Home energy monitoring

[blackheart]

Hi all - I am considering buying a home energy monitoring system. I saw one thread on the forum about the TED500. I was wondering if anyone else had any experience with these whole house monitoring systems, like Sense or some of the other manufacturers. I am not interested in the single plug in options. Just wondering if anyone had any experience with these whole home systems and what benefits you found. Thanks!!

 

[JoeS]

I had been using TED for years. Was an early adopter and some of their hardware stopped working but was replaced under warranty. Used it to monitor my ground-mounted solar and EV charging for about four years. Their CT was too small to fit around my 200A (400A?) house input busbar. TED worked fine but when I installed my rooftop solar with Enphase inverters it knocked out TED. Communications using powerlines are prone to interference. As amends, the solar installers just put in something called eGauge and it's working ok. Haven't had time to play with the various configurations.

 

[Aerowhatt]

I've been using the TED 5000 for five years or so. Unlike JoeS I haven't had conflict issues with my enphase inverters (could be logistics of the install) or he likely has far more than my 12 inverters trying to share the power line for communication. I have 2/0 - 200 amp feeds to the house and the CTs fit with room to spare. So JoeS must have 400 amp service (the CTs won't reach around those). I use it to monitor the solar output and the mains. It gives good information but it certainly is not perfect. An easy way to see how one is doing staying in the less expensive tier one usage for bills structured that way.

Power line communication makes installation much simper with no new cables to run through the attic and walls. TED claims to have dramatically improved the ability to communicate through line noise on their PRO line of products. I've been very satisfied with the 5000 series product except for a few quirks.

Aerowhatt

 

[blackheart]

thanks - I don't have solar yet - this is to analyze our house for use. I saw an add for Sense, and how they said that each appliance had a "signature" so you could track the draw and usage of each appliance. And the fact that it was web based so I could view it from anywhere was convenient. Then I found a few others, all with varied features.
But the Sense unit is $300. I am wondering if I would fins $300 of savings in ?? years. I have some other things I want to address in our house so the $300 up front didn't seem to be the best investment right now. So, I thought I would ask fellow Mievers if they were using anything.

 

[Don]

I'm curious as to how you think using this would 'find' you energy savings? You see the fridge kick on and kick off and maybe see how long it ran?? Same for the water heater, the dryer and various other appliances. How do you make use of that info to save on your power bill?

$50 worth of caulk to reduce the air leakage in your house will pay for itself the first year - Same for new weather stripping on your exterior doors. Turn your thermostat down to 68 in the winter and up to 75 in the summer - Turn it back 10 or 15 degrees with a smart thermostat when no one is home. Install a timer on your water heater so it only comes on for half an hour shortly before you bathe. Hang your clothes on a line outside when the weather permits. Turn up the temp in your refrigerator/freezer a few degrees. IMO, any/all of these would give you a greater return on your $$$ than spending $300 on an energy monitor - You already have a monthly report on the power you use with your power bill every month. You can compare this December with last December and next December to see if you're making improvements. Making a few simple changes will lower that number and that's the one you really want to see change

Don

 

[Aerowhatt]

I'm curious as to how you think using this would 'find' you energy savings? You see the fridge kick on and kick off and maybe see how long it ran?? Same for the water heater, the dryer and various other appliances. How do you make use of that info to save on your power bill?

$50 worth of caulk to reduce the air leakage in your house will pay for itself the first year - Same for new weather stripping on your exterior doors. Turn your thermostat down to 68 in the winter and up to 75 in the summer - Turn it back 10 or 15 degrees with a smart thermostat when no one is home. Install a timer on your water heater so it only comes on for half an hour shortly before you bathe. Hang your clothes on a line outside when the weather permits. Turn up the temp in your refrigerator/freezer a few degrees. IMO, any/all of these would give you a greater return on your $$$ than spending $300 on an energy monitor - You already have a monthly report on the power you use with your power bill every month. You can compare this December with last December and next December to see if you're making improvements. Making a few simple changes will lower that number and that's the one you really want to see change

Don

I agree with everything you point out here Don. An energy monitor is more of a toy or novelty IMO. I bought mine instead of something else "fun". That said, if someone does have solar it helps you keep tabs on it as far as failures, problems etc.

In addition, once I saw what my base load was in the house it was surprising! By eliminating most of the power vampires in the house I cut 127 watts from my base load. That doesn't sound like much but it's 24/7 which adds up pretty fast. 127w x 24hrs = 3 kWh per day. Before adding two busy electric cars to the equation that paltry 127 watts (around the clock) added up to 22 % of the total bill. I don't think it would be possible to find all of them and make good choices about which ones to let ride and which to eliminate without TED. In addition I could quantify and show other family members what their impacts were. Giving them quantified information to make decisions about their habits with. Sure at $0.40 per day or so of savings the pay back is only $146.00/yr. So it takes a couple of years to break even (with just my base load savings). My advice is, if you do buy an energy monitor make sure it has good reliability and a good warranty so you can reach that return on investment and distant future savings. Overall, the knowledge gained and informed changes in habits gave the family a net of 34% to 37% usage reduction. Worth it? Well that's subjective, for me it was, but mine has run for five years with no issues, knock on wood

Aerowhatt