The thing is this:
It’s 2018 and we all know how important living a greener life is, we also understand that if we do not play our part now the consequences will be fatal.
So, how can you change your carbon footprint?
Here at Atlantic Energy we believe in the Power of Choice so we have 3 different services you can choose from (or all):
Today you will find out how to convert your home or business to a more environment friendly space and the main services Atlantic Energy offers.
Natural Gas
The first thing that you need to know is that Atlantic Energy supplies natural gas to all customers at most competitive prices.
Natural gas is the major fuel used to heat buildings.
Businesses and homes also use it as an energy source for cooking, heating water, drying clothes and even outdoor lighting.
With Atlantic Energy natural gas you will:
The question you need to ask yourself is, why should you pay more when you can get cleaner energy for less?
After enrolling with Atlantic and selecting one of out plans you will be able to reduce energy costs once the next billing period began.
Electricity
Think light, think Atlantic. That simple.
For anything that is powered by electricity from lighting, ventilation, space cooling/air conditioning, refrigeration, computers and office equipment, space and water heating, to name just a few you can run it greener and leaner.
With so many appliances at the tips of our fingers, managing the cost of each one defelinty runs up your electricity supply and ultimately the cost too.
Instead, maximise your efficiencies and lower your monthly electricity bill. We offer electricity service plans suitable for any of the following:
If your business is energy-intensive, we can help you manage your supply cost with the customized electricity supply plans.
Plus, also provide a variety of energy-efficiency programs designed to help you better manage, control, and cut your energy costs. Eligible customers can obtain the greatest total reduction in electricity cost by combining Atlantic Energy’s electricity supply with our complimentary LED light bulb program.
We provide FREE energy-efficient LED lighting to eligible customers, which fully replaces their existing older-type lighting, slashes their electricity use and lowers their monthly costs.
When you choose your electricity supplier, whether it’s by reducing your consumption through the LED light bulb program or supporting our eco-friendly renewable energy sources, you actively help to create a cleaner, safer environment on Earth together with Atlantic Energy.
What Are The Rates At Atlantic Energy?
There are 4 rate options to choose from:
Fixed Rate
Here, you pay a flat rate per therm each month during a predetermined time period (usually 6 to 12 months).
This pricing option offers the most predictability to your energy budget, and allows you to best estimate your
natural gas and heating cost.
This option is recommended for customers whose priority is careful budgeting.
Variable Rate
With this pricing option, there is no long-term contract or binding obligation.
The price you pay per therm is determined by market fluctuations, very similar to how the local utility prices natural gas
Explore Rate Options Atlantic appreciates that some customers see an advantage in allowing ongoing market fluctuations in the price of natural gas to determine the rate they pay, while others prefer to protect against potential market volatility by locking in one constant, fixed rate in advance.
When you enroll with Atlantic Energy for natural gas supply, you choose the rate plan that is most sensible for your circumstances and business.
Fixed To Index
Natural gas is traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX).
Three calendar days before the end of each month, a settlement price is established for natural gas sold during the next month.
A fixed margin is added to the settlement price, resulting in our final sale price.
Additional Savings
For New York state customers, when natural gas is purchased from Atlantic Energy, the New York sales tax on the utility portion of the bill is eliminated. For New York state customers, Atlantic Energy is not obligated to collect Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) and Gross Receipts Tax (GRT) fees.
Final thoughts
Going green doesn’t need to be hard when you have the right company behind you.
What you need to be certain of is that they after offer you support long after you’ve bought the product and always steer you in the right direction according to your needs.
Atlantic Energy does exactly this with the customer service ready to help you from start to finish on all of the main services Atlantic Energy offers.
Utility bills can be confusing. There are fees for usage, delivery and taxes which make understanding what your paying for difficult.
Why not let one of Atlantic Energy’s specialists perform a cost-saving analysis (bill audit) for you. Not only can we review your bill history to make sure its accurate, we can also offer you eco-friendly renewable energy and efficient energy solutions for your home or business. A utility bill audit is a detailed analysis of all utility accounts (electrictricity, gas, water, sewer, etc) reviewing up to three years for errors, overcharges, and/or missed opportunities.
There are many scenarios that can result in you paying more than you should be:
By choosing Atlantic Energy to perform a bill audit, we can also share with you special offers we can only offer to Atlantic Energy customers such as:
A bill audit is a simple 3 step process
As a recognized innovators and leader in the energy space, Atlantic Energy wants to make sure your covered. We are passionate about offering renewable energy and efficient energy solutions for homes and businesses. Contact one of our specialists today to schedule your bill audit. 1-800-917-9133.
The United States is a leading energy consumer for both domestic and industrial purposes. This means that energy sources and technology are constantly changing to meet the high demand. With such a large-scale energy consumption, Atlantic Energy wants to ensure that clean and environmentally responsible energy is being produced.
That is why Atlantic Energy stands out and raises the bar in promoting energy efficiencies to reduce the energy used in the production of products and services.
Atlantic Energy is working to reduce electrical consumption on a large scale with our LED lighting Program. It essentially involves encouraging our customers to revert from the old school lighting system of incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs to a more energy-conscious solution.
At Atlantic Energy, we feel that we have the responsibility of creating awareness on renewable energy sources. That is why Atlantic Energy has pioneered an offering of 100% renewable energy to all our loyal customers.
Renewable Energy Sources- Why Are They Important?
Why should we all care about this? Why is Atlantic Energy putting in all this effort? The world seems fine, right? Wrong. That is far from the truth.
Can you imagine that as per 2017, only 17% of United States’ electricity generation was from renewable energy? What does that say about the country or our environmentally responsible strategies? Simple. Our carbon print is getting larger by the day from the emissions of non-renewable energy sources like coal and oil. And the worst part is that we are using technology to make that all happen. Most machines and vehicles are powered by either coal or oil respectively.
The ozone layer that protects us from the sun’s harmful rays is getting damaged and harmful greenhouse gases are being released daily. Oil spills are a common feature on the shores and ecosystems which is both economically damaging and harmful to animal species. Technology seems to be causing so much evil when it should, in essence, be used to make the world better. Right?
Renewable energy sources, on the other hand, captures the magic from ongoing natural processes. That is wind, water, sunshine, geothermal heat and biological processes. They create energy efficiencies by minimizing the amount of energy input in a constant energy service like powering equipment or lighting.
Most renewable energy sources do not emit carbon when generating energy. They are carbon free. And others, like biofuels and biomass, are carbon neutral. Carbon neutral meaning that they are renewable energy sources that release a balanced amount of carbon in the atmosphere.
How to Get Clean Energy Close to Your Home
Atlantic Energy can bring renewable energy sources a step closer to your home. As a renewable energy company, Atlantic Energy promotes energy efficiency by being a provider of clean electricity and natural gas. We source our electricity from natural sources like hydro, wind and water.
Amount of Renewable Energy Currently Being Produced In The USA
The production of renewable energy sources was limited in the 18th and 19th century as it was seen to be expensive to generate. The hesitation carried on to the 20th century as there were inconveniences such as:
• Cloud cover that limited the chances of effectively harnessing solar power • Drought spells that limited the available water for hydropower
• Wind farms could not make enough electricity in low wind days.
However, the late 20th century and early 21st century ushered in a new openness to renewable sources of energy. Solar, wind, and biofuels seemed to be a favorite of many.
As per 2012, renewable energy sources global production was at 22%. In 2016, the United States, in particular, derived 10% of its total energy from renewable energy sources. At the same time, the United States used renewable energy sources to produce 15% of its total electricity generation. In 2017, it rose to 17%. It is expected that in 2020, the U.S will use renewable energy sources to produce about 22% of its total electricity.
Numbers do not lie, and currently, those numbers are pretty low. That is why we at Atlantic Energy have taken on an environmental responsible title by providing renewable energy sources for energy efficiencies.
States That Use the Most Renewable Energy
Some states are doing better than others in reducing their carbon print. We can tell this by looking at the total percentage of electrical energy generated by renewable energy sources. The ranking is as follows:
1. Washington
With a total installed capacity of an astounding 23.884 gigawatts (GW), Washington is the leader in renewable energy sources. Hydropower and wind are the main contributors of energy.
2. California
Following in with 16.460 GW, California has the perfect blend of wind, geothermal and wind power.
3. Oregon
With 10.684 GW, Oregon uses a bit of Biomass, landfill gas and hydropower taking the largest renewable energy source share.
4. Texas
Texas stands at 10.985 GW with windpower taking only 1 GW. The state, however, does not use hydropower.
5. New York
New York City is at 6.033 GW with hydropower being the leading contributor then followed closely by wind, landfill gas and finally biomass.
6. Alabama
Sweet Alabama is at 3.855 using only biomass and hydropower.
7. Iowa
Iowa is at 3.782 GW renewable capacity derived from wind, hydropower, landfill gas and biomass.
8. Montana
Montana’s clean energy stands at 3.085 GW renewable capacity derived from hydropower and wind.
9. Idaho
Idaho stands at 3.140 renewable capacity with hydropower and wind energy making up its profile.
10. Arizona
Finally, Arizona stands at 2.901 renewable capacity deriving most of its energy from wind, solar, biomass and hydropower.
States That Are Falling Short
In no particular order, the states of Louisiana, Kansas, South Carolina, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Kentucky, Utah and Maryland fall below the green zone. These are just a few states, while quite a number of other states in the United States fall below the accepted standard for renewable energy production.
What To Do?
However, Atlantic Energy is here to remedy that flaw. We believe that our work in reducing global emissions is complimentary. It involves supplying our
willing customers with renewable energy sources and at the same time encouraging them to use energy efficient products such as our LED lights.
Do not think of only greenhouse gases as the only villains. There are other harmful pollutants like nitrous oxide, sulfur dioxide, and particulate matter.
However, that can all be prevented by? You guessed it. Going Green with Atlantic Energy. Be part of our journey. Together, if we join hands, we can be the movement that utilizes renewable natural resources instead of relying on harmful resources that hurt our environment and may run dry someday.
Throughout the global energy industry, there is an increasing need to encourage investment and promotion of clean renewable energy. This change in direction has been to keep up with current energy trends, and the overwhelming benefits of using renewable energy over fossil fuel, both economically and environmentally. It is for these reasons that Atlantic Energy – one of the largest natural gas and electricity suppliers in the northeast, is offering and promoting the use of renewable energy sources to their consumers.
