Schneider Electric is latest to draw link between building and network energy controls

Facilities infrastructure giant Schneider Electric has adopted an architectural approach to intelligent energy management that it has dubbed EcoStruxure.

The effort will better integrate the company's technologies across power distribution and protection systems, data centers (where the company's sells the APC by Schneider Electric InfraStruxure line), industrial controls, building controls and physical security technologies. The company has positioned these technologies as vital to corporate-wide energy intelligence. The connections between these various components, through open IP and Web services, is also seen as critical.

Most of the pieces of the EcoStruxure approach exist already. What's missing is the business practices and reference architectures that businesses can use to apply an integrated approach. Look for related training and documentation to emerge throughout 2010, according to the company.