Wasted $300 on a smart thermostat that promised to cut my energy bill

Installed it last spring and tracked my usage for a full year, savings were maybe $12 total, anyone else get burned by one of those 'green' gadgets that just don't deliver?

2 comments

2 Comments

gray_schmidt828d ago

Read that Consumer Reports breakdown last month that tested 8 different smart thermostats over 6 months. Only one of them actually saved people meaningful money, and it was one of the cheapest ones too. The fancy Nest models they tested barely made a dent in heating and cooling costs. Most of those savings claims come from super specific situations where someone had a terrible old thermostat and a really predictable schedule. If your house is like most homes with some drafty windows or a weird layout, the smart features just don't matter that much.

emeryfox28d ago

I remember hearing an energy analyst on a podcast a while back say that most smart thermostat savings come from people actually programming them and then leaving them alone. They claimed the average person sets their schedule once, then manually overrides it constantly because they're home sick or working late. That basically kills any potential savings right there. From what I've seen, an old-school programmable thermostat you set and forget might actually beat a smart one in a lot of drafty older homes, just because there's less to go wrong.