Atlantic Energy is promoting awareness of both energy efficient usage and the use of alternative inexhaustible energy sources. Atlantic Energy has created programs geared to achieve these objectives such as offering free LED bulbs to their customers. Their services are currently available in 8 states and will be expanding to more soon. Atlantic Energy is dedicated to providing its customers with ready options and information on alternative energy sources.
Apart from massively benefiting the planet, alternative energy sources are easy ways to boost the economy at the national level. Renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, hydro and geothermal power are inexhaustible and incredibly less expensive than fossil fuel. With a growing economy and an ever increasing demand – fossil fuel prices in the US and the rest of the world are on a rise. In some parts of the world availability of fossil fuel is not even guaranteed due to heavy consumption. These are only some of the problems with fossil fuel that has caused a rise in interest in renewable fuel.
One of the most underlooked benefits of large companies such as Atlantic Energy offering alternative energy options is the creation of employment.
The production of fossil fuel; oil, gas, and coal in rich yield countries has reached its peak, some reached as early as 2012. Peak production is a point at which no increase of effort or resource will increase fuel yield. This means that increasing manpower in the production of fossil fuel does not increase production in a significant way to justify it. So, fossil fuel industry is evidently not increasing its workforce compared to other industries.
In the renewable energy industry, due to increased awareness and new opportunities, there is an increase in demand for labor. Statistics from 2017 in the United States, show that the renewable energy sector employed about 9.8 million workers in 2016. which is an increase compared to the previous year. In the same year, the solar energy industry alone employed twice as many laborers as the fossil fuel industry. These numbers are expected to rise over the coming years.
Jobs in the green energy sector have become more available and well paying. With renewable energy, there is sustained business development, and long-term investments are safe. Newer technology has made alternative energy production much more effective and economically viable, with components and equipment becoming more reliable and cheaper.
New areas of employment opportunities in the renewable energy industry
Technical fields (engineering and manufacture)
Most products used for generating renewable energy are relatively new or updated to newer technologies. Engineers and other professionals have to design these products in an economical, effective and reliable way and put them into production. Solar panel systems, wind turbines, and hydro turbines are all designed to fit the consumer scale while meeting certain standards.
Before a product can be manufactured, several processes are checked including design and testing. This is all done by teams of skilled and qualified designers and engineers.
Manufacture and assembly of equipment and components is a massive load of work that requires several skilled and handy workers. This also creates new employment opportunities.
Research
Scientific research is continuously being carried out to identify new ways of improving renewable energy sources. Scientific research is a long and grueling process. It includes months and sometimes even years of data collection and testing. This research needs to be carried out to increase the effectiveness of products and also find new ways of harnessing natural energy with convenience and with good economic value. Energy companies employ scientists to carry out research.
Another type of research done in the renewable energy industry is market research. Market analysts conduct market research to collect necessary market information to improve consumer products. Market research is important since the products are relatively new to the market. The industry needs to know how well their products are doing in the market, or how products can be modified or improved to fit the market.
The research field has several employment opportunities for both scientists and market analysts.
Education and training
Educating energy consumers on the uses and benefits of renewable sources of energy needs to be done to get them interested in using renewable energy. Members of the public are mostly unaware of alternative energy options or lack the proper guidance to its use and availability.
Trainers are also needed to instruct consumers and even other employees on how to use the products, basic maintenance, troubleshooting, and repairs.
Atlantic Energy has invested a lot in spreading awareness on available renewable energy options and their benefits, in the bid to get consumers interested in clean energy.
Marketing
Every consumer product or service industry needs a marketing team. Renewable energy firms are no different. They need a marketing department to come up with plans on how to get their products to consumers. In this industry, the marketing departments need to work extra hard to convince consumers why they need renewable energy solutions.
Marketing teams work on publicizing products to consumers across all channels available; social media, print, infomercials and traditional advertising.
Increasing business investments in the alternative energy industry are creating more employment opportunities for local jobs here in the US. Local businesses also benefit from this financially healthy industry. Atlantic Energy has realized this and has chosen to invest in renewable energy and be part of this revolutionary industry.
Use of renewable energy as an alternative to fossil saves the environment, guarantees the affordable availability of ready fuel, and creates new employment opportunities in a variety of field.
In the United States, most of the energy is currently produced from fossil fuels such as natural gas, oil, and coal. All these sources of energy are non-renewable. What that means is that their continued use will eventually make them not easy to find. With time, getting these resources will not only be expensive but will cause great damage to the environment too.
Atlantic Energy recommends the use of more renewable sources of energy such as water, wind, geothermal heat, and sunlight. So what is renewable energy? It is the type that uses natural processes, which are replenished from time to time. The main reason why this type of energy is popular is that it is non-exhaustible and is always undergoing a renewal process.
Atlantic Energy has created a movement and asked their customers to join the mission to push for the creation of more renewable energy. After all, the continued burning of oil, gas, and coal to create energy is terrible for the environment.
The Importance of Renewable Energy
There are a number of reasons why Atlantic Energy offers renewable energy. The following are some of the benefits of renewable energy:
• Benefits to the environment
By their nature, sources of renewable energy rarely have a negative impact on the environment. Energy sources such as water, geothermal heat, solar, and wind do not produce any carbon dioxide. That is in comparison with fossil fuels like coal, gas, and oil which are to blame for global warming. When these fuels are burned, they produce carbon dioxide, which is one of the gases that has been blamed for the destruction of the ozone layer.
Responsible energy is, therefore, that from renewable sources. When you use it, you are showing how responsible you are in helping protect the environment. To help you towards, this goal, Atlantic Energy also offers energy efficient products. Something as simple as using Atlantic Energy LED light bulbs is one of the ways you can reduce your carbon footprint.
• Renewable energy is inexhaustible
Sources of renewable energy such as solar, wind, water, and geothermal heat are hardly exhaustible. These energy sources are usually replenished by nature thus giving them the ability to last for generations to come. As a type of responsible energy, it helps you ensure that your children, as well as their kids, are taken care of.
However, renewable energy sources are yet to become widely available in the US and the rest of the world. At best, local utilities offer only a portion of renewable energy. Atlantic Energy feels that is not enough.
• Creating employment and boosting the economy
Traditionally, energy is produced from fossil fuels through capital intensive and highly mechanized methods. The use of power plants has meant fewer jobs to those who need them. That is not the case with renewable energy sources such as wind farms and solar panels. While wind farms require technicians to maintain them, solar panels require people to install them. In fact, the number of jobs created by using renewable energy sources as in no way comparable to those from coal, gas, and oil.
That is why you should consider becoming a part of the renewable energy promise by Atlantic Energy. What you are looking at is a sector that can create employment five more times than fossil fuels.
• Saving money
People are always looking to get opportunities for saving money and Atlantic Energy recommends that you try efficient LED light bulbs. The amount of energy consumed by these bulbs is lesser than what conventional lights eat up. As an energy user, you will be able to pay less in terms of energy bills.
As for the installations that help in the production of renewable energy, they are only expensive initially. Once they are up and running, they only require very minimal costs to operate. As an energy use, this is one of the ways of saving money. Firms that use renewable energy in their operations will have cheaper unit costs of production. Only that you need to educate your customers on the fact that you are using renewable energy to run your firm. That way, you can create an unstoppable movement that will lead to increased adoption of renewable energy.
How to Get Renewable Energy
If you are looking for renewable energy in the North East of the USA, look no further than Atlantic Energy. We are one of the largest renewable energy providers in this region. Atlantic Energy has operations in eight deregulated states but ever looking for opportunities to expand. We have taken up the goal of partnering with our customers in providing renewable energy.
How Much Of a Big Deal It Is To Help
The reasons why Atlantic Energy offers renewable energy is to mitigate the effects of burning fossil fuels. For years now, global warming has been a major point of discussion among scientists and world leaders. That is because life for most human beings is expected to get harder because of the emission of carbon dioxide into the air. You wouldn’t want to experience increased droughts, erratic rainfall, rising sea levels, erosion of coasts, and heat waves. You can never help the environment without increasing the use of responsible energy.
Talk to us today about safer energy options, today. You can never go wrong with renewable energy, especially when it comes to saving money and the environment.
"As a restaurant owner, you may not realize it, but you’re unintentionally turning your customers off by not paying closer attention to a simple problem", says Patrick Linden, Atlantic Energy's CEO.
"And what's most amazing, it's something these owners see in front of their eyes every day," Linden said. "But yet, they still find it hard to believe they're missing anything considering they're already spending 70+ hours a week running their business, still feel they have the best chef and wait staff in town and continue to be proud of their attractive dining room."
But when pressed further, these owners and managers often admit they should have more customers. And, have also started to notice, that their operational expenses have begun to rise.
But what can they do? Plenty, says the energy company’s CEO. “I’m proud to announce that Atlantic Energy now has a solution that will both improve your patron experiences AND help you reduce usage while running your restaurant,” says Linden.
It first starts with calling Atlantic Energy for a complimentary review of your lighting and energy needs. We can show you plenty of easy to implement examples (see photos below) of how simple lighting changes can improve the ambience of your restaurant; which will encourage customers to stay longer, give better social media reviews and ultimately come back more often.
The goal is to create an experience. To make a mark on the patron. Presentation is key, now in a digital world more than ever. How many times do you see a customer wait to take a picture of the plate prior to eating? That picture will attract new customers. That picture will circulate the internet and group chats everywhere. The perfect lighting will make sure to increase your business value.
And, with the use of greener, more attractive LED bulbs, your new lighting strategy is going to reduce usage. That’s a win-win for both your customers and your business!
Set up an appointment today by calling 1-800-917-9133 or go to atlanticenergyco.com
These days it seems like everything has a ‘smart’ version: you can control your smart lights and your smart thermostat from your smartphone. Then you can hop into your electric vehicle, charged with a smart charger, back up using a smart assist drive and head to the store where smart checkout options may exist. While each of these iterations of smart devices allow for more control, automation, and benefits to users, they are typical modular and limited in scope. However, the most important aspect of our daily lives that’s moving in the ‘smart’ direction is one that you may not give much thought to at all: the electric grid.
The concept of a smart grid has been around as an idea as far back as the 1990s, but in many ways we’re only really just now tapping into the smart grid and realizing the massive implications and potential use cases such a smart grid can bring. So, to the layperson who hears these buzzwords but doesn’t necessary note a difference in their interaction with their utilities, this begs the question—what, exactly, is a smart grid, and is our grid even close to being truly smart?
