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I live in Texas and got a “smart” thermostat recently. I was delighted to find that my energy company is offering a $25/year credit for having one. It’s not muc

I live in Texas and got a “smart” thermostat recently. I was delighted to find that my energy company is offering a $25/year credit for having one. It’s not much, but it’s nice to have. …or so I thought. It turns out that accepting this $25/yr alllows the grid to remotely control my thermostat. I was sweating in my living room, wondering why it felt so hot. Apparently the grid was facing peak load, so they raised my thermostat temperature by 2 degrees! Thankfully there is a manual override when this happens, but I have to call my energy company to disable this “feature” completely. I’m sorry, you cannot pay me $25/yr to sweat on my sofa.

hef19898 3y ago
Also, I am fairly sure, they got the right to collect a ton of usage and personal data for those 25 bucks.
nocoiner 3y ago
I have ecobee thermostats that I’m generally happy with - HomeKit integration, seemingly comprehensive privacy controls, overall well designed and functional - but they have all kinds of dark patterns designed to force you into these programs. And you really have to go in to a bunch of different settings to excise the utility’s ability to take over your thermostat if you’ve happened to opt in. I think demand reduction is generally a great idea, but considering what that two degree increase is saving your utility, there really ought to be a 50/50 split of savings than kicking back a pittance of $25 a year.
- mhb 3y ago
  It would be interesting (better?) if it was a market in which homes with these thermostats could set prices at which they are willing to reduce energy use.
  - nocoiner 3y ago
    100% agree. Actually, 99% agree. In Texas, up until one of our recent power debacles, there was a retail energy provider whose schtick was passing through spot rates to retail customers. Normally this was a small fraction (30%) of typical retail pricing. Until the grid went under stress, spot prices skyrocketed, and retail customers who opted into that limited-upside potentially-unlimited-downside plan were paying something like 10,000% of typical pricing. To quote a former Texas governor who forgot which cabinet agencies he wanted to eliminate, “Oops.” I’m not sure how something like that could happen with what you suggest, but I’m a little wary of unanticipated consequences so as to degrade my degree of confidence slightly given recent events.
dylan604 3y ago
> so they raised my thermostat temperature by 2 degrees! I’m sorry, but you get much less sympathy from me for this generic comment. Raising your temp from 68 to 70 means nothing. Changing your temp from 78 to 80 is totally different. I’m also supposed to feel sorry for you because you didn’t read the fine print? Sure, maybe I’m victim blaming, but come on
1123581321 3y ago
I believe you’re enrolled in Smart Savers in addition to having the thermostat. They might’ve rushed you by the agreement. It’s not supposed to be an opt-out program. In Illinois, Exelon has a similar program. In exchange for $40/year, they install a control on your AC that lets them cycle it off during summer months for a period of time each day. Connecting the program to a smart meter would let them make finer adjustments, and probably more frequently. We stay enrolled in the $40/year program because if they’re cycling us, it’s unnoticeable. I’m not sure how much discomfort we’d tolerate.
windexh8er 3y ago
$25? I live in a northern, Midwestern state and our coop (part of MISO) offered a one time $1500 and continued discounts (11%) per month on electricity for the capability to control utility curtailment (power control to the unit, no ability to adjust set-point or collect any other data). For winter it can only be in buildings that are non-primary living and can only shut off power to an electrical heating appliance (heat pump, boiler, etc). In the summer they can curtail your heat pump / AC for up to 15 minutes at a time. I see the curtailment notification on my thermostat on hot days. But the house never gets warm. I have a newer heat pump that is rated up to 22 SEER2 and compared to my old on/off AC unit the variable speed unit makes a huge difference in performance, cost and noise levels. I never hear it running when it is and so during curtailment I don't notice it unless I see the notification.
- mindslight 3y ago
  Is it really only 15 minutes at a time, or is it 15 minute units with possibly multiple in a row? Heat pump efficiency requires long cycles, so turning it off, on, off, on within the course of an hour to make some "never off more than 15 minutes" guarantee would be counterproductive.
  - windexh8er 3y ago
    The unit basically runs all day during the day on hot days. The difference is, as you state, it runs long cycles. The 15 minutes it's off is the break in the cycle itself. The unit I have is a communicating unit that "learns" the house in terms of all the internal and external changes. So it knows what fan speed and compressor rate to run to get to the setpoint - it doesn't just ramp up to the highest rate after a curtailment event. So it's basically running at a very low rate all day long, curtailment happens, and it ramps slightly if there's a need to bring any zones back to setpoint - but the thermostat is aware of the curtailment event and, as I was told, responds different after the curtailment is lifted. I talked to both the installer and the manufacturer regarding whether or not curtailment would negatively impact the system (performance, cost, longevity) and the consensus was that unless the curtailment events happened every hour there wasn't any downside to cooling. Heating would be another story, but I don't have any curtailment contract for heating in my home. And I believe the contract states curtailment events can only happen up to 4 times in a given day and cannot happen more than once an hour.
LUmBULtERA 3y ago
I'm genuinely curious, what did you think the $25/year they were paying you for if not to do this?
- hombre_fatal 3y ago
  Smart thermostats can do things like turn off A/C when you leave the house.
  - Scoundreller 3y ago
    Things I like about my ecobee: 1. That (but never really set it up due to the number of people going in and out, but nice to turn things back when we’re all away for an extended period and turn it back on before we return) 2. Run the fans for a little bit every hour (i wish it could be smarter within which part of the hour it could run tho) 3. Disable the AC entirely when it’s cool outside (but had to use some unintended setting designed to prevent « heat pump » stress). Though lead to some head banging by family members asking why the ac isn’t running (answer: open some windows). 4. Tried and failed to get it set up to properly account for humidity when it comes to AC (25C and dry is nice, 25C and humid can feel too hot) 5. Set up too much programming to properly pre charge for in anticipation of time of day price increases and step back when it’s going to go down soon. IMO, this should have been out-of-the-box functionality, not require the complex scheduling i had to do. Even though we have gas heat, I still have some programming for this because its electric load is still like 1kw. I did immediately turn off the « community electricity savings » thing. You gotta pay me for that!
ceejayoz 3y ago
> I’m sorry, you cannot pay me $25/yr to sweat on my sofa. I mean, if the grid goes down because everyone refuses to sweat a tiny bit during a massive heat wave's peak load, you might be sweating anyways... for longer and $25 poorer.
- soligern 3y ago
  The ability of the grid companies to rely on the fact that they can lower people’s electric usage centrally might prevent them from appropriately scaling up the system.
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    If they can smooth out peaks - if, say, a bunch of people set their thermostats to cool at 2pm so they spread that out over a 10-15 minute period, or they have some folks run AC at 2-3 and others 3-4 - they might need to also run a lot less wasteful energy production. As with most things, there are good and bad ways to use this ability.
    - soligern 3y ago
      I would prefer if the two entities are separated though. The thermostat should come from a private company that optimizes for the weather locally and possibly takes in data from the electric company through an API so the end user has more control and the motivations for both entities stay intact.
  - sh34r 3y ago
    I’d argue the cost of scaling up the grid, both economic and environmental, are too great when the problem can be resolved by raising everyone’s thermostat to 76 for a couple hours a year. Peaker plants are wildly expensive to keep in service, and usually run off of coal or oil.
- thinkcontext 3y ago
  And not just whether it goes down but it can save money. During summer peaks the cost of electricity to the utility on the open market can spike 10x or more. Almost all utilities have regulated profit which allows them to recover (most) costs, so shaving those peaks ultimately saves ratepayers.
anotheruser13 3y ago
I didn't install the smart thermostat my power company sent me. I don't run the AC lower than 80° and the heater higher than 65°. I'm already doing my part.

