Power Management Apparatus, Electronic Appliance, and Method of Managing Power

• US 20110185196A1
• Filed: 01/13/2011
• Published: 07/28/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 01/25/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Ukita, Masakazu, Yoshida, Asami, Moriai, Shiho, Kawamoto, Yohei, Katagi, Masanobu, Matsuda, Seiichi, Tanaka, Yu, ASANO, Tomoyuki
• Granted Patent: US 9,085,241 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 713/300
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2210/20 AC to AC converters
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2260/54 Energy consumption estimation
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2260/56 Temperature prediction, e.g. for pre-cooling
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/00 Methods of charging batteries, specially adapted for electric vehicles; Charging stations or on-board charging equipment therefor; Exchange of energy storage elements in electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/51 Photovoltaic means
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/52 Wind-driven generators
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/53 Batteries
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/54 Fuel cells
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 55/00 Arrangements for supplying energy stored within a vehicle to a power network, i.e. vehicle-to-grid [V2G] arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 13/00001 characterised by the display of information or by user interaction, e.g. supervisory control and data acquisition systems [SCADA] or graphical user interfaces [GUI]
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 13/00034 the elements or equipment being or involving an electric power substation
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 7/00045 Authentication, i.e. circuits for checking compatibility between one component, e.g. a battery or a battery charger, and another component, e.g. a power source
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 7/35 with light sensitive cells
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 60/00 Enabling technologies; Technologies with a potential or indirect contribution to GHG emissions mitigation
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/70 Energy storage systems for electromobility, e.g. batteries
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/7072 Electromobility specific charging systems or methods for batteries, ultracapacitors, supercapacitors or double-layer capacitors
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/72 Electric energy management in electromobility
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/12 Electric charging stations
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/14 Plug-in electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/16 Information or communication technologies improving the operation of electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/167 : Systems integrating technologies related to power network operation and communication or information technologies for supporting the interoperability of electric or hybrid vehicles, i.e. smartgrids as interface for battery charging of electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV]
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 10/126 : the energy generation units being or involving electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV], i.e. power aggregation of EV or HEV, vehicle to grid arrangements [V2G]
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 30/14 : Details associated with the interoperability, e.g. vehicle recognition, authentication, identification or billing

Abstract

There is provided a power management apparatus including: a managed appliance registering unit carrying out authentication on an electronic appliance connected to a power network and registering an electronic appliance for which the authentication has succeeded as a managed appliance, a control unit controlling operation of the managed appliance and supplying of power to the managed appliance, a managed appliance information acquiring unit acquiring, from the managed appliance, as managed appliance information, at least any of appliance information including identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance, information indicating an operation state of the electronic appliance, information indicating an usage state of the electronic appliance and power information of the electronic appliance, and an appliance state judging unit judging a state of the managed appliance based on the managed appliance information acquired by the managed appliance information acquiring unit.

Claims

1. A power management apparatus comprising:

a managed appliance registering unit carrying out authentication on an electronic appliance connected to a power network and registering an electronic appliance for which the authentication has succeeded as a managed appliance;

a control unit controlling operation of the managed appliance and supplying of power to the managed appliance;

a managed appliance information acquiring unit acquiring, from the managed appliance, as managed appliance information, at least any of appliance information including identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance, information indicating an operation state of the electronic appliance, information indicating an usage state of the electronic appliance and power information of the electronic appliance; and

an appliance state judging unit judging a state of the managed appliance based on the managed appliance information acquired by the managed appliance information acquiring unit.

2. The power management apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein a digital signature authenticated by a specified certificate authority is embedded in advance in the electronic appliance, and

wherein the managed appliance registering unit is operable to verify the digital signature acquired from the electronic appliance, and if verification of the digital signature is successful, to register the electronic appliance as the managed appliance.

3. The power management apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the managed appliance registering unit is operable, when verification of the digital signature acquired from the electronic appliance is successful, to transmit, to the electronic appliance, identification information that is unique to the power management apparatus and a digital signature of the power management apparatus relating to the identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance.

4. The power management apparatus according to claim 3,

wherein the managed appliance registering unit

is operable, when an electronic appliance registered in another power management apparatus is connected to the power network, to acquire, from the electronic appliance, a digital signature, which has been assigned to the identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance by such other power management apparatus, and identification information that is unique to such other power management apparatus, and

is operable, when verification of the digital signature assigned by such other power management apparatus has succeeded, to temporarily register the electronic appliance registered in such other power management apparatus.

5. The power management apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the appliance state judging unit is operable, when information indicating occurrence of an abnormal operation is transmitted from the managed appliance or when the managed appliance information is not acquired from the managed appliance, to detect that the managed appliance is operating abnormally.

6. The power management apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the control unit is operable, when power supplied from an external power supplier has stopped, to distribute, according to type of the managed appliance, power to be supplied to the managed appliance from a power storage apparatus managed by the power management apparatus.

7. An electronic appliance comprising:

a storage unit storing a digital signature that has been authenticated by a specified certificate authority;

an authentication processing unit carrying out an authentication process with a power management apparatus managing supplying of power to the electronic appliance using the digital signature stored in the storage unit, and registering the electronic appliance in the power management apparatus; and

a control unit transmitting to the power management apparatus at least any of appliance information including identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance, information indicating an operation state of the electronic appliance, information indicating an usage state of the electronic appliance and power information of the electronic appliance.

8. The electronic appliance according to claim 7, wherein the authentication processing unit is operable, when the electronic appliance is registered in the power management apparatus, to acquire, from the power management apparatus in which the electronic appliance is registered, identification information that is unique to the power management apparatus and a digital signature, which has been assigned by the power management apparatus to the identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance.

9. A method of managing power, comprising the steps of:

carrying out authentication on an electronic appliance connected to a power network and registering an electronic appliance for which the authentication has succeeded as a managed appliance;

acquiring, from the managed appliance, as managed appliance information, at least any of appliance information including identification information that is unique to the electronic appliance, information indicating an operation state of the electronic appliance, information indicating an usage state of the electronic appliance and power information of the electronic appliance; and

judging a state of the managed appliance based on the managed appliance information acquired in the step of acquiring,

wherein operation of the managed appliance and supplying of power to the managed appliance are controlled according to the state of the managed appliance.