Home energy monitors are handy when you want to find out how is the energy consumption distributed among the electrical appliances at work. If you want to make the move to solar this is an essential device to have for making your house energy-efficient. An energy monitor will provide the data for you to make an informant decision on eliminating energy consumption bottlenecks for making the most of your solar panels.
The case study of 235 Stanley Place, Townsville, Australia shows how energy monitoring and the identification of bottlenecks have led to 32% energy savings and demand savings of 567kVA. Monitoring results showed that the aging cooling system accounts for 50% of all the energy use so it was upgraded. Other improvements included motion detector installation in the corridors to control the lighting and ventilation of the building and conserve energy when the common areas are vacant.
Neurio Home Energy Monitor
Main Features:
- Real-time energy monitoring accessible via web and mobile
- Energy usage forecast based on daily usage
- 99% accuracy
- Easy installation
- Compatible with 120V, 208V, and 240V voltage homes
Neurio integrates seamlessly with any load panel of 1-phase, 2-phase (split phase) and 3-phase homes. After installation, you will have a granular energy consumption data that will help you monitor and conserve energy as well as plan for future storage needs. The performance data is available through Neurio software, Neurio Cloud API or can be streamed into your own cloud infrastructure. Neurio also supports sub-metering of a crucial sub-panel or a major energy consumer appliance like Electrical Vehicle (EV). Beside communicating its data through Wi-Fi, Neurio also supports the RS-485 protocol. When combined with Neurio Solar Expansion Kit (sold separately) you can measure the energy generated by PV panels in real-time. The Solar Expansion Kit is compatible with any solar inverter or battery manufacturer.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Easy installation | Requires additional $70 for appliance recognition feature |
| Nicely displayed web and mobile usage statistics/graphs | No storage when offline |
|
Video instructions |
Customer support is not great |
Sense Home Energy Monitor
Main Features:
- Real-time energy monitoring through web and mobile (iOS, Android)
- Integrates with Alexa and IFTTT
- Shows the dollar equivalent of the energy used
- Can be installed in about 30 mins by a licensed electrician
- Tested for safety. Designed for 240V US homes
Sense installs in your home's load panel and provides energy usage real-time & historical data through mobile (iOS, Android) and web. The logged historical data reveals energy usage patterns and shows when and where you can save. Data is sent to the central server through your home's Wi-Fi network. When you first install this energy monitor it tries to identify all the electrical appliances you use. Not all the appliances can be identified but for the identified ones you can label them and configure custom notifications for when they turn on/off, analyze how efficient they are. Sense integrates with Alexa and IFTTT so that's a plus if you're already using them. It would have been a good addition to this monitor to be able to add electric devices manually. The reason for this is that the built-in algorithm cannot identify all the appliances and manual input would have helped the algorithm to correctly distribute all the consumed electricity among the appliances that really use it.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Good customer service | Appliance detection is not accurate |
| Very high accuracy | No technical documentation for installation |
|
Active community forum with tips |
Eyedro EHEM1 Home Electricity Monitor
Main Features:
- Real-time energy monitoring
- Easy installation
- Runs on 100 - 240VAC to 5VDC wall adapter
- Free web monitoring
- Includes: two 200A sensors and a 10-foot ethernet cable
- Data streaming begins immediately after installation
This energy monitor comes in 2 variations: with built-in Wi-Fi or with Ethernet cable for wired connection. First, a licensed electrician install the device in your home's load panel. Then connect it to your home internet. After that automatic energy data is streamed to the server. You can view the data with a web or mobile browser. Eyedro shows the current consumption and projections. With so-called "plugins" you can see your energy footprint, already spent energy and estimated usage in dollars. Finally, the Comparison plugin lets you gauge the impact of your efficiency projects. This device does not directly measure power or energy so on inductive loads like PC, fans, electric motors, HID lighting, etc it does not provide correct measurement.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Notification emails about status change (reboot, power outage, etc) | Does not directly measure power, only measures current |
| No appliance detection |
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