hef19898 3y ago

Also, I am fairly sure, they got the right to collect a ton of usage and personal data for those 25 bucks.

nocoiner 3y ago

I have ecobee thermostats that I’m generally happy with - HomeKit integration, seemingly comprehensive privacy controls, overall well designed and functional - but they have all kinds of dark patterns designed to force you into these programs. And you really have to go in to a bunch of different settings to excise the utility’s ability to take over your thermostat if you’ve happened to opt in. I think demand reduction is generally a great idea, but considering what that two degree increase is saving your utility, there really ought to be a 50/50 split of savings than kicking back a pittance of $25 a year.

mhb 3y ago
It would be interesting (better?) if it was a market in which homes with these thermostats could set prices at which they are willing to reduce energy use.
- nocoiner 3y ago
  100% agree. Actually, 99% agree. In Texas, up until one of our recent power debacles, there was a retail energy provider whose schtick was passing through spot rates to retail customers. Normally this was a small fraction (30%) of typical retail pricing. Until the grid went under stress, spot prices skyrocketed, and retail customers who opted into that limited-upside potentially-unlimited-downside plan were paying something like 10,000% of typical pricing. To quote a former Texas governor who forgot which cabinet agencies he wanted to eliminate, “Oops.” I’m not sure how something like that could happen with what you suggest, but I’m a little wary of unanticipated consequences so as to degrade my degree of confidence slightly given recent events.

dylan604 3y ago

> so they raised my thermostat temperature by 2 degrees! I’m sorry, but you get much less sympathy from me for this generic comment. Raising your temp from 68 to 70 means nothing. Changing your temp from 78 to 80 is totally different. I’m also supposed to feel sorry for you because you didn’t read the fine print? Sure, maybe I’m victim blaming, but come on

1123581321 3y ago

I believe you’re enrolled in Smart Savers in addition to having the thermostat. They might’ve rushed you by the agreement. It’s not supposed to be an opt-out program. In Illinois, Exelon has a similar program. In exchange for $40/year, they install a control on your AC that lets them cycle it off during summer months for a period of time each day. Connecting the program to a smart meter would let them make finer adjustments, and probably more frequently. We stay enrolled in the $40/year program because if they’re cycling us, it’s unnoticeable. I’m not sure how much discomfort we’d tolerate.

