Question about device that monitors electricity consumption.?

Question

Hi, I just read an article on yahoo about how consumers aren't running their home A/C as much due to rising energy costs and the article mentioned a device that can monitor daily consumption so you can see how turning lights off and turning the thermostat up can save you money.

Here's a snip from that article.....

"In Arizona, 50,000 customers of the Salt River Project utility have cut energy use by an average of 13%, thanks to a gizmo that lets them monitor their daily bill, so they can see exactly how much they save by bumping up the thermostat a few degrees. In Texas, Reliant Energy reports an 8% drop in per-customer energy use since 2005."

Does anyone have one of these? What's the name? Manufacture? Model numbers? I would really like to see how much these cost and how they're installed and so on.

If you know something about these or have one already installed in your house, please let me know. I'm going to do some googling and see what I can come up with.

Answer 1

kill-a-watt.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electro...

Answer 2

The device you are wondering about is called an In-Home Display. Unfortunately, you will have to contact your power company for availability. Since the device's installation involves configuration at the meter base (what your electric meter sits in), it would be considered tampering if you installed one yourself. Ask if they have any residential demand-metering (time variant, or time of use) solutions--the in-home display isn't the only one!!

The Kill-a-Watt is a device to monitor usage of a single appliance (or many linked to one power strip), if you haven't discovered that yet from your Googling. It does not monitor entire household power consumption.

I am glad you are excited about the benefits of residential demand-metering, and I hope this helps.

Answer 3

Whats wrong with monitoring your meter?  Do the math at the end of the month or just wait for your bill.