I'm not sure what is the forum policy around this, but hopefully this post isn't considered a schill-type of thing since I'm not affiliated with the vendor.
The Tesla app is great to see the balance of the grid, solar, battery, and home consumption, but it doesn't provide much insight to what is actually happening in the home. For the extra data layer, I installed the Emporia Vue a few weeks ago. Big thanks to @Oceanwolf for originally mentioning the tool here.
The Emporia Vue allows a homeowner to stick a current transducer (CT) on the load side of individual circuits at the breakers. The hardware then measures and logs consumption each second. This has been a great way to see energy use by zone instead of being beholden to EnergyStar/EnergyGuide stickers or manufacturer claims. It also lets you get that one level deeper than just seeing the total home graph on the Tesla App. Emporia also make devices that track individual outlets, but that just seems like a bit overkill and a poor ROI compared to CT tracking on circuits.
With all this data, you can see the kWh consumed by a load of dishes, laundry, etc. So now I know that "extra dry" setting on my dishwasher actually uses 2 kWh of power. I can also quantify the snazzy wine fridge, upstairs mini-fridge, and garage-freezer to a daily energy cost. This data is useful knowledge to start energy-managing my home in conjunction with new self generation equipment.
Another interesting thing, I found that each of my two air handlers use a continuous 35 watts each even if the blower motor is off and the HVAC is not operating. I have no clue what this 35 watts is actually doing other than powering the blinking Lennox control board and thermostat. But this means the two systems together bleed 70 watts 24/7 no matter what unless I de-activate the HVAC breaker. This is interesting since that means 613 kWh per year is going away to just then enable me to pay more energy costs for air-circulation, heating, or cooling. That underlying 70 watts bleed came out to be $200 worth of energy I paid in 2020 to PG&E and MCE based on what my tiered rates were costing in 2020.
Also of note, it turns out my smart-home, AT&T gateway, set-top-boxes, mesh-wifi, and cameras are taking about 200 watts continuously 24/7 by just existing. Such "vampire" loads add up; and it's something I don't think I would have seen so clearly without tools like the Emporia Vue.
The most major cons lie their user interface. Navigating their app is rather poor, and their API is very limited. You can get CSV exports, but no cool automated reporting/dashboards like what @bmah could dream up. And as with all smart-tech, if Emporia goes belly-up, then your tool will be worthless since all info has to run through the cloud. This doubles as a potential privacy risk as well.
Oh and one last downside... if your wife likes to run a space heater, this extra info will kill your soul. You'll now see just how bad that space heater is, but you'll never convince your wife to stop using said space heater. So maybe it's not worth the money.
The Tesla app is great to see the balance of the grid, solar, battery, and home consumption, but it doesn't provide much insight to what is actually happening in the home. For the extra data layer, I installed the Emporia Vue a few weeks ago. Big thanks to @Oceanwolf for originally mentioning the tool here.
The Emporia Vue allows a homeowner to stick a current transducer (CT) on the load side of individual circuits at the breakers. The hardware then measures and logs consumption each second. This has been a great way to see energy use by zone instead of being beholden to EnergyStar/EnergyGuide stickers or manufacturer claims. It also lets you get that one level deeper than just seeing the total home graph on the Tesla App. Emporia also make devices that track individual outlets, but that just seems like a bit overkill and a poor ROI compared to CT tracking on circuits.
With all this data, you can see the kWh consumed by a load of dishes, laundry, etc. So now I know that "extra dry" setting on my dishwasher actually uses 2 kWh of power. I can also quantify the snazzy wine fridge, upstairs mini-fridge, and garage-freezer to a daily energy cost. This data is useful knowledge to start energy-managing my home in conjunction with new self generation equipment.
Another interesting thing, I found that each of my two air handlers use a continuous 35 watts each even if the blower motor is off and the HVAC is not operating. I have no clue what this 35 watts is actually doing other than powering the blinking Lennox control board and thermostat. But this means the two systems together bleed 70 watts 24/7 no matter what unless I de-activate the HVAC breaker. This is interesting since that means 613 kWh per year is going away to just then enable me to pay more energy costs for air-circulation, heating, or cooling. That underlying 70 watts bleed came out to be $200 worth of energy I paid in 2020 to PG&E and MCE based on what my tiered rates were costing in 2020.
Also of note, it turns out my smart-home, AT&T gateway, set-top-boxes, mesh-wifi, and cameras are taking about 200 watts continuously 24/7 by just existing. Such "vampire" loads add up; and it's something I don't think I would have seen so clearly without tools like the Emporia Vue.
The most major cons lie their user interface. Navigating their app is rather poor, and their API is very limited. You can get CSV exports, but no cool automated reporting/dashboards like what @bmah could dream up. And as with all smart-tech, if Emporia goes belly-up, then your tool will be worthless since all info has to run through the cloud. This doubles as a potential privacy risk as well.
Oh and one last downside... if your wife likes to run a space heater, this extra info will kill your soul. You'll now see just how bad that space heater is, but you'll never convince your wife to stop using said space heater. So maybe it's not worth the money.
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