I think Home Automation is a great way to use technology to help with energy saving, cost awareness, convenience and more. Here’s an introduction for you.
Great intro Chris. The energy saving aspect is of most interest to me - especially with kids running around and leaving lights and TVs on. I have gone back to using Kasa to make sure everything is off and setting the dehumidifier to come on at sensible times - but I can see there are many more levels of complexity that can be added. It would be interesting to see predictive energy use and storage with solar and the variable rate from Octopus energy.
The energy saving aspect is a great one, and so simple to benefit from once you start to get a few things automated. It would be really to add Kasa devices to home assistant and then control them based on rates from Octopus or presence at home. I definitely recommend getting Home Assistant set up and to start building from there!
I felt the real pay off, after the work of automating the house, when I enabled things to happen automatically that I would previously would forget to do. When I leave the house, the hoover goes round. When the washing machine finishes, it reminds me to empty it. If I'm out at the time, it doesn't remind me until I get home. For someone with a poor memory, automation is an augmentation of the brain, not just a thing to save me a bit of effort.
Thanks for the comment Mr. Phil! The reminding aspect is a great point, and for anyone else reading; something like a washing machine empty reminder can be done based just from a smart plug monitoring the energy usage of the machine, you don't have to buy a new washer or make any massive outlay to acheive this sort of setup.
Great intro Chris. The energy saving aspect is of most interest to me - especially with kids running around and leaving lights and TVs on. I have gone back to using Kasa to make sure everything is off and setting the dehumidifier to come on at sensible times - but I can see there are many more levels of complexity that can be added. It would be interesting to see predictive energy use and storage with solar and the variable rate from Octopus energy.
The energy saving aspect is a great one, and so simple to benefit from once you start to get a few things automated. It would be really to add Kasa devices to home assistant and then control them based on rates from Octopus or presence at home. I definitely recommend getting Home Assistant set up and to start building from there!
I felt the real pay off, after the work of automating the house, when I enabled things to happen automatically that I would previously would forget to do. When I leave the house, the hoover goes round. When the washing machine finishes, it reminds me to empty it. If I'm out at the time, it doesn't remind me until I get home. For someone with a poor memory, automation is an augmentation of the brain, not just a thing to save me a bit of effort.
Thanks for the comment Mr. Phil! The reminding aspect is a great point, and for anyone else reading; something like a washing machine empty reminder can be done based just from a smart plug monitoring the energy usage of the machine, you don't have to buy a new washer or make any massive outlay to acheive this sort of setup.