The ZigBee wireless standard which is becoming popular for home automation is set to be modified so that attached equiptment can operate without batteries.Popular with vendors like Control4, ZigBee is also proving popular with Pro AV installers.

The ZigBee Alliance is currently drafting an energy-harvesting specification that will enable switches and sensors equipped with its wireless home-control technology to operate without batteries and without a connection to a home's power lines.

Accordig to their latest press release ZigBee's green power modification will allow low-function devices - such as ZigBee-enabled on-wall light switches, dimmers, motion detector, moisture sensors and door sensors - to harvest energy from small solar cells, from heat or from the conversion of mechanical energy to electrical energy. In the case of a light switch, for example, the mechanical energy created by the press of a button or the flick of a switch would be converted into a small electrical charge, which in turn would power an embedded ZigBee transmitter, a spokesman said. The ZigBee signal would then turn on ZigBee-equipped lights.

The standard will be available to Alliance members at the end of 2009, the group said.

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