First things first, when talking about the grid people are referring to the network of transmission & distribution lines, power generation stations, transformers, and all other aspects of the electricity delivery system that takes electricity from its source to its end up in homes and businesses. The original infrastructure for the grid was built started in the 1890s in the age of Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla, with it being built more widely and more advanced as time advanced.
While an engineering marvel for the times in which much of the grid was built, with the modern version reaching hundreds of thousands of transmission lines, many parts of the modern grid have been built out piecemeal from these original efforts. A grid for today and tomorrow needs to be rebuilt and updated to match our modern needs, and that is where smart grid efforts come in.
When discussing a smart grid, the definitive aspects is the ability for two-way communication between the utility and its customers. For decades, the only source of data would be meters outside buildings that could be read to display the amount of electricity used, but utilities had no way to actively communicate in real-time with customers. Such limitations meant that the ability to build in automatic controls or allow responses on the customer end was difficult or impossible. Smart meters, however, are being installed across the power system that allow customers to see how much electricity they’re using, when they use it, and its associated cost—all in live time. A system built up as a smart grid has sensors all along the process, can allow utilities to communicate with its customers (through price signals or information sharing) in an attempt to minimize or shift the level of demand during peak hours, and creates a much more efficient system, overall. Additionally, utilities can see and address problem areas in the transmission and distribution system (such as outages) in quicker order and utilize data to improve and optimize all aspects of the electricity generation and delivery process.
According to analysis from the U.S. Department of Energy, the adoption of smart grid technologies is “accelerating but at varying rates depending largely on decision-making at utility, state, and local levels.” Despite the transformative nature of a smart grid, institutional barriers and system-wide inertia (given the existing grid, as mentioned, is over a century old) have prevented a rapid and wide-spread deployment of smart grid technologies. While worldwide spending on the smart grid market is, indeed, growing quickly and expected to reach $189 billion in North America alone by 2020 (up from just $21 billion in 2013), and smart meter installations doubled from 2010 to 2016, the installation of smart meters (just one of the technologies that enable a whole system smart grid) still lagged behind as a tiny portion of total residential customers:
Source: EIA
Thanks to the parts of the grid that are already smart today, advantages gained include the increased efficiency of electricity transmission, reduced need to build out expensive new generation sources in lieu of demand shifting, improved opportunity to integrate renewable energy generation sources that are inherently intermittent (whether utility-scale or customer-owned) through minute-by-minute readings of supply and demand, quicker restoration of power delivery during outages and issues, and much more. These advantages not only benefit utilities through increased efficiency of operations, but those benefits are often passed along to customers through lower costs and increased reliability of energy delivery.
Many of the most exciting aspects of the smart grid are really only being tapped into today. For example, one area that’s only really being tested and implemented on a small-scale today but will allow great integration in the smart grid of tomorrow is the use of smart home devices that interact with the smart grid. While people are slowly getting used to the idea of smart lights they can control with an app or a programmable thermostat that can be adjusted remotely, utilities have begun looking ahead to programs that would enable smart home systems to respond to the two-way communication systems of a smart grid. In this type of program, for example, a utility can send price signals to a customer’s home to say that demand is about to exceed supply and their resources are strained. Where previously this scenario might have led to rolling blackouts or other undesirable outcomes, smart home products in a customer’s homes might receive the information that the supply is strained so the utility is temporarily adjusting up the price of power and can take that signal as a sign to dim certain superfluous lights or turn the air conditioner down a degree or two. While these responses would have a minimal effect on a signal customer, the aggregate impact of many customers adjusting in this way could be enough to improve overall grid reliability and prevent a utility from needing to pursue alternative, inefficient, and expensive solutions like building new power plants.
Going into the future, as smart communication aspects are continually built into new and upgraded parts of the grid, the reliability advantages of a smart grid will really become apparent. During power outages during emergencies or other significant grid events, the communication systems built into a smart grid system will not only be able to identify these issues immediately to allow the power providers to work on a resolution as soon as possible, but the smart grid will also be able to isolate the affected parts of the grid and bypass them automatically. Where typical outages often have a cascading domino effect on a larger portion of the grid, a smart grid will be able to automatically reroute electricity to the most critical parts of the grid (emergency services, vulnerable areas like hospitals, or critical applications like traffic lights), while also more readily integrating customer-owned generation sources into those emergency systems. These aspects of the smart grid of tomorrow will be a critical part of the national security discussion moving forward.
The utility industry has only just begun to realize the potential of smart grid and how such technologies can be implemented. The term smart grid is quickly shifting from futuristic buzz word to actively implemented energy strategy, bringing with it benefits to customers and utilities alike.
The biggest story in the world of lighting over the past decade has been the phase-out of inefficient incandescent light bulbs. Between the increasing efficiencies and decreasing costs of the replacement compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) and light-emitting diodes (LEDs), as well as the implementation of federal energy-efficiency standards, customers across the United States are now widely familiar with the more efficient alternatives and enjoy the savings on their power bills. If the past 10 years were a story of home lighting becoming more efficient, though, the next 10 years will undoubtedly be recognized as the time when home lighting became smarter.
Smart home products, including not only smart lights but also smart speakers (like the Amazon Echo) and smart thermostats (like the Nest), have become incredibly popular and are commonly offered from many different manufacturers and stores. But many people are still afraid to dip their toes into the smart home world, be it for confusion about how to best do so, uncertainty about what the exact benefits are, or even just for out of not completely understanding what smart products are.
When it comes to smart lighting, though, taking an initial plunge doesn’t have to be intimidating. To get started, here’s some background information about the smart lighting revolution and some tips about how to get involved yourself.
Controlling the functions of your home remotely or automatically used to sound like something you’d only see in futuristic movies, but the past few years have really seen the home automation and control market take off. Within these smart home products, lights are among the easiest to integrate into your daily life.
Put simply, smart lights enable automation and control of your home lighting systems as connected through a central hub that takes the form of an app on your phone or a program on your computer or tablet. This degree of control enables homeowners to adjust properties of the lights, including level of dimming, schedule of turning them on or off, color of the light, and more. This control can take the form of live, in-person adjustment, scheduling it on a timer, or even programming them to respond to other inputs (e.g., sensors detecting occupancy or levels of natural light). Smart lighting puts you in direct control of your lights to a degree that was never before possible.
The complexity and features offered by smart lights range from the simplest of products that simply turn on and off remotely to the more advanced products that allow for full control over color, allow the programming of flashing lights in specific patterns, adjust the light levels based on the amount of natural light sensed in the home, and even some models that will use artificial intelligence to learn the typical lighting schedule in your home and automate based on that. Smart lighting is a broad term that covers a rapidly expanding market of products, but again it all boils down to one thing: giving you complete control over your lights.
The process for setting up your smart lights will depend on the specific model you’ve purchased, with some as easy as simply screwing in the light bulb and opening your phone and others requiring a bit more complex of a set-up process. That fact shouldn’t scare you off, as smart light providers have typically adopted one of a few types of automation standards.
All smart lights have some sort of communication function built into them, which takes the form of WiFi capabilities, Bluetooth functionality, or specially designed communication protocols (such as Zigbee or Z-Wave). These communication abilities each enable you to connect with them through your phone or other device, adjusting the light levels in real-time or via automation. However, when selecting your lights, it’s important to recognize the advantages and disadvantages of each:
WiFi lights connect to your home internet, so you can control them from anywhere in the world when you have an internet connection. The downside, though, is that if your internet goes down then so too does your remote control.Bluetooth lights communicate with each other without any outside equipment (such as an internet router or smart hub), but they can only be connected to a single user’s device (which can be frustrating in a home with multiple people) and they cannot be controlled when you are out of Bluetooth range.Special protocols enable your smart lights to communicate effectively with any other smart home products you may have, but they typically require a secondary piece of equipment known as a hub that communicates with all the devices.
Regardless of the type of smart light you choose, though, the manufacturers will include clear instructions and indications of what other products/systems with which they are compatible.
All products on the smart lighting market are LEDs or CFLs, so if you are still lighting your home with incandescent light bulbs then new smart lights will inherently be much more efficient. But even if you’ve already been using these efficient lights, among the prominent advantages of smart lights is that the level of control they offer enables you to maximize the energy efficiency of your home.
These optimized efficiencies are achieved with a complete home lighting system arrangement. Specific efficiency strategies using smart lights include dictating lower levels of light in less-frequented areas or those with sufficient natural light and using occupancy sensors and timers to eliminate lights from being accidentally left on. These simple strategies have been proven energy savers: the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnership finds that only 10% of residential sockets are installed on dimming switches, so using smart lights with their inherent dimming abilities can greatly reduce overall energy demand for lighting; meanwhile, other studies find that motion sensors connected to smart lights in areas like busy hallways can reduce the associated energy needs by up to 90%.
While energy savings, and associated drops in electricity bills, are certainly among the most exciting advantages of smart lights, the benefits don’t end there. Smart lights can be used as a home security measure, by scheduling your lights to turn on and off while on vacation to deter burglars. Additionally, some smart lights can even turn on automatically when they sense that you (and your smartphone) are approaching the front door, eliminating the safety concerns of walking into a pitch-black home. These products can even be used to maximize your health and productivity, adjusting colors and light levels in the perfect way to gently wake you up in the morning, transition your mind for sleep at night, and minimize strain on your eyes when staring at a laptop for hours.
If you’ve been convinced that smart lighting is right for your home, the only question left is how to get started. While most light bulbs you’d previously buy at the hardware store were interchangeable, the nuances of different models of smart lights requires buyers to consider what features and characteristics are most important:
Power use:
Not only do efficiencies of various smart lights differ, but they also use varying levels of standby power, even when off
Light levels:
Whereas wattage used to be used as a proxy for light levels (most 60-watt incandescent lights put out about the same amount of light), buyers need to carefully consider the level of illumination offered by different bulbs.
Dimming capabilities:
Most, but not all, smart lights offer dimming
Geo-fencing:
If a smart light offers geo-fencing, it can turn on and off based on GPS signals from your phone telling it your location
Color control:
Some lights don’t offer control over color, some allow for adjustments of warmness of the white light, and others offer any color of the rainbow
Communication system:
Based on the previously mentioned advantages and disadvantages of WiFi vs. Bluetooth vs. other communication protocols, you’ll have to select which is the best for your needs
Compatibility:
Not all smart home products communicate well with each other, so if you’re looking to create a whole home system then it’s important to ensure they’re all compatible (the packaging will typically address this for you)
Price:
With the above and other features available, smart light prices fall across a spectrum depending on how sophisticated they are, so you’ll need to balance your needs with the resultant price
Once you have these factors identified, you’ll be well on your way to choosing the smart lights for you and beginning the home automation process. Some utilities will even offer incentives or rebates for you to purchase smart lights (Atlantic Energy even offers three WiFi LEDs and one Bluetooth speaker bulb in its Smart Home Bundle), so be sure to check with them first!
