My name is Chris Link, and I'm responsible for business development and our strategy for all energy-related technologies. Energy technology is an exciting space because I get to do two things: grow the business and make this world a better place. My job is to look for opportunities in areas where semiconductor innovation previously wasn't a factor. One recent example are motors in HVAC units: moving from AC induction motors to brushless DC (BLDC) motors with variable speed drive increases the efficiency by 30%. In parallel the amount of copper and steel needed to make the BLDC motor is so much lower that it more than offsets the cost for the electronics.
Other areas of energy innovation I'm excitied about are solar inverters (which enable us to hook solar panels to the grid and power our houses), LED lighting (which underlines the effect of everything going solid state over time, like computers), the electricity grid and of course motor control. Looking farther out, I'm particularly interested in energy harvesting and devices that live off the energy the environment provides. To sum it up, just as the chip industry enabled new forms of communications, it's going to do the same thing in the energy space, enabling new uses and sources of energy that we haven't thought about in the past.
A couple of trends I'm watching: power companies are looking at our 50-year-old grid and trying to figure out how they can take the peak load and better distribute it throughout the day. How can they create smart metering systems and provide incentives to customers, for example, to use their clothes dryers when most people aren't using their dryers? I'm also tracking regulations, like Energy Star, at eceee, the EU Eco-design Directive, that for example sets limits on how much standby power a device can use. These have a big influence on our customer designs.
Improving energy efficiency always means being smart about how the energy is used. Smart devices in today's world mostly equate to electronics. Combine the two and we are looking at electronics where ever energy is made, moved or used.
The next big thing in energy? There won't be just one "next big thing." There are going to be a whole slew of them. It just depends on where you look.
Chris Link
Energy Business Development Manager
