Networked Fridges 'Negotiate' Electricity Use

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday January 14, 2009 @08:44PM from the share-the-juice dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers have developed a way to network household and commercial fridges together in a distributed peer-to-peer fashion that lets them 'negotiate' with each other on the best time to consume electricity. A retrofittable controller is attached to each fridge and then a temperature profile is built around the unit. The controller enables communication between other fridges on the network and also the power source. It enables fridges to work together to decide when to cool down, and thus consume power, based on how much surplus power will be available, and to anticipate power shortages and change their running schedules accordingly to use as little power as possible during these times."

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One day... by retech · 2009-01-14 21:17 · Score: -1, Flamebait

We'll be able to look back and tell our grandchildren that we remember a day when the internet didn't have coffee makers and refrigerators chattering all day.

A day when it was just computers and a few scant cell phones...

Those were the days.