Every several years, the Energy Information Administration (EIA), a sub-office in the U.S. Department of Energy, conducts the Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS) and publishes the results publicly. The periodic publication of RECS allows the wise homeowners, energy professionals, and efficiency advocates to monitor the trends on the residential building space, anticipate future changes to the residential energy demand, and properly assess energy needs.
Before that’s possible, though, a base-level understanding of the type of information collected and disseminated through RECS is required. After understanding the data to expect from the surveys, keen readers will be able to find relevant conclusions from RECS and ultimately use that information to their benefit.
When conducting RECS, EIA administers the survey to a representative sample of households across the country, cutting across regions, home types, income-level, and more. The data collected on these homes includes energy usage data, characteristics of the building that relate to energy use (such as types of appliances used, typical patterns of when people are home, and type of rates offered by the energy suppliers), and more. These data points are collected through direct interview with homeowners by trained energy professionals. Additionally, EIA reaches out to the utility companies and energy providers themselves that serve these homes to determine the exact amount and type of energy being supplied, including the fuel sources that make up that energy supply. Through these two methods, the final result of RECS is considered across the energy industry to be the most accurate and representative data source for understanding residential sector building energy use.
EIA makes publicly available the exact surveys used at every step of the RECS process to demonstrate the robustness of the data collected and the survey methods used. An example from the 2015 RECS cycle can be found on the EIA website, with a version showing the paper survey that homes would be mailed, a more thorough computer-assisted personal interview for homeowners, a similar computer-assisted personal interview directed at landowners or apartment managers, and even surveys to be filled out by the providers of electricity, natural gas, and propane to given homes. In this way, RECS is truly able to capture all the necessary information from its representative sample to intricately know what type of energy is being delivered to homes in what quantities and how it is being used.
The most recent version of RECS was published based on 2015 data (the next set of data is already being collected, as RECS is typically published every four years or so), but the collection and analysis of that data are intensive enough that it didn’t get released until 2018.
PRECS’s insights are varied and useful to those who want to know more about energy use in the residential sector, so let’s take a look at some of the takeaways from this most recent version.
The key data and analyses from RECS are composed of more than just raw energy numbers. On a basic level, RECS starts by providing an outline of square footage, household demographics, and the major energy users (heating, cooling, lighting, appliances, and electronics). With these as baselines and a means to increase granularity in data, RECS outlines the energy use, the applications the energy use is broken up between, and the exact installed equipment consuming the energy. Further, the fuel types providing the vast energy needed in the residential building sector are identified and parceled out individually, from electricity to natural gas to fuel oil. In these vast data sets, there really is no shortage of insights to gain for the informed reader looking for energy solutions, you just need to dive in.
But knowing how and where to start can surely be intimidating for the average reader. As such, EIA carefully curates accompanying documents and releases. Much of this information can be found on the RECS website, including webinars, summaries, and more. Throughout the year, EIA also provides bite-sized summaries of particularly useful or interesting findings from RECS, including the following:
Space heating and water heating combine to account for nearly two thirds of energy use across American households, highlighting how critical these functions are to examine when thinking about efficiency upgrades
Air conditioning accounts for about 12% of energy bills across U.S. homes, though that obviously varies depending on climate
Peripheral devices, such as streaming devices or video game consoles, now consume nearly as much energy in U.S. homes as televisions for the first time
Across U.S. homes, one in three face issues in paying for their energy needs and/or sustaining adequate heating and cooling in their homes
Once all the data for RECS is collected, aggregated, and published, the use of this comprehensive survey is vast. This information can be used by homeowners or other building owners to compare their current energy use needs with other similar buildings. Experts in the energy field can be brought in to compare the RECS results with future trends to identify opportunities for energy savings. Policymakers and utilities themselves can identify trends from this survey to determine positions on regulatory actions and tax incentives that can help save homeowners energy in the future. Even further, RECS provides the complete data sets for the previous years that the survey was published. Using this historical data in addition to the most recent set of data allows for investigation into trends over the years and comparable predictions regarding the continuation of those trends.
Homeowners who see that their energy use is widely varied from comparable homes elsewhere are given an insight into what actions they can and should take to save on their energy bill and decrease their carbon footprint. The benefits of reducing energy demand are widely recognized and sought after, so RECS presents a great opportunity for homeowners to dig deep and evaluate their current performance and needs compared with what’s actually possible. Doing so will surely give them a leg up over homeowners who are instead left in the dark (darkness that wouldn’t be necessary if they employed more efficient lighting!)
Families across the country have caught the bug to embrace clean energy and energy efficiency wherever they can. Not only are these decisions helpful for meeting dire global climate change goals, but many of these energy-related upgrades are an easy sell because they can save households money on their monthly power bills (just like how Atlantic Energy can manage to provide more renewable sources of energy and still beat competitors on cost per kilowatt hour).
While many of these measures to save energy at home have started to become more technical and complex– from electric vehicle chargers built into the garage to solar panels installed on the roof — some of the most effective ways to increase energy efficiency at home come from overlooked opportunities. Window blinds are a prime example of a part of the home many might simply take for granted and not realize the potential for energy efficiency (or, when used improperly, energy waste) they can provide the average home.
Many people might only think of window blinds as a means to let in or keep out light, but blinds and any other window coverings can also be key to a home energy management strategy. That relation to energy use in the home comes from the fact that allowing in or keeping out sun rays has a direct effect on interior temperatures and, when done correctly, can minimize the energy required to run heating or air conditioning.
Gaining efficiency from blinds is more tangible than some other household retrofits because the savings are felt physically when the temperature of a room is managed, and it can be done with beautiful custom window blinds that appeal to the interior designer even before energy is taken into account.
Home heating and cooling accounts for over half of a home’s average annual energy bill. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, windows themselves can account for 24 to 40% of annual heating and cooling costs due to lost home heating energy, while 76% of sunlight falling on standard windows enters to become heat. No matter the season or the climate, the windows in your home represent a potential weak point in your building envelope through which energy waste can skyrocket. In the cold winters, the heat you pump into your home will try to escape through the windows which is made much easier if the glass panes are the only thing stopping it. During warm summers, the sun bearing down on your windows will heat up your home and require additional air conditioning to maintain a comfortable temperature unless the heat can be reflected away.
The most basic of window blinds, using flimsy plastic that doesn’t block out light or heat effectively, is minimally effective as an efficiency solution, if at all. These simple and cheap blinds that you might see in dorm rooms aren’t providing the opportunity for energy savings that the world of blinds makes possible today.
At the most basic level, the ability for blinds to increase energy efficiency in a home breaks down into two parts:
How effectively they can control solar irradiance and temperature; andThe consistency and reliability with which homeowners utilize their blinds to optimally line up with the heating/cooling needs of the home.
To really understand the potential of energy efficient blinds compared with the alternatives it’s important to understand how that can be measured. When looking at window treatments or windows themselves, the “R-value” is a measure of thermal resistance. Materials with higher R-values have more thermal resistance and vice versa. For example, a single-pane window has an R-value of about 0.9, whereas plywood would have an R-value of 1.25 and a solid wooden door has an R-value of 2.2. The goal of more energy efficient blinds is to use materials that result in a greater R-value when closed, though at the same time the goal is to make them seamless and usable in the home (otherwise the energy efficient solution would just be to board up your windows!)
Roller shades are a basic but still energy-efficient blind solution, providing R-values of 1.3 to 1.8 depending on the fabric used. Their efficiency can be increased when using specifically ‘blackout roller shades’ to eliminate gaps between the window shade and window sill, as well as some higher-grade roller shades made out of solar screening material.
The next step up in efficient blinds is plantation shutters. Averaging around an R-value of 3.0, can be quite effective at blocking out heat transfer, especially when more insulating materials are used.
The most energy-efficient blind type is called a cellular shade. This form of blind can come in a variety of fabrics and can have ‘single cell’ or ‘double cell,’ so the R-value can vary, but typically they fall between R-values of 2.0 and 5.0 thanks to their ingenious design that can trap heat and keep a room insulated.
These previously discussed efficient blinds only addressed the first aspect of potential energy efficiency: the effectiveness of controlling temperature and insulating from the sun. But in today’s world of smart phones, smart lights, and even smart refrigerators, you may be surprised to learn that smart blinds have hit to market to tackle the second aspect of potential energy efficiency in blinds: consistently and effectively deploying window blinds at the right time for home energy management.
A U.S. Department of Energy study has found that 75% of residential window coverings remain in the same position every day. This habit leaves low-hanging fruit in energy savings waiting to be harvested, and smart window blinds are one such solution. To rectify that, smart blinds (or “connected blinds”) have found their way into the market of Internet of Things products. Smart blinds are somewhat new on the market, but they have already found themselves in retailers like Ikea, showing the push to the mainstream they are making. While the obvious use of smart blinds would be to be able to open and close them via app on your phone or through voice command with Amazon Alexa or Google Home, the real potential to be tapped in the coming smart blinds market is through sensors and automation.
Picture, for a second, that you have an ideal temperature you’d like to keep your home during the day. You can tell your smart home system what that temperature is (even varying it based on time of day and occupancy) and have the AI behind the smart home system determine the optimal way to achieve that temperature– should blinds be opened or closed? Can doing so be a more energy-efficient way to reach that temperature than ramping up part of your HVAC system?
Take it a step further, and you can also let it know what the light levels you’d like to have while at home in addition to the temperature. Now the smart home system can sense the light levels and determine what the most energy efficient way is to accomplish the light levels and temperatures between your smart lights, your smart blinds, and your smart thermostat. This trend is what will take the market from segmented smart products to truly smart homes, and blinds will be at the forefront of those possibilities!
If smart home products pique your curiosity, be sure to check out the smart light bulbs, plugs, cameras, and speakers that Atlantic Energy offers as a part of its Smart Home Bundle.
Over the past decade, the energy industry has made enormous strides in building up sources of clean and renewable energy generation in an effort to replace fossil fuels, and efforts to ramp up that trend are only picking up steam through discussions on the Green New Deal and other public policy efforts. Much of the focus and conversation about clean energy has focused on the greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels like coal, gas, and oil, and rightfully so given that such emissions are bringing about climate change, one of the most serious and dangerous threats of our time. While climate change should continue to lead towards these clean energy efforts, other benefits arise from the continued penetration of clean energy, benefits that get overshadowed by climate change.
