Among the various road maps, one published in 2003 (http://www.epri.com/roadmap/) by the Electric Power Research Institute stands out among the crowd, head and shoulders above the White House's own plan (http://www.whitehouse.gov/energy/National-Energy-Policy.pdf). The EPRI report lays out a carefully staged, decades-long strategy that includes modernization of the power grid, decentralized production, real-time price signals in support of demand response capabilities, and -- in the long term -- use of hydrogen as a complementary energy carrier.

In "The Energy Web (http://www.infoworld.com/4232)," an October 2004 blog essay, I bemoaned the fact that, during the run-up to that year's U.S. presidential election, neither of the political parties were championing any of EPRI's excellent analysis and solid planning. In the end, however, I concluded that neither could contribute much.

Information technology is both the key enabler and a prime beneficiary of the EPRI vision, and information technologists -- not politicians -- will make the difference. "Maybe," I mused, "a new entrepreneurial partnership between energy and IT is all we really need."

Last Friday, I got a glimpse of what such a partnership might look like. For my weekly podcast (http://akamai.infoworld.com/weblog/udell/gems/ju_frost.mp3), I interviewed Mike Frost, CEO o f Site Controls (http://site-controls.com/), a 3-year-old Austin, Texas, startup focused on the part of the energy web that can be built out now, for profit, with near-term ROI and a growth path that could eventually produce macro-level network effects.

Site Controls works with retail, restaurant, and convenience-store franchises. Using an Internet-connected server based on Linux and Java at each location, its system monitors and controls CO2 sensors, HVAC fans, and thermostats for two purposes: to lower operating costs and to assure QoS (quality of service). In this context, QoS might mean the permissible temperature range for Petco's fish tanks.