windexh8er 3y ago

$25? I live in a northern, Midwestern state and our coop (part of MISO) offered a one time $1500 and continued discounts (11%) per month on electricity for the capability to control utility curtailment (power control to the unit, no ability to adjust set-point or collect any other data). For winter it can only be in buildings that are non-primary living and can only shut off power to an electrical heating appliance (heat pump, boiler, etc). In the summer they can curtail your heat pump / AC for up to 15 minutes at a time. I see the curtailment notification on my thermostat on hot days. But the house never gets warm. I have a newer heat pump that is rated up to 22 SEER2 and compared to my old on/off AC unit the variable speed unit makes a huge difference in performance, cost and noise levels. I never hear it running when it is and so during curtailment I don't notice it unless I see the notification.

mindslight 3y ago
Is it really only 15 minutes at a time, or is it 15 minute units with possibly multiple in a row? Heat pump efficiency requires long cycles, so turning it off, on, off, on within the course of an hour to make some "never off more than 15 minutes" guarantee would be counterproductive.
- windexh8er 3y ago
  The unit basically runs all day during the day on hot days. The difference is, as you state, it runs long cycles. The 15 minutes it's off is the break in the cycle itself. The unit I have is a communicating unit that "learns" the house in terms of all the internal and external changes. So it knows what fan speed and compressor rate to run to get to the setpoint - it doesn't just ramp up to the highest rate after a curtailment event. So it's basically running at a very low rate all day long, curtailment happens, and it ramps slightly if there's a need to bring any zones back to setpoint - but the thermostat is aware of the curtailment event and, as I was told, responds different after the curtailment is lifted. I talked to both the installer and the manufacturer regarding whether or not curtailment would negatively impact the system (performance, cost, longevity) and the consensus was that unless the curtailment events happened every hour there wasn't any downside to cooling. Heating would be another story, but I don't have any curtailment contract for heating in my home. And I believe the contract states curtailment events can only happen up to 4 times in a given day and cannot happen more than once an hour.

LUmBULtERA 3y ago

I'm genuinely curious, what did you think the $25/year they were paying you for if not to do this?

hombre_fatal 3y ago
Smart thermostats can do things like turn off A/C when you leave the house.
- Scoundreller 3y ago
  Things I like about my ecobee: 1. That (but never really set it up due to the number of people going in and out, but nice to turn things back when we’re all away for an extended period and turn it back on before we return) 2. Run the fans for a little bit every hour (i wish it could be smarter within which part of the hour it could run tho) 3. Disable the AC entirely when it’s cool outside (but had to use some unintended setting designed to prevent « heat pump » stress). Though lead to some head banging by family members asking why the ac isn’t running (answer: open some windows). 4. Tried and failed to get it set up to properly account for humidity when it comes to AC (25C and dry is nice, 25C and humid can feel too hot) 5. Set up too much programming to properly pre charge for in anticipation of time of day price increases and step back when it’s going to go down soon. IMO, this should have been out-of-the-box functionality, not require the complex scheduling i had to do. Even though we have gas heat, I still have some programming for this because its electric load is still like 1kw. I did immediately turn off the « community electricity savings » thing. You gotta pay me for that!

ceejayoz 3y ago

> I’m sorry, you cannot pay me $25/yr to sweat on my sofa. I mean, if the grid goes down because everyone refuses to sweat a tiny bit during a massive heat wave's peak load, you might be sweating anyways... for longer and $25 poorer.

soligern 3y ago
The ability of the grid companies to rely on the fact that they can lower people’s electric usage centrally might prevent them from appropriately scaling up the system.
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  If they can smooth out peaks - if, say, a bunch of people set their thermostats to cool at 2pm so they spread that out over a 10-15 minute period, or they have some folks run AC at 2-3 and others 3-4 - they might need to also run a lot less wasteful energy production. As with most things, there are good and bad ways to use this ability.
  - soligern 3y ago
    I would prefer if the two entities are separated though. The thermostat should come from a private company that optimizes for the weather locally and possibly takes in data from the electric company through an API so the end user has more control and the motivations for both entities stay intact.
- sh34r 3y ago
  I’d argue the cost of scaling up the grid, both economic and environmental, are too great when the problem can be resolved by raising everyone’s thermostat to 76 for a couple hours a year. Peaker plants are wildly expensive to keep in service, and usually run off of coal or oil.
thinkcontext 3y ago
And not just whether it goes down but it can save money. During summer peaks the cost of electricity to the utility on the open market can spike 10x or more. Almost all utilities have regulated profit which allows them to recover (most) costs, so shaving those peaks ultimately saves ratepayers.

anotheruser13 3y ago

I didn't install the smart thermostat my power company sent me. I don't run the AC lower than 80° and the heater higher than 65°. I'm already doing my part.