Chief among these so-called ‘secondary’ benefits to clean and renewable energy is in the arena of public health. While the emissions resulting from the burning of fossil fuels have an inherent effect across the globe due to the buildup of greenhouse gases that are hastening climate change, the pollutants being spewed by these sources of fossil fuel generation have a serious localized effect on the public health of an area, not to mention a number of other hazardous results of dirty fuels. As renewable energy continues to get built up, ideally to replace fossil fueled power plants, the impacts on the health of residents of the area will be notable and vital. In developing areas of the world that are really industrializing at a quick pace now, namely in China and India, the type of power generation that gets built to meet those growing energy demands will likewise have a significant impact on the health and well-being of citizens.
So, while climate change takes most of the headlines, advocates of renewable energy should keep in mind the public health benefits of clean energy, which include but are not limited to the following:
As already stated, the burning of fossil fuels releases air pollution into the air which has serious and immediate health impacts to those who live or work in the air of these sources of power generation. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), these risks to health include respiratory illness from fine-particle pollution and ground-level ozone. These risks, unfortunately, are also the most severe for the most vulnerable populations, including the sick, children, and the elderly. Further, living close to such sources of pollution is inherently less desirable so property prices are lower. The result of this is that the residents most affected by this air pollution are disproportionately low-income households, creating an issue of equity and environmental injustice.
On the other hand, renewable energy generation does not burn fuel and thus does not emit this type of air pollution. Whether it’s solar power being fueled by the sun, turbines being powered by the wind, or hydropower creating energy from the natural flow of water, renewable energy generation does not create these negative externalities from fuel burning. As such, the more renewable energy that’s built up in an area, the more quickly fossil fuel generation can be ramped down and ultimately closed, removing the air pollution and its impacts to local health.
To start, clean water resources in many areas is by its nature limited, particularly in areas that have histories of drought such as California. Typical fossil fuel generation like natural gas and coal require very large amounts of water to be used, which can put a strain on the total water resources that are also needed for agriculture, drinking water, and other critical needs. Wind and solar energy, by contrast, use next to no water resources and thus allow for clean water to be utilized as needed for other reasons, ensuring lack of water supply does not endanger public health.
Further, air is not the only natural resource polluted by fossil fuel generation, but water pollution is another problem area. Coal mining and drilling for natural gas, specifically, are huge risks to pollute natural clean water resources and any damage to those resources can impact the supply of drinking water. Tampering with a local region’s supply of drinking water might not even be noticed right away, so the impacts to public health are very real. Those issues are nonexistent for solar and wind energy, though, so the advent of the clean energy revolution can have a very positive effect on public health related to water.
While camps of people may still try to argue against the science behind climate change and turn it into a divisive issue, the negative public health impacts of fossil fuels (and, in turn, the health benefits of switching to renewable energy) are indisputable. Some statistics behind these public health risks can put it all into context:
The World Health Organization has found that nine of every ten people on earth breath polluted air, which leads to 7 million deaths per yearIn just 2010, studies found that fine particle pollution from U.S. coal power plants resulted in 13,200 deaths, 9,200 hospitalizations, and 2,000 heart attacks, with associated health costs reaching over $100 billion per year.In 2015 alone, the American Wind Energy Association found that wind energy replacing fossil fuel generation resulted in $7.3 billion in public health savingsClimate change itself has public health impacts, as the EPA found that by the end of the century, 57,000 fewer Americans would die each year from poor air quality if the worst of climate change were avoided
With all the attention on climate change as the main driver behind pushing renewable energy today, we must remember that many of the negative impacts of fossil fuel are even more immediately and locally felt. These numbers help drive that point home and should encourage even more rapid response to the clean energy transition.
The Green New Deal has made a lot of noise since late 2018 in the push towards an energy transition, one that would replace America’s polluting and greenhouse gas emitting fossil fuels with renewable and carbon-free energy sources. In terms of efforts to get the American energy mix to 100% clean and/or renewable energy, the Green New Deal called for 100% ‘clean, renewable and zero-emission energy sources,’ but those studying the world of energy policy have long noted that it’s been state governments, not the federal government, who’s had continued success in passing legislation and mandates for clean energy goals.
While the Green New Deal has been invaluable for its ability to push the clean energy and climate change conversation to the mainstream and give the debate staying power that has long eluded this area of focus for too long, signs are still pointing at the uphill battle that advocates will have in trying to get the federal government to commit to 100% clean energy (or any other mandated amount). On the other hand, the past year has been a landmark one for state governments debating and ultimately passing legislation that would push this necessary change.
So, the next time you find yourself reading or debating about the Green New Deal or any other federal clean energy policies, keep in mind the success state governments have had and continue to have, including the following:
Hawaii arguably has the most incentive to convert to renewable energy as not only is the island state most vulnerable to the effects of climate change due its geography, but without in-state fuel sources they typically rely on expensive shipments of fossil fuels to power their grid– shipments that are also vulnerable to interruption. As such, Hawaii passed a bill to get 100% of its power from renewable energy by 2045, the first such state to do so.
California was the second state to set a complete commitment to the energy transition, again an unsurprising leader in this regard considering the Golden State’s history as an environmental leader. SB 100 was passed in 2018 that set the mandate that the state must be powered by 100% clean energy by 2045.
Also in 2018, New Jersey’s governor signed into law an executive order that calls for 100% clean energy by 2050. The Garden State didn’t stop there, also specifically committing to helping develop technologies like offshore wind, community solar, and energy storage in order to achieve these goals.
Most recently, New Mexico’s legislature passed the Energy Transition Act that requires the state to shift to 100% carbon-free energy generation by 2045, with an interim goal of 80% renewable energy by 2040.
While not (yet) a state, Washington DC also made waves when the Federal Capital passed the Clean Energy D.C. Omnibus Act of 2018 that mandated that 100% of the district’s energy come from clean and renewable electricity by 2032. Particularly noteworthy is that this mandate covers federal buildings in the city, White House and Congress included.
Another not-yet-a-state who’s unwilling to wait for the federal government, Puerto Rico responded to the destruction of its grid system during the 2017 hurricane season with recognition of the need for climate action and for a more reliable and resilient grid system. As a part of those efforts, the territory passed the Puerto Rico Energy Public Policy Act that sets a 100% renewable energy target by 2050.
These states and territories are surely just the beginning, as neighboring areas will see the goals they set and, more importantly, the progress they make in achieving those goals. Early adopting states will provide a road map for just how affordable and beneficial these clean energy goals are, and the ‘clean energy bug’ will pass from state to state. Already, New York has made initial moves in this direction as well, while hundreds of cities, counties, and even corporations have joined the fray in committing to clean energy goals without federal mandate.
All of this progress from state governments is undoubtedly good news for the environment, the grid, and the climate, but relying on clean energy policy to come on a state-by-state basis is not without some drawbacks.
Inconsistency in goals (what percentage of power has to be converted? Are we talking about renewable energy or ‘clean energy’ that includes nuclear? What are the deadlines and checkpoints along the way?) makes for an uncertain and difficult to follow market for the energy industryUsing a patchwork of requirements results in inefficiencies in implementation and utility strategy roll-out where there would not be were a single national policy enactedInterstate and international electricity trading is typically not controlled under these goals, just electricity generated within the state, so the result of some state policies will be to ‘outsource’ dirty energy generation across the border.
Despite these problems, clean energy advocates and anyone who understands the dire situation presented by climate change should be grateful for state governments that aren’t sitting on the sideline and waiting for the federal government to act. Piece-by-piece, states and renewable energy proponents are making sure the United States will do its part to combat climate change while debate continues to go in circles in Washington DC.
The idea that a home could be ‘smart’ and occupants could interact with it in new, automated, and intelligent ways dates back many years, even just starting with the Jetsons and futuristic depictions of what the homes of tomorrow would look like. The consumer gadget industry tried to get us excited about what was possible in this regard, giving us smart lights and smart thermostats as ways to adjust our home automatically, through schedules, or through phone or web portals. However, those products and others like them remained mostly an afterthought and a niche product for the gadget nuts.
That all changed, however, when the voice assistant market exploded. Whether the assistant is Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, or Apple Siri, the market was sparked with the introduction of Amazon Alexa in 2015 and has ramped up with immense speed
The trend only looks to grow as soon enough it’ll be hard to remember a time before we could ask Alexa or Google to lock the doors, fetch us a recipe, or call Mom. With that growth, though, is an immense growth potential for revolution in home energy use. Those smart lights and smart thermostats were now accessible and convenient for more people who simply wanted to announce their desired temperature or light levels.
Let’s look at some of the best practices for saving energy (and money!) using your voice assistant of choice:
The most obvious ways that energy-conscious users can embrace the energy saving potential of their voice assistants is by connecting energy consuming devices to them so they can be controlled by the user’s voice. The most obvious devices to attach are smart lighting systems and smart thermostats, but other products that can be connected to your voice assistant include smart appliances and smart plugs or outlets. Each individual device will have instructions included or in the online support about how to connect them to Amazon Alexa, Google Home Assistant, or other device.
While the energy savings are available immediately by using your voice commands to turn lights off when you leave a room or adjust the thermostat so it’s not blasting cold air when you’re too lazy to get off and change it manually, the real savings come from setting commands or ‘scenes’ with your smart voice assistants. When you have a host of lights and multiple floors of thermostats connected to one voice assistant, for example, you can then create a single command for the voice assistant that will adjust them all at once. Perhaps you set an ‘away from home’ setting that you trigger by saying “Alexa, Goodbye” and then all the lights get turned off, the thermostats are turned off, and appliances connected to smart plugs turn off. That way you’re not wasting energy by powering these devices for an empty home. Similarly, you might set a nighttime setting that you run by saying “OK Google, Goodnight” and then your front porch lights turn off, the thermostats for floors without bedrooms are turned off, and the light outside the kids’ rooms are dimmed so they can safely see when going to the bathroom.
By looking at your smart products as one cohesive smart home, using your voice assistant as what ties them together, you can create more opportunities to reduce energy waste and inefficiencies in your home.
