Averagely, an American household spends $649 on using natural gas during the winter. Since Americans live in the coldest stages, so they have to heat their houses. That’s why they often use more expensive fuels like heating oil or propane and pay too much money. Therefore, many households often turn the temperature down when no one is at home and when people throw an extra blanket on the bed. Of course, this way can help them save about 10% on heating. Do the same thing for your air conditioner when the summer comes.
And the appearance of a programmable thermostat can help people control the temperature as they want. Unluckily, this product is quite complicated and inconvenient that many people don’t know how to use. But, until that time – a new era of Internet and high-tech industries, a smart thermostat promises to change what you are worrying. Nest is considered as the first pioneering thermostat. Additionally, Honeywell is one of the biggest names in this market.
With this smart thermostat, you don’t need to program a weekly schedule because it will program itself automatically relying on your movement and temperature changes. Moreover, it also has neat features as the ability to alter your house’s temperature availing a smartphone or laptop anywhere in the world.
Nest thermostat – a good choice?
To some people, using the programmable thermostat is quite annoyed when they have to set the schedule for every week. Or they might forget to reschedule for the next week. Nest thermostat will help you with its learning feature. Similar to the traditional programmable thermostat, it might be programmed to increase automatically or decrease the temperature to raise comfort and fewer utility bills.
Instead of forcing you to set the schedule manually, the Nest will learn your behavior and try to expect your own timetable. If you often increase the temperature at 7 AM, it will start performing that automatically every morning. Or if you often return home while it is in a power-saving mode, it also discovers your motions and boost the temperature.
Furthermore, the Nest thermostat has some abilities that the traditional one doesn’t. Its smartphone app permits you to adjust temperatures over the Internet. If you are going on holiday, you are able to turn the temperature down on the way to the airport. And before returning home, you can adjust the temperature so that you can enjoy your warm house when you arrive.
Why should you invest a smart thermostat?
Many people often wonder how much energy this device can save. Well, it depends on a difference of factors i.e. how hot (or cold) it is where we live, the kind of heating system we have, and how big of a temperature swing you permit.
Normally, forced-air heating systems produce more cost savings because they are easy to switch on and off at a moment’s notice. Meanwhile, the programmable thermostats cannot work as well for other systems. According to Department of Energy, some programmable thermostats don’t truly save energy for heat pumps. To heating systems as radiant floor and steam, they need different algorithms to save energy while maintaining temperatures comfortably.
So, how about money can we save when using the smart thermostat? If you have the Nest thermostat in your house, you will save from 10 to 12% of the heating costs and 15% of the cooling costs. Meanwhile, some programmable thermostats generally keep from 5 to 15% of heating costs, according to the Energy Department.
Mine has paid for itself in the two years since ordering. Not running the heat all day is a real money saver.