Texas homes heat up as power companies alter smart thermostats
Texas homeowners have discovered their homes are getting warmer despite the use of air conditioning, with the discovery that energy companies are remotely adjusting the thermostat to higher temperatures with minimal warning.
Residents in Houston and surrounding areas have complained that their thermostats have been increasing in temperature, seemingly on their own. Rather than keeping the house cool, the thermostats have been remotely tampered with to operate at a warmer temperature.
In one example aired by WFAA, the English family of Deer Park discovered such a situation on Wednesday. Brandon English returned home that day to discover his wife and daughters had lowered the temperature at 2:30pm, but it had been changed while they had a nap.
The house had risen in temperature to 78 degrees, English said, and that his wife and kids "woke up sweating." He was concerned about his three-month-old daughter potentially dehydrating from the heat in the unbearably hot home.
Later, his wife received an alert advising their thermostat was changed remotely as part of a three-hour "energy-saving event."
It was determined that the family's thermostat was enrolled into a program called "Smart Savers Texas," operated by EnergyHub. As part of an agreement, EnergyHub could remotely control the thermostat during a period of high energy demand, in exchange for entry into sweepstakes.
The changes occur during a period in the summer where homeowners are putting a strain on the power grid to keep their homes cool with air conditioning. On Wednesday, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas urged residents to raise their thermostats to reduce the strain on the power grid.
In a statement received by Gizmodo, EnergyHub said "During a demand response event, Smart Savers Texas increases the temperature on participating thermostats by up to four degrees to reduce energy consumption and relieve stress on the grid. Every participant actively agrees to the terms of the program and can opt-out of a demand response event at any time."
EnergyHub says it works with a number of smart thermostat vendors, including some that offer thermostats with HomeKit support. The list includes Ecobee, Honeywell, and Lux, as well as Google's Nest, which pledged support for the Apple-backed smart home protocol Matter in May, meaning HomeKit support for Nest thermostats is in development.
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Residents in Houston and surrounding areas have complained that their thermostats have been increasing in temperature, seemingly on their own. Rather than keeping the house cool, the thermostats have been remotely tampered with to operate at a warmer temperature.
In one example aired by WFAA, the English family of Deer Park discovered such a situation on Wednesday. Brandon English returned home that day to discover his wife and daughters had lowered the temperature at 2:30pm, but it had been changed while they had a nap.
The house had risen in temperature to 78 degrees, English said, and that his wife and kids "woke up sweating." He was concerned about his three-month-old daughter potentially dehydrating from the heat in the unbearably hot home.
Later, his wife received an alert advising their thermostat was changed remotely as part of a three-hour "energy-saving event."
It was determined that the family's thermostat was enrolled into a program called "Smart Savers Texas," operated by EnergyHub. As part of an agreement, EnergyHub could remotely control the thermostat during a period of high energy demand, in exchange for entry into sweepstakes.
The changes occur during a period in the summer where homeowners are putting a strain on the power grid to keep their homes cool with air conditioning. On Wednesday, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas urged residents to raise their thermostats to reduce the strain on the power grid.
In a statement received by Gizmodo, EnergyHub said "During a demand response event, Smart Savers Texas increases the temperature on participating thermostats by up to four degrees to reduce energy consumption and relieve stress on the grid. Every participant actively agrees to the terms of the program and can opt-out of a demand response event at any time."
EnergyHub says it works with a number of smart thermostat vendors, including some that offer thermostats with HomeKit support. The list includes Ecobee, Honeywell, and Lux, as well as Google's Nest, which pledged support for the Apple-backed smart home protocol Matter in May, meaning HomeKit support for Nest thermostats is in development.
Keep up with everything Apple in the weekly AppleInsider Podcast -- and get a fast news update from AppleInsider Daily. Just say, "Hey, Siri," to your HomePod mini and ask for these podcasts, and our latest HomeKit Insider episode too.If you want an ad-free main AppleInsider Podcast experience, you can support the AppleInsider podcast by subscribing for $5 per month through Apple's Podcasts app, or via Patreon if you prefer any other podcast player.AppleInsider is also bringing you the best Apple-related deals for Amazon Prime Day 2021. There are bargains before, during, and even after Prime Day on June 21 and 22 -- with every deal at your fingertips throughout the event.
Comments
As for it being it Texas, that doesn't matter. I've seen these programs in California as well. Both these states are in a heat wave.
We’re these participants seduced into entering this program by offering them a sweepstake prize or did they enter a sweepstake and the energy control was part of the fine print?
Are thermostats currently under HomeKit allow for third party alteration or are these merely thermostats that could be HomeKit controlled but currently aren’t?
Why does the Ecobee thermostat show it set to 72 degrees when the example home had theirs adjusted to 78 which would exceed the “by up to 4 degrees” limit?
If I set my thermostat to 62, does that mean it would be reset to 66?
Who in the world other than entitled rich people calls 78 degrees unbearably hot?
Why should we care that entitled rich people are sweating?
This was Texas. Have you not lived in the south or an area with extreme heat? If your AC turns off and you’re in a far room away from the thermostat you’ll start sweating pretty quickly before the thermostat in the living room catches up to the heat. This problem needs to be solved.
These consumers accepted "smart" wifi-enabled controllers for their a/c systems in exchange for a rebate or entry into a contest. The incentive for the electric utilities is that they can adjust the temperature when the grid is strained. This is kind of a good thing, although if the utilities were smart they would keep this sort of tampering to within 5º changes.
The real scandal here is that the utilities are so badly run, and that they have to resort to this sort of nonsense to keep the power running while the executives give each other million dollar bonuses every year. The scandal is kleptocracy.
On a different note, maybe Texas should be investing their time and money into a more robust power grid if they want to be on their own and not on some stupid border wall they don't need. Did they not learn anything from earlier this year?
As for the Texas power grid, you are incorrect. Texas should connect to the national power grid and give up the inane idea of going alone. But instead the National Laboratory For Bad Government (the Texas Legislature) decided it should use it’s time to restrict women’s access to health care, attack trans kids and do it’s best to keep people from voting. Seriously, the border wall is pretty low on their list of bad idea.
I thought only the user had access to their smart devices. The fact 3rd parties can control them is scary.
I would post examples but use your own imagination if you’re gonna dismiss a point so easily.
it is like setting up auto pay for your electric bill and then being surprised that your bill was automatically paid.
I have been reading AI for over 20 years, but if you keep churning out trash like this, you will quickly fall off of my bookmarks. There are plenty of other reputable sites covering Apple that post the same news as you do, just as timely. Clearly they are more informed about the topics they are reporting.
Engadget similarly posted a trash story about smart thermostats a few years back (here), and I promptly removed them from my news feed and have not been back.
Absolutely complete bullshit. 78 degrees is THE recommended setting for energy saving. 78 F is NOT ‘unbelievably hot’. A Three month old will NOT dehydrate in 78 degree heat. I can’t believe the bullshit of this article. Beats said: All of your posts in this thread have been abject, histrionic fear mongering.
And this is just the beginning. Expect mandatory environmental control to increase as demand for energy rises geometrically while fossil fueled power plants are shut down, hydroelectric dams are blown up, and nuclear plants are blocked at every turn by environmentalists. Fusion power will remain a pipe dream for decades to come. Wind and solar panels cannot store enough energy to meet daily loads, let alone base loads.