Nest Thermostat | greenusonia

Nest Thermostats - Smart Thermostats

In my research of smart thermostats, I settled on a Google Nest smart home thermostat. From start to finish, the experience was excellent. The packaging is straight out of the Apple playbook of packaging. It is clean, environmentally sensitive and protective (the Nest is really a small computer).

Installation:

The parts were clearly labeled and well thought through. Now, one might think that installing this may be a problem, complicated or scary. But the Nest support team takes that all away. The company has a sleek inquiry system. If you are unsure of installing the Nest computer to your furnace (HVAC – heating, ventilation, and air condition system), you simply remove the existing thermostat (make sure that the system is off):

take a picture of your thermostat wiring,
email the picture to their support site,
wait for emailed wiring instructions, including a picture, and
follow step by step instructions.

The faceplate, wiring plate, screwdriver and screws are all included in the box. It goes together in 5 minutes. It’s that simple.

Nest App Setup:

The setup software and instructions are equally simple. They were clear and easy and the instructions come in English, French or Spanish (North and South American markets). I was able to set it up to my furnace in no time. The iPhone/iPad/Android Nest apps make it easy to build your on and off schedule for the whole week in an easy to view screen.

The Nest is equipped with a temperature sensor, a humidity sensor, a near-field sensor, a far-field sensor, and an ambient light sensor. There are not RoHS (Restriction Of use of Hazardous Substances). And it is arsenic free, mercury free, and PVC free.

There are several cool features to the Nest: 1) There is internet access through your Wi-Fi. This allows it to retrieve the weather information from the point nearest to your Nest. 2) There is a motion detector, so that as you walk by it, it will illuminate to show the temperature setting. The motion detector will also notice your absence and adjust the furnace settings that you programmed. What I mean by that is, if you have programmed the Nest to have the heat set at 68 degrees F while at home, but you step out during that period, and the device detects no movement; it will automatically lower the temperature to its lowest default temp. Hence, it achieves more energy savings. 3) It connects automatically to its companion product Protect, an integrated smoke alarm . 4) It is expandable. This means, that numerous companies are adding new products that will integrate to the Nest. For instance, there are programmable LED lights, door locks, garage door openers, etc. There are several appliances that will connect to the Nest. This learning computer eventually will be able to monitor and adjust your energy usage based on your presence or absence, thus saving more energy. If you have ever been to a European hotel, the newer hotels use your key card as the on off switch for all of the electricity in the hotel room. I think that this is where the Nest is headed.

Google Nest sends each user a monthly statement of the customer’s energy usage. I find it not as useful as it could be. I would like to see line graph depicting the outside temperature versus the energy usage over time.I hope that the software that is on my iPhone will include the expandable devices.

Below are pictures of the devices. The picture on the left is the setup screen. Everything can be done from there. The picture on the right is the Nest app. I shows a screenshot of the schedule which can be setup and adjusted from either the Nest thermostat or the Nest app.

So, how did it work? Below is monthly view of our energy consumption over the past two years. The first peak was January 2014. That was a particularly cold January. We installed the Nest in August 2014, making that 13 months of Nest thermostat use. During the transition months - Spring (April, May and June) and Fall (September, October and November?) - the Nest keeps the furnace off as much as possible. This can be seen when you compare like mohths, March 2014 with March 2015. In each comparison, the energy usage has declined. Once the sensors in the Nest learn the habitats of the inhabitants, a steady state will be achieved and savings will become normal routine. Future same month to same month savings will look like there has been no improvement, but in reality, it has become permanently built in. You will have adjusted to a new norm in your home. Our average inside winter temperature has decreased from 72 degrees two years ago to 68 - 70 degrees this year. A 2 degree temperature drop in the house, saved us enough to pay for the Nest and then some. The samings were strong during the summer months, when the household temperature was moved up to 78 degrees. These learning thermostats are excellent.

Should you want to change the temperature on the the fly, say for getting the temperature of the house ready for a party that you are giving, simply go to your Nest app and adjust your thermostat to the desired temperature. By the time that you arrive home, it will be comfortable.