{"id":"open-problems","title":"Open problems","description":"Questions and proposed experiments the corpus has not resolved, with the record each one challenges or tests and the next test on file.","license":"CC BY 4.0 for original Airform Agent Commons text and tables; third-party sources retain their own terms.","updatedAt":"2026-09-07T12:00:00.000Z","count":9,"fields":[{"name":"id","type":"string","description":"Record id"},{"name":"title","type":"string","description":"The question or experiment"},{"name":"kind","type":"string","description":"question or experiment"},{"name":"summary","type":"string","description":"Statement"},{"name":"bears_on","type":"string","description":"Pipe-separated record ids it challenges, tests or depends on"},{"name":"next_test","type":"string","description":"The next test"},{"name":"url","type":"url","description":"Canonical page"}],"rows":[{"id":"node-pilot","title":"A fifty-node federated pilot","kind":"experiment","summary":"The experiment that would move the thesis from argument to evidence: fifty installed nodes, one utility or data-centre timing signal, one season, and a published record of delivered flexibility, comfort and compensation.","bears_on":"federation | dispatch-without-discomfort | ai-load-question","next_test":"Name the counterparty, the site owner and the participant advocate; register the baseline before the first dispatch.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/node-pilot"},{"id":"ai-load-question","title":"Can a distributed thermal-electric fleet actually serve computation?","kind":"question","summary":"Data centres cluster at a few large sites with dedicated supply. The link between a scattered fleet of household batteries and the growth of intelligence is real only if the fleet can relieve a constraint that computation actually feels.","bears_on":"is-this-good-for-ai | the-grid-is-full","next_test":"Publish a bounded experiment, its baseline, its failure criteria and the observed outcome.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/ai-load-question"},{"id":"nature-inside-the-grid","title":"Does a federation give land and heat back to nature?","kind":"question","summary":"If storage sits inside buildings, fewer substations, transformers and peaker plants are needed. The claim that this returns land, reduces waste heat and quiets the city is plausible and unmeasured.","bears_on":"solar-era-city | switchgear-deletion","next_test":"For one district with a known transformer constraint, publish the avoided-infrastructure and added-hardware ledger, in land, energy and materials.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/nature-inside-the-grid"},{"id":"location-question","title":"Does flexibility arrive where it is needed?","kind":"question","summary":"A fleet can appear large in aggregate while offering little relief at a particular constrained part of the grid.","bears_on":"federation","next_test":"Publish a bounded experiment, its baseline, its failure criteria and the observed outcome.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/location-question"},{"id":"dispatch-without-discomfort","title":"How much of ten kilowatt-hours can be dispatched without touching comfort?","kind":"question","summary":"The usable share of a node's battery is bounded by the building's own needs, the comfort envelope and the reserve the occupant expects for an outage. The number is unknown.","bears_on":"storage-as-byproduct | thermal-flexibility","next_test":"Publish a bounded experiment, its baseline, its failure criteria and the observed outcome.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/dispatch-without-discomfort"},{"id":"field-proof","title":"How we would know this helps","kind":"experiment","summary":"A proposed field protocol: establish the baseline, measure delivered flexibility, count recovery demand, record comfort and overrides, and publish uncomfortable results.","bears_on":"thermal-flexibility | shared-intelligence | source-doe-flexible-buildings","next_test":"Select a pilot site and owner; register the baseline method, privacy terms, comfort envelope and acceptance thresholds before dispatch.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/field-proof"},{"id":"override-trial","title":"Test the right to override","kind":"experiment","summary":"A proposed failure exercise: interrupt communications, withdraw consent and verify that local comfort and control remain intact.","bears_on":"comfort-first","next_test":"Name the engineering owner and validate a bounded test procedure before any live equipment test.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/override-trial"},{"id":"rebound-question","title":"What if the peak simply moves?","kind":"question","summary":"A successful dispatch interval may be followed by recovery demand that erodes its value or creates another constraint.","bears_on":"thermal-flexibility","next_test":"Publish a bounded experiment, its baseline, its failure criteria and the observed outcome.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/rebound-question"},{"id":"compensation-question","title":"Who is paid when a household's battery serves the grid?","kind":"question","summary":"If the node is the household's comfort and the grid's resource at once, the value it creates has at least three claimants: the occupant, the building owner and the operator of the federation. The split is undecided.","bears_on":"comfort-first","next_test":"Publish a bounded experiment, its baseline, its failure criteria and the observed outcome.","url":"https://www.airformdata.com/commons/compensation-question"}]}