Equiwatt - The Energy Saving App
Hi - I’m Johnson Fernandes, and I’m the founder of equiwatt, a free app that helps householders in the UK to save energy and do their bit for the planet
By enabling our community of users to reduce their energy usage as a collective during times of peak demand, the equiwatt app helps prevent the use of backup power plants that are more polluting and expensive to run. This helps shift energy usage to times when it is cheaper and greener. Better still we reward our users according to the energy and CO2 they reduce.
The idea behind equiwatt
I've always been passionate about clean, renewable energy and the whole idea of being self-sufficient and generating your own energy which is less polluting and better for the planet.
However, I realised that adopting clean energy is quite hard for most homes because it involves installing solar panels and battery storage, which is expensive. This added to my frustrations around the management of energy causing power cuts and blackouts in developing nations such as India where I had experienced such things first-hand.
It was while studying for my PhD that out of interest, I started researching more about energy systems and found that power cuts and blackouts are a global phenomenon. In countries, like the US and UK, we just build more and more polluting power plants, or we just build expensive infrastructure, like battery storage to mitigate the increase in demand that causes such blackouts.
So, I really wanted to work on a solution that avoided the need to build these power plants and instead better manages peak time demand. This is when we came up with the idea behind equitwatt.
In particular we realised the opportunity for people at home to contribute to this challenge. Engaging consumers at home and incentivising them to reduce their peak time demand as a collective can help avoid the need to build polluting power plants and help make clean energy more accessible to all of us. What is more, energy companies offer incentive payment schemes to communities like equiwatt for helping them to reduce this dirty, expensive peak time energy.
Our app makes it really easy for consumers at home to reduce their peak time demand on the grid and earn a share of these payments received from energy companies. You don't need to have solar panels or own an electric vehicle to be green and adopt clean energy!
How does it work?
To get started just download the free app, register and connect your smart meter to receive notifications for our 1 hour long energy saving events. When the energy on the grid is being generated by dirty sources or the grid is under strain, we notify you to take action along with the rest of our community via the app.
If you are happy to participate in the event, you can respond by reducing your home’s energy usage by switching off appliances in the home and logging your activity in the app. If you want to make things even easier, you can also connect compatible smart plugs and electric vehicles to automate your participation in our energy saving events.
At the end of an event, you turn appliances back on and we send you a summary of how much energy and CO2 you have helped to save and the points you have been awarded for your contribution. Points can be exchanged in the app gift store for rewards including eGift vouchers, donations to charity and planting trees with the World Land Trust.
What we’ve achieved so far
As well as having a growing community of thousands across the UK, we were recognised by PwC as one of the top 50 climate tech startups with the potential to help the UK reach its Net Zero ambitions in their Future50 Net Zero report.
We have also been selected to join the Tech Nation Net Zero 3.0 programme that supports fast-growth tech companies that are helping the UK reduce greenhouse gas emissions either directly or indirectly.
Finally, we're excited to be part of the pioneering local energy flexibility trials being conducted in Oxfordshire as part of Project LEO that focus on balancing local grid demand at peak times.
What’s next?
Now really is the perfect time to use the equiwatt app with energy bills rising and the cost of living crisis impacted all of us. equiwatt offers a simple, easy and effective way to save energy and help the planet and we look forward to helping even more people in the UK to achieve this.
Having seen the positive consumer appetite for our service in the UK, I would like to explore global consumer appetite as well. Power cuts and blackouts are a phenomenon around the world and what we are doing is a blueprint for energy grids worldwide. We are on a mission to help people across the world get access to cleaner energy and help the planet with a solution that is accessible to everyone!
We would love you to join the equiwatt community and help grow our community by telling others about what we’re doing!
Website: www.equiwatt.com Instagram: @equiwatt Facebook: @equiwatt Twitter: @equiwattuk
Download the app here: https://www.equiwatt.com/get-app