According to Value Walk, a news and opinion website that covers financial and investing news, “Five years ago, just 13 percent of American households had some sort of smart technology integrated into their homes. In 2019, it’s anticipated that at least 38 percent of American households will have entered the market.”
Energy and cost savings are the two largest drivers in the global smart housing market, but there are a number of other important factors contributing to its growth—including the increasingly aging population and the marked improvements in comfort and convenience.
Let’s explore the auxiliary perks of the smart home and discover how you can help your customers take advantage of the smart home technology available today.
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Smart homes still face the problems of subpar intelligence hampering functionality. But as intelligence systems mature, including more sophisticated algorithms, activity recognition methods and prediction accuracy, smart homes will transform and become more desirable. The gold standard: a multi-agent, interoperable system with distributed intelligence by integrated smart appliances across platforms. In simpler terms, it means all appliances and applications working together seamlessly, despite running on different platforms. To get there, here are five trends that herald the smart home 2.0.
The idea of a smart home is attractive for a number of reasons, including convenience, safety and a sleek home aesthetic. From an industry standpoint, one of the most compelling advantages is that it increases energy efficiency by reducing unnecessary usage. In fact, according a 2018 ACEEE report, Energy Impacts of Smart Home Technologies, “U.S. homes can lower their energy use by up to one-sixth simply by incorporating smart technologies.” And with each new iteration, the technology becomes more viable, affordable and user-friendly.
Here are seven of the most promising areas of smart home living – and the potential cost savings from adopting each one.
Although sales of smart home devices are ramping up, the daunting prospect of compatible platform integration, or interoperability, is still scaring off prospective consumers.
Among the wide variety of factors that influence whether a water savings program is successful, a few themes stand out as best practices. According to the ACEEE report “Saving Watts to Save Drops: Inclusion of Water Efficiency in Energy Efficiency Programs,” these four areas are key to determining a program’s viability.
Several programs have shown demonstrable, proactive thinking in their approach to maximizing water and energy conservation by seeing the two goals as interdependent. Here are three of the most notable for creating a new standard of best practices.
In recent years, the relationship between water and energy, referred to as the energy-water nexus, has become a more compelling focus for energy efficiency programs. Researchers and practitioners are increasingly interested in better understanding this relationship in order to design integrated programs to manage energy and water in tandem. The ACEEE report “Saving Watts to Save Drops: Inclusion of Water Efficiency in Energy Efficiency Programs” laid out specific criteria for assessing the viability of water saving energy efficiency programs. It also serves well as a template for designing a successful program.
Here are five essential considerations to integrate into a well-planned water savings program.
Appliance standards are a hot issue in our current energy efficiency landscape. According to the 2018 State Energy Efficiency Scorecard from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), states have historically led the way in establishing standards for appliances and other equipment.
State government has enormous sway in advancing energy efficiency policies. But state government goes beyond traditional energy offices to include public universities, economic development agencies and general services agencies. State government gets involved in energy efficiency through these entities to focus on three common initiatives: financial incentive programs for consumers, businesses and industry; lead-by-example policies and programs to improve the energy efficiency of public facilities and fleets; and research and development for energy efficiency technologies and practices.
In light of a recent UN report on climate change, the need for energy efficiency has taken on even more urgency. Scientists warn that to avert the damages of global warming, we need to make massive changes to the way that we live our lives. The 2018 UN report says it will take nothing less than “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society.”
