Keep Your Cool In The Summer Heat
July 24, 2022
This summer has brought record heat to many parts of the US (and Europe for that matter). It has put a strain on power grids nationwide and produced sky-high electricity bills from running our air conditioners to keep our homes comfortable. As a follow up to last week’s post about smart thermostats, I wanted to offer some other options to beat the heat and not break the bank. Smart ceiling fans are one way to reduce your energy usage (and your power bill) without negatively impacting your comfort.
Using smart home technology and the integrations between devices can help automate the process of keeping your home cool. One way smart ceiling fans can help is by setting your thermostat to 82 degrees and triggering your smart ceiling fans to turn on in rooms with occupancy sensors. Do this when the temperature reaches 78 degrees can save upwards of 12% on the cost of cooling your home while maintaining a comfortable environment. And you won’t need to run out and buy new ceiling fans. There are a number of solutions for making your existing ceiling fans into smart ceiling fans so you won’t have to buy new fans.
According to research done in 2019 by Sense (the manufacturer of the Sense Energy Monitor), a 2,500 square-foot home in Arizona would cost $477 per month to keep cool. Other states where residents have to pay a high cost for cooling their home are New Jersey, Texas, Florida, Georgia, Connecticut, and New York. Homes larger than 2,500 square-feet will cost even more to keep cool. With this in mind, anything that can be done to lower the cost of cooling a home can save a homeowner a significant amount of money.
The US Department of Energy recommends that to balance energy savings and comfort a thermostat should be set to 78 degrees for air conditioning. And, again according to the US Department of Energy, each degree the set point on a thermostat is raised can result in a 3% increase in energy savings.
So, what if there was a way to raise the set point on your thermostat by up to four degrees, saving you up to 12% more on the cost of cooling your home, without impacting your comfort? The good news is that smart ceiling fans can make this possible.
Everyone appreciates how a breeze on a hot day can make you feel cooler than on a day where the air is still. Your body is cooled by the conduction of heat-to-air molecules. The more air movement there is, the more air molecules come into contact with your skin. Your body transfers heat to each air molecule it comes in contact with so the more air movement there is the cooler you will feel.
One of the best ways to create air movement in a home is with ceiling fans. Ceiling fans are much cheaper to operate than an air conditioning system. Breaking it down by simple costs:
- A central AC unit would cost about $129.60 per month
- Each ceiling fan would cost about $1.20 per month
According to the US Department of Energy, if you use air conditioning to cool your home, a ceiling fan will allow you to raise the thermostat setting about 4°F with no reduction in comfort. And, because a ceiling fan uses so much less energy than an air conditioner, using a fan this way will minimally impact the 12% savings outlined above.
Common fan manufacturers like Big Ass Fans, Modern Forms Fans, Minka Aire Fans, Hunter, and others offer “smart” ceiling fans. Hunter smart fans, for example, are compatible with Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and Apple HomeKit. Replacing a ceiling fan with a “smart” model, however, can be both challenging and expensive. Fortunately, there are ways to make your existing ceiling fan smart.
You could simply replace your wall-mounted fan controller with a Z-Wave fan controller that can be integrated with a SmartThings, Hubitat, or other smart home hub. Leviton and Jasco manufacture Z-Wave fan controllers that can replace your existing in-wall, wired, fan control.
If you’ve read many of my post on Smart Home on the Range, you know I’m a big Z-Wave fan. To recap why, Z-Wave is controlled locally (within your home) and avoids the dependency on wifi. This means your Z-Wave devices still operate even without internet access.
Another option, if your ceiling fan can be controlled wirelessly, is using a Bond Bridge to integrate control with a wide range of smart home platforms. The Bond Bridge is compatible with Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, SmartThings and Control4.
With these options and others that are available, it should be reasonably easy for a smart home owner to integrate their ceiling fans with their smart home processor/hub, add programming rules to use their ceiling fans as a first-stage cooling system in their home, and set back their thermostat to save money on their air conditioning.