Utility companies are increasingly getting in on the game with smart voice assistants, recognizing the possibility of helping their customers engage with the utility while also saving money. The first and most direct way utilities are able to do this is to create a ‘skill’ on their home voice assistant (which is like an ‘app’ for a phone) related to the utility. Through this app, customers can ask basics like when their next bill is due and how much it is. They can also check up on how their energy use is this month, allowing them compare if they’re using more or less than a previous month and be mindful of energy use for the rest of the month if they think it’s to much. Some utilities have even enabled customers to ask their voice assistant for energy saving tips, which will have Alexa or whichever assistant you use recite some tips for saving energy around the house.
Taking it a step further, though, are emerging pilots and programs from utilities that enable the use of demand response through your voice assistants. Demand response is the strategy of asking or incentivizing customers to reduce their energy consumption during moments where the total aggregate from customers is approaching the limit of what the utility can handle. In these emerging programs, a utility might be able to send a notification to your voice assistant to ask if you would consider turning off some appliances or lighting and offer that you’ll be paid out a bonus from your utility for the help. Alexa and Google Assistant, as we’ve noted, might even let you turn off those devices via voice command.
Once you’ve got your smart voice assistant set up and you want to tap into energy savings, be sure to note that Atlantic Energy offers smart light bulbs, plugs, cameras, and speakers as a part of its Smart Home Bundle.
As the smart home market has grown in recent years, it’s long been smart light bulbs that have led the way. Because smart light bulbs simply plugged into existing lamps and light sockets like a ‘normal’ light bulb, they were easy to install. And since customers were already accustomed to the ideas of lights that were able to adjust light levels on a dimming switch, the ability to reduce light levels was not a foreign concept. Customers were excited about the ability, though, to tap into the ability to control lights using a mobile app on their phones or via timer or sensor, and the smart home revolution kicked off once major brand began pumping the products out.
However, just because the market started to be flooded with these neat gadgets doesn’t mean that customers were immediately using them in the most intelligent way. That ease of installation that allowed them to be plugged into regular sockets also enabled users to overlook or forget the energy- and cost-saving potential of the smart lights. Still today, many customers are unfortunately not getting the most value out of their smart lights. Given that installing these lights in rooms throughout the home come with a real cost increase over simply regular and efficient light bulbs, this trend represents a lost opportunity.
To ensure that you don’t fall into the trap of missing out on the potential savings from smart lights, particularly if you’ve recently received smart lights as a part of your Smart Home Bundle from Atlantic Energy, keep reading for tips on how to extract the maximum energy savings and cost savings.
One of the most common sources of energy waste in a typical home is when lights are left on in rooms where the light is not needed. Children or absent-minded adults may forget to turn them off when they leave a room, lights may have been turned on when it was dark outside and then not turned off when sunlight lit the room, or lights may even be left on in an empty house so occupants don’t have to navigate a pitch-black house when they return at night. Turning off energy-consuming devices when it’s not needed is energy conservation 101, but smart lights enable added functionality and convenience to make that happen.
Smart lights can be set on a timer with the accompanying app, ensuring that when the sun rises the lights are turned off. They can also be controlled via an app no matter where you are, so if you leave the house and suspect someone might have forgotten to turn the lights off then you can do so from your phone. Similarly, if you wanted to be greeted by a lit house after a long day out of the house, you can manually turn them on via your phone as you approach or even use one of the many programs that will allow you to geotag your phone and turn lights on when you come within a certain distance. Functionality in this regard can be increased simply by adding light sensors or occupancy sensors to your smart lighting system. With smart lights, there’s no longer any excuse for the lights to be left on when they’re not needed.
A common strategy that’s been enacted long before smart lights hit the market is to dim lights when the full light level is not needed. Perhaps you only want a low level of light to allow for watching a movie, for security, or to make you feel that your pets aren’t left in the dark while you’re out of the home. Dimming lights reduces not only the level of light but also the energy being actively consumed.
However, previously dimming the light was only possible when connected to light switches with a dimmer installed. Given the electrical know-how required to install a dimmer on a switch that did not have one, this led to many households not being able to take advantage of the energy and cost savings of light dimming. Smart lights have changed that, though, as most smart lights on the market are built with dimming capabilities in the bulbs themselves. That means that light dimming can now become an energy saving strategy even in homes without dimming switches.
The previous tips help smart light owners to save money on their power bills simply by strategizing using less energy, but an increasingly common strategy from utilities is to implement demand response programs. As explained in a previous post, demand response is any sort of strategy by a power provider that encourages or incentives customers to shift their typical energy usage from periods of peak demand to times where it will be easier for the grid to handle so supply can more easily meet demand. A common demand response strategy is for the power company to send price signals to the customers, via text, email, or even automatically through smart meters. The utility may alert customers that the grid is strained at a given moment and they will pay a bonus to any customers who are immediately able to reduce their energy use at that moment. If you have smart lights, you can immediately and conveniently turn the lights off, even if you’re not home at the moment. This partnership between utilities and customers to minimize the peak demand on the grid is a great cost savings opportunity for both parties, and smart lights can be a key part of that strategy.
A last piece of advice on saving energy and money using smart lights is to not assume they will automatically reduce energy use. In fact, if you plug in smart lights but then don’t utilize their smart functions then you may even risk increasing your energy use. Smart light bulbs consume a small amount of energy to remain in standby mode that allows them to receive instructions from the app on your phone. This amount of energy is typically minimal, but taken over the course of a whole month can add up to a fraction of a kilowatt hour. If you aren’t using the smart functions to reduce the wasted energy from lights being left on, taking advantage of dimming, and aren’t engaging in demand response, then that small amount of energy will simply be added to your total energy use. As a smart light owner, be proactive in extracting the most energy and cost savings from your lights.
If you keep these tips in mind, smart lights can be one of the most cost-effective energy savings installations in your home. Even better, if you’re an Atlantic Energy customer you’ll simply get three smart LEDs and one Bluetooth speaker bulb as a part of your Smart Home Bundle.
Smart home technology has often been cited as a simply gadgets that are fun, convenient, or just technology for the sake of technology. However, the trend of people seeking out and using smart home devices in ways that could manage their energy to be more efficient and bring down utility bills is only increasing, as people are realizing that their in-home uses of the Internet of Technology enabled devices represent an undeniable way to become mindful and responsible energy customers.
That said, not every product appears to be useful in-home energy management on the surface, and those other uses of smart home technology are still ever-present. Additionally, these other uses of smart home technology that aren’t mindful of energy use might actually risk users unknowingly and accidentally increasing their total energy load. Especially when people feel good about the good energy decisions they make, they are more prone to unwittingly undermining and even cancelling out those energy benefits—a phenomenon known as Jevon’s Paradox.
Smart home products used for home security seem especially ripe for undoing all the energy gains from smart lights, smart thermostats, voice assistants, and more. Because plugging in security products might seem like they are only consumers of new energy that wasn’t being used previously and not replacing or mitigating energy use in a home, it might not be obvious how security measures through smart homes can also be used to be a smart energy consumer.
With that in mind, here are a handful of strategies you can use with your new smart home that are actually able to improve your home security while also delivering energy savings:
Using smart lights for burglar deterrent
A common strategy for protecting your home from burglary when you’re out of town for the night is to leave lights on strategically to make it appear as if you are at home. Burglars will often circulate through neighborhoods trying to find homes where families are obviously not home, and a home with all its lights off is a red flag. To combat that, many people have long left a few strategic lights on to make it appear as if someone is home. Unfortunately, though, if those same burglars see the same lights on day and night without change, they might reasonably deduce that the family is on vacation and will be emboldened to target it.
Smart lights, however, change this strategy. You can use your smart lights to regularly schedule which lights turn off and on and when while you’re away, with some smart home programs even allowing you to make this process a bit more random or varying from night to night so no one will be able to tell by the lights if you are home or not. Even better, by being able to turn the lights on and off strategically instead of leaving them on constantly, you are also saving energy using the lights as security measure, while also making the security aspect more effective.
If you’re wary about getting involved with smart lights, note that Atlantic Energy offers free smart lights to customers just for being customers. The Smart Home Bundle from Atlantic Energy offers 3-Smart Wi-Fi LED bulbs after just 90 days as customer (along with a host of other free smart home products during the first 2 years as a customer), thus enabling you to engage in this energy saving and security increasing strategy.
Utilize data collection smart security systems to maximize energy savings
Smart home cameras are among the most common smart home products designed for security. By allowing you to see what’s going on in your home when you’re out of the house or even in a different room, you are able to react, call police if necessary, and simply rest easier. But those cameras are able to do much more than simply record video; they can collect data and sense when rooms are occupied and when they are left empty.
How does this help you save energy? Well, a comprehensive smart home system can use the occupancy sensing abilities of smart home cameras to learn your typical activity patterns and use that to get a real-time snapshot of a home. This information can, for example, be fed to your smart thermostat for it to automatically learn when rooms or floors of the home tend to be used and when they’re typically empty and optimize the patterns of heating and cooling in your home so you’re not spending money and wasting energy to change the temperature in an unoccupied area of the home.
If you’re eager to start building your comprehensive smart security system with cameras, note that the Smart Home Bundle from Atlantic Energy provides 1 Wi-Fi smart camera to customers for free after 90 days as a customer and a second Wi-Fi smart camera after 6 months as a customer.
Keep an eye on energy-using devices
The smart home security systems give homeowners the ability to see inside and outside their home via their phone no matter where they are. While the main reason for this is to keep a watch on the safety of the home, a side benefit is the ability of these smart camera systems to check in on the other aspects of the home. If you’ve ever been out of town and wondered if you’ve accidentally left the lights or the TV on, you’ve likely kicked yourself over the wasted energy. But by looking into your smart home security camera portal, you’ll be able to assuage your concerns and see if everything is left off like it should have been. If it’s not, hopefully you’ve attached those products to smart apps and/or smart plugs so you can turn them off remotely!
Create whole home geofencing functions
One of the more advanced tricks you can do with your whole smart home is to integrate a geofencing feature. Geofencing is the ability of your smart home products to sense when you’re leaving or approaching the home, sensing it based on location of your phone (which is only possible when you enable this function voluntarily). Advanced smart home setups will let you arrange for your home to perform certain functions as a result. Security systems in particular, are advantageous in this way, as you can arrange that your smart locks will unlock as you approach the home and lock as you leave the home. In setting up this type of geofencing, you can also arrange for your smart home to adjust the energy-using functions of your home, namely turning off devices, lights, and the heating and cooling systems at the same time as locking your doors when you leave the home. By integrating all aspects of your smart home, security and otherwise, you are able to save energy in savvy manners.
As mentioned, getting started using smart devices to increase energy efficiency and give you security peace of mind could be easier than grabbing the free Atlantic Energy Smart Home Bundle. Just for continuing to purchase your home’s energy from Atlantic Energy, you’ll continue to get smart home products to add to your home over the course of two years.
