on smart lighting.
The goal of smart lighting is to allow lights to be activated remotely and automatically via wireless controllers.
A module shown in this photo includes chip sets that offer highly efficient and dimmable drivers for smart lamps, according NXP.
Features included in the GreenChip module are an ultra-low power standby supply controller with 10 mW no-load capability; an IEEE802.15.4 standard-compatible integrated RF transceiver and wireless microcontroller with a Tx/Rx current below 17 mA; and low-power, IP-based wireless connectivity enabled by the open source JenNet-IP networking software. The module fits right into the light bulb socket.
Embedding visual smarts in a car
Toshiba has developed hardware-based IP called “FocusNavi IP.” Designed to embed more smarts into cars, Toshiba leverages its proprietary motion detecting algorithm. The hardware IP can determine, for example, whether moving objects are human beings, by applying the “Support Vector Machine” to the database. A tiny camera is installed in the first car of the miniature train in the photo below. While the train is running, the camera accurately discriminates between humans and other objects.
The second picture below is a monitor showing what the camera is actually “seeing.” The hardware IP can be dropped into any ASIC, FPGA or SoC to enable the feature. It then detects only the objects the system needs to detect, according to Toshiba. Beyond surveillance cameras, Toshiba’s FocusNavi IP’s most obvious applications are in cameras used in vehicles.
Smart robot feeds you food
One can’t walk around any Japanese electronics shows without bumping into warm and fuzzy robots. Here’s one. Although still a prototype (and nowhere near cuddly yet), this robot, equipped with eyes of Microsoft Kinect Xbox, is designed to help feed a handicapped person. It can feed “miso” soup without forcing a person to move his head or feed a spoonful of cooked rice or tofu right into one’s mouth without mashing or dropping it. The system was developed by Core Group, which is based in Kyushu, Japan.
Renesas mobor control
Renesas showed off a new motor control MCU designed for hybrid and non-hybrid electric vehicles. Using the company’s well proven SH-2A CPU (capable of running at up to 160 MHz), the Renesas engineering team has integrated both a resolver to digital (R/D) converter and motor control unit (EMU) inside the new SH72AY. The hardware integration helps offload CPU processing, making the new chip a perfect MPU for high-speed performance control motors demanded by HEVs and EVs. Renesas is sampling it now. Competitors such as Freescale are often running R/D converter or EMU functions in software on their MCUs, explained a Renesas representative.
Smart multi-unit dwelling
Tokyo Gas is building a new “smart,” multi-dwelling unit in Yokohama. The company’s lucky employees are expected to move in next year. The utility will install several of the company’s “Ene Farm” residential fuel cells in the building. By combining residential fuel cells together with those already used in EVs, the new smart multi-unit dwelling will offer plenty of space to store “left over” energy (and the energy generated by solar cells on the roof top) along with a method for sharing the energy among several families living in the building. The new mantra for new smart homes is the home that not only consumes energy but generates energy.
责编：Quentin
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