Another way to keep your smart home cool is to mitigate heat gains. It’s always better to keep heat out in the first place rather than struggle to remove it later. Since we can’t turn down the searing heat of the summer sun, but you can take steps to minimize how much of that searing sun enters your home. Keep the windows closed and the drapes drawn on the sides of your home with sun exposure. That includes early eastern sun, peak southern midday sun, and evening western sun exposure.
This may be an option for friends and family who live in the northern US states and Canada who don’t have central air in their homes. Probably a good idea as well for my friends in the UK as they’ve been experiencing a stretch of record high temperatures. In speaking with one of them this week he shared that it’s rare if home have AC there.
Whether you have a small home that doesn’t have central air or a bigger home that does (but you don’t want to pay to cool every inch of it to the comfort level you prefer), window air conditioners are an effective solution for small spaces.
Bare-bones window units can cost as little as $150, but you’ll typically pay closer to $300 for a window AC if you want more features or more cooling power. A basic traditional model, like the Midea 8,000 BTU model, is typical of what you’d find in most homes with window AC units and generally available at big box retailers across the US.
However, if you rent or lease, you might not be able to use a window unit. Many apartment complexes and high-rise buildings prohibit the use of window air conditioners on the grounds that they don’t want the eyesore or risk hazard that comes with heavy air conditioners sticking out of windows.
That doesn’t mean you can’t use a portable air conditioner, however, as the machine remains entirely inside your home. Portable air conditioners sit inside the room or even the garage, for DIY projects during the summer heat. They have a similar profile to dehumidifiers or large air purifiers. They come in two basic types: single hose and double hose. The hoses are used to exhaust hot air outside your home through a spacer fitted in a nearby window
Single hose models are less efficient as they eject some of the conditioned air from your home. Double hose models are much more efficient as they pull air from the outside to assist in ejecting the waste heat, leaving the conditioned air in your home more or less undisturbed. A couple great dual-hose portable AC unit options are the Whynter ARC-14S 14,000 BTU Dual Hose Portable Air Conditioner or the Dreo TwinCool.
If you live in a part of the country with high humidity you may want to consider a dehumidifier — especially with the high temperatures lately. The higher the humidity, the harder it is to sweat effectively, and the more dangerous high temperatures become. If you’ve ever heard weather forecasters talking about the heat index or seen the RealFeel temperature on your favorite weather app, you’re seeing the effect of the ambient temperature and the humidity presented in a way that translates to human comfort (and risk).
If it’s 92° and around 40% humidity, it feels like it’s about 94°. That’s still pretty warm, but it’s not deadly hot, especially if you take it easy. But if it’s 92° and around 95% humidity, it feels like 127°. At that heat-index reading, you’re at risk of heat-related injury even if you’re sitting still and not exerting yourself. That’s an extreme example, of course, but you get the idea: the drier the air, the easier it is to tolerate higher temperatures. That’s why air conditioning doesn’t just cool the air, it also removes moisture to lower the humidity. This is also why some smart thermostats have a long-run dehumidification setting to further dry out your home to increase your comfort.
A great option for a home dehumidifier is the hOmeLabs 1,500 Sq. Ft Energy Star Dehumidifier. This unit is Energy Star certified and designed for medium to large rooms, to quickly and effectively absorb moisture without racking up your energy bill.
Hopefully these other options to cool your home have gotten you thinking about alternative ways to stay ahead of the heat and save some money. They may not seem like obvious smart home choices but can make a difference thanks to their integration capabilities. Their energy savings and automations make them attractive for your smart home. That may be the best part of smart home technology in general — so many options around so many solutions. It’s only limited by your imagination.
I’m curious how many of you may already be using smart ceiling fans, portable AC or dehumidifiers. Are you keeping it simple or integrating with other platforms? Do you use voice commands to manage your comfort level? If you’re using one of these above, what has your experience been with it? If you’re using a different model, which is it and how do you like it? Are you using occupancy sensors? Where have you or would you place them?
Let Debbie and I know in the comments, DMs and emails as we really enjoy hearing from you. Thanks again to all those following Debbie and I through our home building journey. It’s great to hear your success stories and suggestions as we move through the process. And if you like the content I’m posting each week, don’t forget to ‘Like’ and ‘Follow.’ Until next week …
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