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VoltSafe Blog Team – February 22, 2023
VoltSafe Inc. sails away from the AMI Conference and Expo with a boatload of interest in VoltSafe Marine
VoltSafe Inc. attended North America’s leading marina and boatyard conference which ran between January 30 – February 1. Attendees at the conference were executive-level marina professionals. Our VoltSafe team had a chance to interact with individuals and corporations from every corner of the marina industry. This included marina owners, managers and operators to boatyard owners and consultants in the field including marina software management. VoltSafe exhibited as part of the group of shore power vendors.
The team noticed that this was a friendly and close-knit group, excited to hear about how VoltSafe Marine would be able to handle multiple pain points within their industry. Our crew left the conference with the affirmation that this is one of the top markets, if not the single best market, to bring a new VoltSafe product into. Marinas face a host of issues related to electrical power which our technology addresses. Let’s take a look at each of these respective areas to demonstrate how safe, simple and smart VoltSafe technology can be for marina operators and boaters alike.
We’ve mentioned some of the critical VoltSafe safety features before such as no hidden corrosion, and no overheating which prevents electrical fires. Or its over/under-voltage protection to protect sensitive electronics, current leakage monitoring and automatic/remote breaker reset, and many more. Industry leaders seem to have recognized that VoltSafe Marine is the perfect solution for marinas regardless of whether they’re already in operation, being upgraded, or that are on the verge of being constructed in the near future. Marinas will be able to take advantage of the benefits of VoltSafe Marine to prepare for the upcoming code changes while making their meeting the requirements of boaters and insurance companies happy.
If you’ve been keeping up with our blogs, you’ll know that breakaway damages are a recurring theme. It’s no different here. Every now and then, a boater is just a little too eager to get out on the water and forgets to unplug from shore power, sometimes bringing the entire dock-side pedestal with them. VoltSafe’s breakaway feature can prevent this mishap from causing major infrastructure damage.
You may also wonder if marinas need to buy standalone VoltSafe pedestals, or whether they can use their existing infrastructure – especially if they recently upgraded their pedestals. We’ve made it simple enough for our hardware to sleeve over existing pedestals and hardware. This will enable us to retrofit pedestals that have been recently upgraded so marinas can take advantage of our technology, serving all 9,000+ marinas in North America, regardless whether they’re currently overhauling electrical infrastructure or not.
For marina operators, one of the biggest monthly headaches is power metering and billing. Everything from invoicing, chasing accounts receivable, boat owners disputing charges, constant requests from boat owners to check whether their boat is connected to shore power, and monitoring leakage current is a cumbersome monthly challenge.
VoltSafe’s marine app puts control of power metering and management into the hands of marina owners. This allows them to monitor the power used by individual vessels and receive notifications when a vessel is disconnected from power. This will allow them to bill owners on their individual power usage and address any disputed charges by showing the boat owners their personal usage. As far as collecting payments, if a boat owner fails to pay their bill for an extended period of time, the marina owner could go as far as can choose to shut off power to that owner’s vessel. Think about how individual home power metering is billed by hydro companies. VoltSafe’s technology is similar, but smarter.
Another major concern for marinas is current leakage. Electrical code changes are on the horizon that will greatly affect marinas. Marinas will have to measure the current leakage from every docked vessel. Since most boats are essentially hunks of metal and composites sitting in water, they can rust and leak. Every vessel tends to leak some current into the surrounding body of water. If a person or pet hops into fresh or brackish water close to an especially (electrically) leaky vessel, it can result in electric shock injuries or possibly be fatal. Since VoltSafe technology measures current on all three lines, VoltSafe’s app can easily indicate a vessel’s current leakage down to the milliamp at any given time ensuring unprecedented electrical safety near water. One of the biggest takeaways from the AMI conference was seeing first-hand how big of a compliance hurdle the new 2026 NFPA code poses, and how seamlessly VoltSafe can assist marina operators achieve compliance.
So, where do we go from here you might ask? Market-leading pedestal and cord manufacturers are interested in partnering with us to integrate our technology and design into their current business. While we have the capability of manufacturing VoltSafe Marine ourselves, a true, collaborative partnership can be a better, faster way to serve the entire industry. The right partner will already have trust built over years of exceptional service, and be keen to continue to provide their customer base with market-leading technology. As a tech company, VoltSafe has the ability to adapt its technology to the needs of this particular industry by providing game changing hardware and software integrations.
We are looking to partner with marinas for field testing our marine solution. We also want to have licensing or co-manufacturing discussions with prospective partners about bringing this inventive and industry-changing product to market.If you are a marina operator or marine professional in manufacturing or licensing and partnerships, we want to connect with you!