Ford Partners with Other Companies on Energy-Saving Program

Officials from Ford were in town recently to discuss an energy initiative that the automaker has launched with other companies designed to demonstrate how U.S. consumers can greatly reduce their energy consumption and costs.

The MyEnergi Lifestyle program includes Ford, Eaton Corp., SunPower, Whirlpool, Infineon and Nest Labs and offers ways to incorporate energy-saving home appliances and plug-in vehicles.
Think of it almost as an electricity makeover that lets you use less and spend less.


The presentation at Georgia Tech featured Mike Tinskey, Ford's global director of vehicle electrification and infrastructure, Bert Bras, a Georgia Tech engineering professor and Charles Tahara, an Eaton project manager.
They discussed how MyEnergi Lifestyle can combine renewable energy generation with “time-flexible” loads to create more efficient energy consumption from plug-in vehicles and home appliances.

Ford and its business associates worked with researchers from Georgia Tech to create a computer model that calculates the electricity usage of a typical single family in their home for one year and the associated savings with moving to an energy-efficient lifestyle, according to a news release. The cumulative results predict a 60 percent reduction in energy costs and more than 9,000 kg of CO2 (55 percent reduction) saved from a single home, the release said. If every home in the U.S. were to implement these energy-saving technologies, it would be the equivalent of taking all the homes in California, New York and Texas off the power grid (32 million homes), according to Ford.

“More than ever, cars are sharing the same energy source as the home,” Tinskey said. “The time is right for the home appliance and transportation sectors to converge if we are going to tackle a myriad of sustainability challenges in a rapidly changing world.”

The average American home uses more than 11,000 kWh of electricity a year, said Warwick Stirling, global director for energy and sustainability at Whirlpool. “But with recent technology advancements in our appliances, a family can use energy smarter and more efficiently,” he said.

“As innovation in home electrical technology advances, so does the need for safe, reliable and efficient power distribution,” said Joanne Edwards, a vice president at Eaton. “At the same time, giving homeowners the tools to tap into the details of distributed power for their homes allows them to modify their behavior and further reduce energy consumption.”

Tinskey talked about the MyEnergi Lifestyle retrofit contest with Katie Couric on her syndicated talk show “Katie.” Homeowners can enter the contest for a chance to win a package that includes a Ford C-MAX Energi  plug-in hybrid vehicle, new Whirlpool brand appliances, a SunPower solar power system and other home products designed to bring energy-efficient living to a family. The contest runs through June 9, with the grand prize winner to be announced this summer.

More information about C-MAX Energi can be found here.