The brief:
Dynamic Demand is a campaign that we set up to promote a new environmental technology. We wanted a website that would help build the technical and economic case, and add credibility to our campaign.
A particular challenge was in the copy writing. Telling the story of dynamic demand requires some potentially confusing technical information about how our electricity system works.When writing scientific copy for a lay audience, you have to work very hard to stand back and imagine what it is like for someone who doesn’t know anything about the subject. What images are you creating in their minds? Is there anything you haven’t explained? Is it too patronising or boring? Being “technically correct” is only a tiny part of it.
My role on the site:
Design, writing, coding and hosting of the site, as well as management of the update list.
The live grid meter
Dynamic Demand involves reacting to the “mains hum” (or more properly, “AC frequency”) of the power grid, which rises and falls in pitch ever so slightly whenever there is a temporary excess or lack of generation.
We attracted additional interest in the campaign by including on the site a live meter showing the state of the UK grid in real-time. This was created using the web animation tool ‘Flash’. The meter reads the mains frequency every second, which is continuously posted to a text file by a PC with added electronics at our offices.
My role:
Design and creation of the meter in Flash. Design and build of the electronics.
If you’d be interested in a meter like this, or any visualisation, to show anything at all -- temperature, pressure, whatever -- let me know.