US Department of Energy Green Button Program Spurs Smart Apps
NEW YORK, /CSRwire/ - The winners of the US Department of Energy's “Apps for Energy” Challenge were announced this week, and New York based VELObill by ZeroFootprint, Inc. won 3rd place as the leading app for utility bill visualization. As of today, it is also the lead contender for the popular vote category. There is still time to cast your Public Vote for VELObill through May 31.
Software developers were invited to submit web and mobile apps to help consumers save energy in coordination with the US Department of Energy’s Green Button Challenge, launched in January. The program first urged utilities and energy service providers to standardize energy usage data for their customers in a simple downloadable format, known as a “Green Button.” The hope was that easy access to energy usage would enable consumers to manage their consumption and make more informed decisions. It’s a good example of American ingenuity. To date, energy utilities that signed up for the Green Button serve over 30 million US homes.
Green Button’s energy data formatting sparked a wave of creativity among futurists, visionaries and “App” developers that is quickly changing how Americans think about energy. For Dr. Ron Dembo, CEO and Chief Architect of American software company ZeroFootprint, this translates to reducing our carbon footprint. “It is time for an “occupy energy” movement, so where better to start than to know and understand what we use?” said Dembo, who authored VELObill. “By standardizing our energy data, Green Button is revolutionizing an antiquated industry and putting consumers in the driver’s seat.”
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