In most economic marketplaces you engage in on a daily basis, you are presented with a myriad of choices. There are many different computers you can buy from a myriad of competitors, the highway is littered with gas stations representing different companies, and even if you want a fast food burger on that highway you’re sure to pass half a dozen different options to scratch that need. The existence of those different options puts you, the consumer, in the driver’s seat: depending on what you prioritize you’ll make your selection. Do you pick the computer that’s got the highest memory or the one that comes with an operating system you’re comfortable with? Do you go to the gas station that has a lower price or the one with a great rewards card? And for that burger—do you go with the restaurant who represents your values more or the one where you get the most bang for your buck?
What does this have to do with energy? Well, the power industry is one of the only markets most consumers will operate in where they don’t have this type of choice and are required to buy the offering from the only option provided to them. And this isn’t a product that consumers can choose to go without if they’re unhappy with their provider, this is the electricity required to run their homes.
This setup is the source of much frustration to consumers who feel they aren’t getting the best possible service from their power providers, as their monopolies have removed the companies’ incentive to improve and innovate. To push back against that, a number of states across the country have implemented deregulated markets, or markets where customers can choose their power provider.
What does this mean for customers? And who can take advantage? Keep reading to find out.
For most of the history of the modern grid, monopolies have ruled the electricity generation industry. Because it would be economically and logistically infeasible for multiple entities to build out transmission and distribution systems to deliver power to homes, customers were presented with one option based on where they live and government regulatory bodies would provide oversight to ensure that those companies were delivering satisfactory service at a reasonable price to consumers.
However, by the end of the 20th century there were many who felt that utilities were taking advantage of this setup. Regulatory bodies allowed them to increase rates to help them build out new infrastructure and facilities, but there wasn’t any oversight to ensure these investments were actually helping out the customer. Worried that utilities were simply building capital-intensive projects because it was easy to get higher rates for it, a number of states started deregulating the energy markets.
When this happened, the local utilities would still be in charge of the transmission and distribution grid, maintaining the infrastructure and charging customers for their access to it. However, other operators would be allowed to enter that grid and sell their energy to customers through that grid. Customers would have the choice to sign contracts with utilities other than the legacy company to take advantage of the offerings of these other companies, and all the free market benefits of such an arrangement were newly available to them.
As noted regarding the choice of computers, gasoline, or burgers, customers can make their selection based on whatever criteria matters most to them. When it comes to power generation, you may assume that all energy delivered to a home is the same, but that’s the thinking the legacy utilities rested on without competition. Competition by other companies breeds innovation, creative offerings, and the best possible prices—all characteristics that ultimately benefit the customer.
If customers only care about attaining the cheapest electricity possible, they can seek out the power provider on their grid who is offering the best prices. For green customers who want to support clean and renewable energy sources, they can find the power providers offering the greatest carbon-free energy mix. The competition of energy choice even allows utilities to get creative with how to reward loyal customers through new and unique programs. Atlantic Energy, for example, offers customers utility bill audits and bundles of smart home products to bring energy use in homes to the 21st century, in addition to a clean energy mix that’s priced ahead of the competition. These are offerings that a monopoly utility company would not have to offer, because their customers have no option but remain customers. But with an open market with energy choice, customers are empowered to seek out the utility that matches their needs, values, and price points.
To date, a majority of states still do not offer energy choice, and there are also restrictions and complications in knowing where such choice and exists and for which customers. Some states restrict energy choice to just electricity and not natural gas, or vice versa. Other states offer for all sectors and some offer energy choice just to large commercial or industrial customers.
For residential consumers of energy, though, the following states offer at least some degree of electricity choice:
Connecticut
Delaware
Illinois
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
Texas
Virginia
Washington DC
For residential consumers of natural gas, the list of states that offers some form of energy choice includes:
California
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Montana
Nebraska
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Virginia
West Virginia
Wyoming
Washington DC
Because there are restrictions even within these states, it’s important to do research or contact your utility to see what options you have. For residents of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Maryland, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Washington DC, Atlantic Energy is one of the options you may have as an alternative energy provider. Contact us today to learn if you’re eligible and find out what great programs, prices, and clean energy services we can offer you thanks to the system of energy choice!
There was an early stage in the smart home gadget market where you would only be a participant if you were very technologically in tune (so many didn’t even know what the Internet of Things, or IoT, was!) and had enough money to spend to actually get into the game. However the past few years have seen the smart home market explode in offerings and popularity, and a large part of that trend has been the fact that smart home products have become quite affordable and intuitive and easy to use. While new smart home products and appliances are being added to the market every year-- from smart washing machines to smart electric vehicle chargers and more-- smart plugs have long been available to fill in the gap and make ‘smart’ any product or piece of equipment that uses electricity. These smart plugs fit right into the mold of a smart home product that’s not expensive and can be used by anyone to improve the smart aspects of their home.
Smart plugs don’t just allow the flexibility to make your home products smart and convenient, though. Rather, one of the most exciting aspects of smart plugs is that they can easily open up the door for energy efficiency and eliminating wasted energy anywhere across your home, ensuring your smart home is also an eco-friendly green home.
What are smart plugs?
Smart plugs are small products that plug directly into the outlet in your wall and have the same outlet openings on their other side to allow you to plug products into the smart plug just like you would typically plug straight into the wall. Within the smart plug, though, is where the magic happens. Smart plugs are able to be controlled remotely or automatically, connecting via WiFi to the rest of your smart home devices. This connectivity gives users the ability to turn a smart plug on and off from the Atlantic Energy App on your smartphone, or with the voice command going to Amazon Alexa or Google home, and even with an automated schedule you set up ahead of time via the Atlantic Energy App. The ability to control whether the product plugged into your smart plug is on or off remotely, without needing to be in the room or even in the house, is the crux of a smart plug’s ability.
How do you use a smart plug?
The actual use of a smart plug depends on the exact model you have, as different products have their own instructions and functionalities. But broadly speaking, once you plug your smart plug into the wall you’ll then be able to follow the product’s directions to connect the smart plug to your Atlantic Energy App . Once connected, all you ever have to do is activate and deactivate the smart plug and whatever you’ve plugged into it-- a lamp, an entertainment center, a fan, or really anything else with a plug load-- will turn on and off instantly. Again, you can also set up the smart plug to work on an automatic timer, such as connecting holiday decoration lights to a smart plug so they automatically get powered on when the sun goes down and powered off when you go to bed.
The possibilities for how to use this function stretch as far as you can be creative. You can use them to turn the bedroom lamp on or off from bed, to turn off the home entertainment center when you know you’re always out of the house, and more. But how do you connect these functionalities with energy efficiency, environmental practices, and the trend of going green?
Increasing sustainability and going green with smart plugs
Smart plugs create the ability to reduce energy use during times when energy going into devices in your home would be inherently wasted. For large houses or homes with children, a common source of energy waste comes from leaving the lights on when no one is home. With lights connected to a smart plug, you can have peace of mind by checking and turning off the lights even when you’re not home that may have been left on and were drawing power. Users can also automatically turn off lights during specific times when homes are always empty.
Going further, a common source of wasted energy is when large electrical setups remain plugged in and drawing power even when they’re off. Typical examples of these situations include home offices (with a computer, a monitor, a printer, a fax machine a phone, etc. all plugged in and drawing standby power while not in use) or home entertainment centers (television, cable box, AV receiver , DVD player, video game console, etc. all plugged in and drawing standby power while not in use). If these setups are plugged into a smart plug, then users can automatically turn all of these devices off with the single press of a button when they are not in use, or tell the smart plug to turn them off during the expected hours they will not be needed, and thus save all that wasted energy!
Customers of Atlantic Energy that want to start saving energy and making their smart home eco-friendly are in luck, because smart plugs are included as a part of the Smart Home Bundle. Customers will receive 3 WiFi enabled smart plugs after 18 months of being with Atlantic Energy. So what are you waiting for?
As utilities across the grid seek to get move into renewable energy and away from fossil fuels, one of the key aspects holding renewables back are their inherent intermittency. Intermittency means that they can not be relied upon to generate electricity whenever you want, because solar power needs to have sun and wind energy requires the wind to be blowing. When either of these factors, which are out of our control, are not cooperating, you cannot generate energy from them. Contrast this with baseload energy sources, such as coal, natural gas, and nuclear energy, which can be determined to be turned on whenever the grid needs them, regardless of extraneous factors. This intermittency is one of the main characteristics holding renewable energy back from really taking over the grid, but luckily there’s another energy technology that’s being developed in tandem that can help start to solve that problem: energy storage.
Energy storage is exactly what it sounds like—a type of technology that can take energy that’s generated and utilize it at a later time when it’s needed. As such, the connection with intermittent renewable energy is quite clear. When the sun is shining or the wind is blowing, these renewable energy sources can be used to create extra energy to save for later via energy storage.
This combination of energy storage with renewable energy is particular a good fit because the prime hours of generating wind and solar energy come during the middle of the day, when energy consumption is not peaked and so total power generation tends to outpace consumption on the grid. In scenarios without energy storage, this would result in extra energy being generated going to waste, being taken by neighboring grids for a negative price (i.e., one grid operator paying another grid to take it’s excess generation), or the uneconomical practice of curtailing energy generation and turning off perfectly good resources.
Given how inefficient a market is when the excess supply goes to waste, energy storage provides a market-based solution. Energy storage is often available as a grid resource where a utility or grid operator can simply take the cheap and available energy that’s being generated from renewable energy sources and store it in giant batteries on the grid, such as Megapack stationary storage solutions being built by Tesla. Similarly, energy can be stored on a small scale, via battery packs installed in homes (especially those who have on-site generation from solar rooftop panels) or even by mobile storage solutions that you may known as electric cars!
Wherever they are on the grid, energy storage is able to draw further value out of renewable energy resources.
You’re likely familiar with a basic form of energy storage littered throughout your house in the form of batteries. Batteries are an electrochemical solution that converts electricity to chemical energy to be stored and dispatched at a later time when it’s needed. However, that’s just one type of energy storage.
Another common form of energy storage is pumped hydropower. Using this technique, energy is used to increase the potential energy of water—either through pumping it up to a higher distance and/or by increasing it’s pressure so it’s ready to be released at a high velocity—and then releasing that water when the energy is required so it goes through a typical hydropower plant.
