Patent ID: 7248977

Claim:
A system for measuring the delivery of electrical energy from an energy supplier to a consumer through an electric circuit, said system comprising: (a) a digital network; (b) first and second devices coupled with said digital network, said first and second devices each comprising: (1) at least one sensor coupled with said electric circuit and operative to sense at least one power parameter in said electric circuit and generate at least one analog signal indicative thereof; (2) at least one analog to digital converter coupled with said at least one sensor and operative to convert said at least one analog signal to at least one digital signal representative thereof; (3) a first processor coupled with said at least one analog to digital converter and operative to generate at least one computed value from said at least one digital signal; and (4) a plurality of communication ports, each communication port of said plurality of communication ports operable to send and receive communications over said digital network with said first processor, said plurality of communication ports being coupled with said digital network, wherein each of said first and second devices are operable to engage in a first communication from a first communication port of said plurality of communications ports substantially simultaneously with engaging in a second communication from a second communication port of said plurality of communications ports; (c) wherein each of the plurality of communication ports of said first device are further operable to communicate with at least one of the plurality of communication ports of said second device over said digital network; and (d) further wherein each communication port of said plurality of communications ports includes at least one communications parameter, wherein said at least one communications parameter of a first communication port of said plurality of communications ports is operable to configure the first communication port and said at least one communications parameter of a second communication port of said plurality of communications ports is operable to configure the second communication port independently of the first communication port.