To combat climate change, we all need to reduce CO₂ emissions. On the one hand by moving away from fossil fuels, on the other by consuming less. But of course we don’t want to sacrifice comfort. Fortunately, home automation and energy saving go hand in hand.

How does that work in concrete terms, saving energy with home automation?

It is often in small things, but many small things together make a big difference. The advantage is that, thanks to DOBISS home automation, energy saving takes no effort or time. Sometimes it literally happens automatically.

A few examples:

• You can switch off lights and electrical outlets with one ‘all off’ button. No more standby consumption or a forgotten light that has stayed on.
• Timers ensure that lights turn off automatically if no movement is detected.
• You regulate the heating efficiently with different schedules: one schedule for when your children stay at home and one for when they stay with your ex, a schedule for school holidays, for when you are travelling, for periods when you work from home, etc.
• In addition, you can create a separate schedule for each room, so that you really only heat the rooms where you are. 

I have a digital meter. Can I control my energy consumption better with home automation?

Yes! A digital meter gives you greater insight into your consumption (how much and at what time), and also into how much energy from your solar panels you are injecting into the grid. Thanks to the link with home automation, you can turn that digital meter into a smart meter.

You can better spread your consumption over time and thus avoid peaks. Important, because when your peak consumption is high, you’ll have to pay a higher capacity fee. So in this case, home automation does not directly save energy, but it does save costs.

Here too we give some concrete examples:

• Typical situation: you come home, you charge your car battery, put your laundry in the dryer, turn up your heat pump a few degrees and start cooking. So that’s a mega peak! With DOBISS home automation as energy manager you approach things differently: for example, you automatically switch on your heat pump at a time when your solar panels produce surplus electricity. The hot water is stored in a buffer tank and is released to your home in the evening when you get home.
• You can also automatically switch other appliances on or off depending on the availability of energy at that time, such as the swimming pool filter pump or the charger for your bicycle battery, the robotic lawnmower, the stick vacuum …
• If your peak capacity is nevertheless exceeded, you’ll receive a notification, so that you can adjust your home automation system/energy manager.