Digital Home Thoughts - News & Reviews for the Digital Home

"The "smart grid" might not be a reality for most of us yet, but a clever combination of sensors, WiFi, and Web data provides unique feedback on your energy use. We tested the Hohm service with one of these devices, the ingenious PowerCost Monitor from Canada's Blue Line Innovations, to find out just how much you can learn from watching your home's energy use in real-time—and if that knowledge is worth the cost."

A good first step to more efficient energy usage is to get an idea of how much energy you use. There have been several tools in the past which help you do this, from an individual device like with the Kill-A-Watt, to an entire household, with the Black & Decker Power Monitor. Each of them are useful but they act like stand alone devices. Microsoft Hohm seems to be the next logical step, where information can be sent to a server and later analyzed. I live in an apartment, so Hohm seems to not be for me (The tracker attaches to your power meter) but it looks like a great way to get feedback on just how much power is being used. However, I used to live in a house, and Toronto Hydro was piloting a project with "smart meters" that allowed you to monitor your daily power consumption on their website. It was great for tracking but it did lack the real time feature. It is all a great start, though I hope that they will be able to offer a more granular service, such as a room by room, or fuse by fuse, solution.

This is all well and good, but the value of the site remains low for most US residents. Although residents of parts of California, Washington, and the Midwest can connect their utility providers directly to Hohm, providing more accurate monitoring, for most the option is unavailable.

The Microsoft Hohm service is a neat site that offers the ability to track your power consumption. While it is still in development, and of course, very unlikely to be seen in Canada, it is definitely a good service. Being able to identify your power consumption patterns can go a long way to reducing it. If helping the environment is not enough of an incentive, it can help you save money! It does not offer the ability to track things down to the per device level, but it is a start. I am hoping that some day, a company will come out with a product that will allow very detailed power consumption that can run through something like Z-Wave.

"Bringing people together to save energy and money Sign Up and start saving. It's free! Sign up with Hohm and we'll provide you with a home energy report and energy-saving recommendations tailored to your home. How can you get a personalized energy report for your home?"

Hohm (home and ohm, get it) became available for sign-up on Monday. I've gone through most of the questions (and there are quite a few) and it looks like they will be able to give some pretty detailed recommendations, especially for the energy efficiency novices. But, it looks like some of the best benefits will be for those who's utility meters are accessible by the service. My city recently installed smart meters, unfortunately, other than a digital readout, there is currently no benefit for the consumer, although the promise there will be later.