An emerging form of energy storage is thermal energy storage. The principal can be implemented in a number of techniques, such as through solar energy storage or molten-salt thermal storage, but the implementation is essentially to collect and store excess energy generation and use it at later times. For a micro-example, an HVAC system may take extra energy to make ice and then use that ice as a means to create cold air to cool a building later the next day when it’s warm out.
Given the possibility of energy storage solutions, what’s the real-life outlook look like? The best way to look at energy storage is that we’re looking at a tipping point, but we’re still a few years away from reaching it. One energy storage expert at Duke Energy noted:
If you are wanting to run your home just on solar and batteries, from where the technology is today, it’s going to be tough. It’s something we are keeping an eye on, but at this point it’s pretty overstated.
At the same time, though, the market, the technology, and the public policy surrounding energy storage are all moving in the right direction. Respected energy analysts at Wood Mackenzie see energy storage markets doubling from 2018 to 2019 and then tripling from 2019 to 2020. That’s massive growth, underscored by the continual bipartisan support that energy storage solutions get and the increasing R&D that’s being poured into the solutions.
Especially as energy storage becomes a part of an increasingly flexible, demand responding, and versatile grid, batteries and all other energy storage technologies are going to see the type of growth in the next ten years that solar power has experienced over the previous decade. Get ready for it!
In recent years, the Internet of Things has truly transformed from being something only commercial businesses or the most tech-savvy of residents could take advantage of to ubiquitous home accessory that everyone from children to their grandparents utilizes every day. Home voice assistants are common holiday gifts, smart lights are frequently encouraged and incentivized by your local power provider, and new homes will even come built with smart thermostats or cameras as an option. The market has blown up, and it shows no sign of slowing down with reports stating that the market size will grow by more than a factor of five between now and 2023.
The world of smart products appeals to customers and businesses for a myriad of reasons. Customers like the peace of mind that being able to turn off their products remotely gives, businesses like the ability to save money through automation, people love the convenience of a thermostat that learns your habits, and, frankly, these products are just cool!
smart home energy usesmart home energy use
But a main and growing advantage frequently cited by existing and new smart home product customers (with 90% of people in the United States owning at least one such product!) are the ability of them to be used in a way that is eco-friendly and improves the energy profile of your smart home. Automation, remote control, and increased agency over your electronics no matter where you are go hand in hand with smart ways to save energy, but because these smart home products will draw energy even when they are not being actively used there are also risks that they can be used in a non-sustainable way.
Whether you’re a novice or you’ve had smart home products for years, here are a few key ‘Do’s and Don’ts’ to keep in mind as you look to integrate your IoT products in an energy-conscious manner.
Do: Create Automated Scenes
One of the most useful ways you can integrate your smart home products into your daily life is by creating automated scenes. These are ways where you create pre-set arrangements that you can call upon in given situations. For example, you might create a ‘Goodnight’ automated scene that you can engage to turn off lights, adjust your thermostat to your comfort level, and turn off all the smart plugs in your house that are no longer needed. Then by pressing the ‘goodnight’ scene in your smart home app of choice, or activating it via your smart home voice assistant, you can make sure you don’t miss a thing.
Other examples you may want to initiate are ‘away from home’ settings to similarly turn on any lights you want for security purposes but turn off your HVAC system; a ‘sunrise’ setting that will look up when the sunrises that day and gradually turn lights off as the level of light rises, or anything else you can think of. The advantage of these scenes is that the convenience will ensure you more easily remember to turn off the devices that aren’t needed at a given time, and thus reduce power loss.
Don’t: Fall Victim to Jevon’s Paradox
The first and most overarching ‘Don’t’ is to avoid falling into Jevon’s paradox. Jevon’s paradox is a phenomenon across the world of energy efficiency where the installation and availability of more efficient technology will actually increase the overall power used by a building because people feel less guilty about using the product knowing it’s more efficient and they end up ramping up their use by more than the energy that would have otherwise been saved. A common example is that when people purchase more fuel-efficient vehicles, their overall gasoline usage can often increase because they feel better about the efficiency and decreased pollution they believe they are contributing to, undoing the benefits they should have realized with the efficiency upgrade.
jevons paradox energy smart homejevons paradox energy smart home
Smart home products are definitely a notable example where Jevon’s Paradox can come into play. Because smart home products will need to be plugged in and at least left in standby mode when not in use so they are able to pick up automated or remote signals about when to turn on again, they are constantly drawing a small amount of power. As such, if the user does not offset that energy use by carefully taking advantage of the energy-saving abilities elsewhere, it’s too easy for Jevon’s Paradox to rear its head and increase power bills. Avoiding this means being present and energy conscious.
Do: Utilize Wi-Fi Smart Products
Back to ‘Do’s’, an important place to start is when choosing which smart home products you end up purchasing. For example, Wi-Fi enabled lights are very different than Bluetooth enabled lights, in terms of what’s possible. Wi-Fi products mean they are connected to your Internet router and thus anywhere where you can access the Internet (even if you’re across the globe) you can send a signal to turn that light on or off. Bluetooth lights, however, require that you be within Bluetooth range (just 100 meters or so) to tap into them and adjust them. That means you can’t be away on vacation and check to see if you accidentally left the lights on, limiting the potential opportunities for you to save energy.
Don’t: Keep Them Separated
People tend to buy their smart home products in pieces rather than installing a complete system all at once, both because the products are expensive and because they tend to want to test out their systems and gradually integrate them into their daily routines. Doing it this way is definitely fine, but as you build your smart home product collection it’s important to keep compatibility in mind so you can avoid having them be too separated. If you purchase products in completely different ecosystems that don’t have the ability to be controlled all at once via a central app or hub, it’s going to take significantly more effort to utilize the IoT in a way that will save you energy smoothly and easily. So don’t keep these smart home products separated, but be sure to integrate them and make sure you’re keeping this integration in mind when choosing the next addition to your collection.
Do: Ask Your Trusted Energy Advisors
Lastly, realize that you don’t have to go on this smart home and energy saving journey alone. Instead, ask your trusted energy advisors. You can find professionals who do home energy audits that may be able to identify ways in which you can integrate smart home products in an efficient and green way. Similarly, your power provider is a key stakeholder in how and when you use energy and so they’ll often seek out ways to help you reduce your demand on the grid. Be sure to reach out to your utility or energy service company to ask if they have smart home programs-- some will offer rebates or incentives for you to purchase smart home products. Even better, some providers will even provide you with smart home products completely free. Atlantic Energy’s smart home bundle is an example, that will provide you with smart lights, plugs, and cameras at absolutely no cost to you, just for being a customer! So, see what options are available to you.
There’s no denying it anymore, the smart home market is emerging as a hot and growing sector that doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. Even better for the energy-savvy consumer, these smart products are able to help you manage your home energy use and increase overall energy efficiency in ways that were never before possible.
From smart lights to smart thermostats to voice assistants and more, the smart home market is a force with which to be reckoned. If you’ve held off on jumping about the smart home bandwagon until now, it may seem intimidating to get started and know what to consider as you make your first purchases.
To help you get started, here are some key aspects to keep in mind when choosing the right smart home products for your newly (congrats!) smart home:
The first important aspect of smart home products to consider is that not all products in a given category are not created alike. Significant variance exists in what features are offered, and so it’s important to consider what you are hoping to do with the smart home product and make sure the product you are buying fits into that.
For smart lights, for example, some products offer color-changing abilities which can be deemed a desired feature while others only offer white light. Similarly, some smart lights offer the ability to dim them (which is a great way to save energy) while others only function as on or off. If these differences are important to how you envision using your smart home, make sure to clearly read the description of features on your smart light.
More generally, the features and way you interact with your smart products can vary from product to product. Some smart products will have a dedicated app that lets you control them, while others require integration with a dedicated smart home panel, a web portal, or something else. Consider how you want to interact with the product and read up on what each product offers.
More advanced features are also only offered by the most state-of-the-art products. Some products have built-in geofencing, for example, that can see when your phone gets within a certain distance and completes an operation based on that (unlocking the door or turning on the foyer lights, for example). With how quickly the smart home field is advancing, it’s important to look at the latest and greatest and determine if those features are ones of which you want to take advantage.
Beyond just knowing what neat or useful features you want in your smart home product, an absolutely essential area of consideration is the compatibility. There are various different smart product ecosystems and communication protocols that might be used, and they don’t always play nicely together.
For example, smart home products from Apple will only worth with other Apple products, as they’ve created a closed ecosystem. On the other hand, the SmartThings smart home protocol from Samsung is built on a more open ecosystem that allows anyone to put out products or programs that operate with compatible products.
When you’re first starting off with your smart home, it’s important to recognize the potential for two products to not be compatible with each other and plan around that. You may want to identify what the most important part of your smart home is (maybe lights? Or maybe the security system) and build the rest of it using the appropriate ecosystem for that product. Luckily, manufacturers of these products make it easy to understand what a given device is and isn’t compatible with, and the packing will often include a note that this product ‘Works With’ which given ecosystems.
To make it even easier, many smart home manufacturers have also started to create product bundles to get you started that all work seamlessly together. You can get a foot in the smart home with these starter packages, and then they also offer add-on packages and again can leave the customer confident they are getting products that work together well.
For example, customers who start with the Atlantic Energy Smart Home Bundle, a series of products (including smart lights, smart cameras, and smart plugs) that are offered to customers for free just for being loyal customers, all the products are designed to work together seamlessly in the same home and controlled with the same app.
Voice assistants in just a few short years became the most widely sold smart home product on the market, thanks to the likes of Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. Luckily, there are many useful ways to integrate the rest of your smart home in with these voice assistants, even in convenient and easy ways to save energy.
For customers who already have a voice assistant and want to start adding other products into the mix, it’s important for them to make sure that those products work with their preferred voice assistant since compatibility again isn’t universal. The makers of the smart home devices again try to make this easy on you by putting notes on the box or online advertising regarding which voice assistants are compatible with their products, so be on the lookout for that. The Atlantic Energy Smart Home Bundle, mentioned before, is easy to set up and control with Amazon Alexa, providing ease of function and smart home integration.
Lastly, all of the various functions and features possible with smart home products, of course, come with a range of prices. The most basic smart products will be cheaper, and the state-of-the-art products will cost you more for the added abilities. For this reason, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution and each home must weigh their budget and what they are looking for out of the products.
Going back to the Atlantic Energy Smart Home Bundle, what could be a better price point than free. Just for continuing to purchase your home’s energy from Atlantic Energy, you’ll continue to get smart home products to add to your home over the course of two years.
