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RSSHome Automation is a Guilty, Green Pleasure
GreenWerks | 
Dec 18th, 2011 | 
We all have our guilty pleasures. For me, it’s Jessica Alba movies and women’s gymnastics, and no matter how embarrassing these pleasures (Ms. Alba is admittedly not the greatest actress), they serve their purpose. Being green is often a similar deal. People usually have ulterior motives on buying green, and love the social clout that goes along with making green buying decisions.
Home automation is one of these purchases. You don’t go spending thousands of dollars on a home automation system that makes your life easier because it saves you 20% off your energy bill each month. It’s not the driving factor behind an automation system, but when your neighbors ask about it, you’re going to tell them that it saves tons of energy and it’s a lot of fun to control everything your house form your phone.
So let’s put all the ulterior motives on the table:
Lighting Control
You’ll tell the neighbors that you program all your lights to come on to 80% luminosity on a tap of the light switch because it saves you 20% of your lighting bill as you use less electricity and are kinder to mother earth. You actually got lighting control because you’re tired of the kids leaving the lights on around the house and you want the ability to hit one “goodnight” button and have every house in the entire house shut off without making the nightly rounds.
You also got it because you can put occupancy sensors in each room that turn the lights on when you enter the room, and shut them off when you leave, and it results in you never needing light switches again. Not to mention, you programmed them to only come on to 20% luminosity when you head to the kitchen for a midnight snack or the bathroom for a potty break so the bright lights don’t shock you into having trouble falling back asleep.
HVAC Control
You tell the neighbors that you got HVAC control because it saves energy every month by turning the various zones in your home to low power consumption mode when they aren’t in use. What actually swayed you was the ability to touch a button on your way home from the office so your home is the perfect temperature the second you walk through the door.
You didn’t tell your spouse this, but you were also excited about the fact you could quickly and easily change the temperature to your most comfortable setting from your iPad, and no one is the wiser.
How about your teenagers hanging out with their significant others in the theater room – wouldn’t you just love to make the room too warm to snuggle? Automation features are fantastic for pulling pranks!
Energy Monitoring
Last of all, you tell your neighbors that you have energy monitoring so you can continually optimize your energy usage as to be as environmentally conscious as possible. You actually got it because it’s awesome to see how much energy the appliances in the house use, and you want to shut them down remotely to save money. You love how you can teach the kids to check their consumption habits to train them to waste less of your money.
No matter your motivations, home automation is excellent for everyone to enjoy, and is a very convenient way to be greener and save money while you’re at it.
I’d love to hear your ulterior motives and green aspirations in the comments!
This article was written by AJ Wilcox who is the marketing manager for Big Fish Automation, a company that deals with home security in Utah, along with home automation and theaters. He loves using fun technology to be green and save energy, and also enjoys running and exotic sports cars.
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- Home Automation Systems
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The green benefit then becomes the second best reason for getting ourselves a home automation system. We have to admit, it’s fun AND we’re cool.
This is only applicable for large houses. You don’t need to have this if you’re living in a simple house.