ChArGED Gateways are deployed, in order to collect measurement and pre-process the energy consumption of all the different devices and appliances at the user sites. The gateways support the necessary communication protocols from smart home and building automation in order to connect smart-plugs that provide the actual energy consumption information from the consumers’ appliances and other sensors that will provide valuable information such as temperature, humidity, luminosity and motion.

The gateway software will be based on the OSGi middleware, a widely adopted standard for creating smart home solutions.

The aggregation and processing of consumption data takes place at the Cleanweb Energy Cloud back-end System. This collects data from the measurement devices and applies intelligent processing for real-time discovery of energy insights and alerts notification.

Utilizing the aforementioned data, game mechanics and dynamics introduce the end user in a process that resembles a game, with a goal to educate him/her and support him/her in adopting more energy efficient patterns of interaction with the surrounding everyday appliances.

The end goal is to stimulate energy savings and ensure balanced load.  The end users will be able to access their energy profiles to monitor consumption, energy saving advices, achievements, etc. that will be served in a game-like approach to support them in their everyday energy reduction goals and efficient appliance use missions.

All the aforementioned will be amplified with a social innovation process in the gamification motivation paths creating virtual and social engagement loops of interactions.

Eventually, the design of the back-end enables proprietary solutions of consortium partners and third parties to connect through a public API to extend the functionality in the future and eventually create a novel ChArGED based ecosystem.