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Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

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Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#91

Post by xyzzyz »

celticninja wrote: post #50
MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like heating/cooling your house more in advance of demand? It would be neat if they could enable/disable demand on a rolling basis where AC runs for one subpopulation for part of an hour then for another subpopulation the next part.

or you know, dont live in the desert e.g Phoenix Arizona, or if you do decide to live in the desert then realise that's your choice and dont add to pollution and climate change by trying to cool down a desert with AC.

Do you also recommend that people don’t live anywhere it snows? I mean, heating up in winter uses even more energy than cooling down in summer.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#92

Post by seiferteric »

xyzzyz wrote: post #91
celticninja wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or you know, dont live in the desert e.g Phoenix Arizona, or if you do decide to live in the desert then realise that's your choice and dont add to pollution and climate change by trying to cool down a desert with AC.

Do you also recommend that people don’t live anywhere it snows? I mean, heating up in winter uses even more energy than cooling down in summer.

It's funny that I have seen several anti A/C articles and several pro Heat Pump articles in recent times, do you think they know these are the same things in reverse? At least A/C is often used in sunny locales were solar can be used effectively.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#93

Post by ars »

I had a Smart thermostat for a while, but removed it because it was costing me extra energy.

My boiler is more efficient if it runs at low. But with the thermostat allowing the house too cool off, the boiler had to run at high to warm up the house in time. (I don't remember the exact number it's something like 98% vs 80% efficient.)

This ended up using more energy, than leaving it to run at the lowest possible output temperature the entire day.

When I googled this I found that Energy Star does not consider smart thermostats to be energy saving.

I suspect the same will be true of A/C - letting the heat pump run at very low all day will save more energy than high speed to quickly cool the house.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#94

Post by conductr »

taylodl wrote: post #71

I really don't like the strategy of super cooling in the morning. I prefer fresh air instead. I throw the windows open wide and let all the cool morning air in. By midmorning I'm usually starting to close those windows because the outside air is getting warmer. By mid afternoon I'm closing all those windows and turning on the AC and setting the temperature to 1 degree (Fahrenheit) cooler than the current room tempera…

I have a similar lows in the 80s. Except high is 105. I also have a wife that likes it 65 (70 is our great compromise). I don’t think any of this precooling/ventilation hacks would work for me. This time of year, even at night (thermal mass), if my AC turns off the house temp goes up about 1F every 5-10 minutes. It’s just brutal.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#95

Post by moralestapia »

evanreichard wrote: post #11

Ecobee has eco+ which has "Community Energy Savings" [0]. It was just way too intrusive. It seemed to be a reactive system vs proactive. Technology Connections goes into this more [1], but I believe they should be providing a system that proactively cools when there is less demand _prior_ to an expected increase in demand. Effectively using your house as a "battery". When I had it enabled, I was _always_ too hot (in…

>Sorry, not sorry: I'm not willing to sacrifice my comfort for the ~$10/mo incentive.

Hey, but at least you don't use plastic straws, right?

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#96

Post by r3trohack3r »

evanreichard wrote: post #11

Ecobee has eco+ which has "Community Energy Savings" [0]. It was just way too intrusive. It seemed to be a reactive system vs proactive. Technology Connections goes into this more [1], but I believe they should be providing a system that proactively cools when there is less demand _prior_ to an expected increase in demand. Effectively using your house as a "battery". When I had it enabled, I was _always_ too hot (in…

Ecobee integrates with SRP in my area and does exactly what you describe. They know my billing plan (Time of Use - Demand) and, from my understanding, will coordinate with SRP ahead of a conservation event to pre-cool my house by up to 2 degrees before raising it by up to 4 degrees when attempting to “flatten the demand curve” of the grid.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#97

Post by jjtheblunt »

evanreichard wrote: post #11

Ecobee has eco+ which has "Community Energy Savings" [0]. It was just way too intrusive. It seemed to be a reactive system vs proactive. Technology Connections goes into this more [1], but I believe they should be providing a system that proactively cools when there is less demand _prior_ to an expected increase in demand. Effectively using your house as a "battery". When I had it enabled, I was _always_ too hot (in…

Our ecobee (Phoenix, so HOT) does the precooling and is buggily aware of the expensive time window for electrical rates. Arizona Power just shrunk the expensive time window, not sure how that made sense, but the ecobee seems to not know, nor is there any way i could find to inform ecobee of the new shorter expensive time window.

I've had two Nests before, and two Ecobees, and they both were fine, in general, but for the next house not sure which I'd prefer.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#98

Post by saurik »

moralestapia wrote: post #95
evanreichard wrote: post #11

Ecobee has eco+ which has "Community Energy Savings" [0]. It was just way too intrusive. It seemed to be a reactive system vs proactive. Technology Connections goes into this more [1], but I believe they should be providing a system that proactively cools when there is less demand _prior_ to an expected increase in demand. Effectively using your house as a "battery". When I had it enabled, I was _always_ too hot (in…

>Sorry, not sorry: I'm not willing to sacrifice my comfort for the ~$10/mo incentive. Hey, but at least you don't use plastic straws, right?

Why would you expect someone who isn't willing to sacrifice their comfort for a $10/mo incentive to sacrifice their comfort for a $0/mo incentive? Deciding "I don't like this person's ethics" doesn't mean "this person is suddenly inconsistent": you need to check your knee-jerk responses :/.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#99

Post by bcbrown »

furyg3 wrote: post #33

Isn't this the same if you have a 'dumb' thermostat set on a schedule, which is presumably what most people have anyways? Even if you have a 'really dumb' thermostat, presumably people are waking up at similar times and turning on their heaters... I sometimes wonder if the smartest thermostat isn't actually a 'really dumb' thermostat on a timer. As in, you want it to be warm? You have to get up and set the heater to…

That's essentially the system I use. I have it set to turn the furnace on for an hour in the morning right before I wake up. Other than that, I manually set the temperature when I'm at home over the course of the day. It automatically resets at noon, 4pm, and 11pm back to 63 degrees, so if I don't turn it off before leaving, it'll still reset pretty soon.

Re: Smart thermostats inadvertently strain electric power grids

#100

Post by hyperdimension »

jandrese wrote: post #46
evanreichard wrote: post #11

Ecobee has eco+ which has "Community Energy Savings" [0]. It was just way too intrusive. It seemed to be a reactive system vs proactive. Technology Connections goes into this more [1], but I believe they should be providing a system that proactively cools when there is less demand _prior_ to an expected increase in demand. Effectively using your house as a "battery". When I had it enabled, I was _always_ too hot (in…

Nest has an energy saving feature that feels like it is trying to boil the frog. We normally keep the thermostat at 78F (~25.5C), but over the course of a couple of weeks it ticked it up to 79F, then 80, then 81, and now 82F (~28C). I had to go in and manually adjust the schedule to get it back to something reasonable.

An interestingly more literal use of the analogy. I like it.
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