Smart Home Devices That Can Reduce Your Power Bill

Your electric bill is a major expense. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could effortlessly lower your energy consumption every month and pay less on your bill? Your Cedar Hill electric company, Pronto Power, has a solution that only costs a little bit of money but will save you thousands of dollars over time: smart home devices.

Smart technology includes appliances or other devices that respond to internet commands. “Smart” is actually an acronym for self-monitoring analysis and reporting technology. The market for smart technology is rapidly growing, which means these devices are becoming less expensive. This year consumers are projected to spend $158 billion worldwide on smart technology for homes and businesses. Which of these devices are your best choice?

Smart thermostats

The Energy Information Administration determined that 16% of all residential energy is dedicated to climate control. Smart thermostats can be programmed to be energy efficient while you are away, then adjust your home’s temperature before you arrive, making it more comfortable. Smart thermostats know when a mobile device is on site. When you are gone, the system adjusts the temperature to a more energy-saving level. When cellular phones are present, the system senses the change and makes the ambient temperature more human-friendly. A smart thermostat can save you 20% or more on your electric bill.

Smart LED bulbs

LED bulbs are always the best choice for lighting since they save money, do not produce heat, and are bright enough for task lighting. Smart bulbs can be controlled for brightness, color, usage time, and motion detection. You can control the lights with your phone or via a smart speaker for simple voice control functions. You can turn the lights off from your phone or program lights to be turned on at a specific time every night before you come home from work.

Smart speakers

While these are not money savers per se, smart speakers can be used to give voice commands to many of your devices connected to the Internet of Things. Tell your speaker to turn off lights, control the thermostat settings, or change the timer on the water heater. Consumers are much more likely to turn off unneeded lights when it is simple to do so.

Smart plugs and power strips

Plug these into your existing outlets and watch the savings begin! Smart plugs and power strips monitor energy usage. When not in use, they turn off the power. This controls your ambient energy use, which consumes 25% – 46% of the energy you use day to day, according to EnergyStar.gov. Instead of manually unplugging appliances when not in use to control the ambient (“vampire”) power use, all you do is plug the appliance into a smart plug or power strip.

Tankless water heater

Heating water consumes a huge amount of energy. When water is constantly heated, as with a traditional water heater, energy is wasted. A tankless water heater saves approximately 1/3 of your water energy use. With no tank, you have more room in your closet or utility room as well.

Smart sprinklers

You have seen those homes with nice lawns and automatic sprinklers. The sprinklers turn on every day at 6:30 regardless of the weather. Finally, technology has caught up with automatic sprinklers so if you own this house, you can hit an app on your phone and turn off the sprinklers when it’s raining. Some of these systems also come with a device that tells you if you have a leak in the system.

Energy monitoring systems

Pronto Power gives you technology in your hands with a free energy monitoring app. This monitoring system lets you see your energy usage in real time and recognize when an appliance is using an extreme amount of power. This app has been proven time and again to save energy usage.

Turn to your Cedar Hill electric company, Pronto Power, to learn even more energy-saving tips. Call us any time at 888 400-6632.