Are you wondering what it’s like to have StrømKontroll installed at your place? Linda Ørstavik Öberg from the Landlords’ Association has recently had StrømKontroll installed and we have been allowed to share her experience. The article was written by Nina Granlund Sæther for the Huseiernes Landsforbund member magazine. Feel free to read the article here or take a look at the attachments at the bottom of the blog post.
If you are worried about formidable electricity prices and surprisingly high network rent, a simple electricity management system can perhaps reduce the stress level somewhat. Smart technology allows you to adjust the biggest loads from heating and hot water and thus save money.
Linda Ørstavik Öberg, who is an energy policy adviser at Huseierne, is very keen to reduce and relocate some of the family’s energy consumption. Together with her husband and two children, she lives in a relatively new and well-insulated detached house in Strømmen, a couple of miles from Oslo. An air-to-air heat pump is installed in the living room, and the electrical cables on the bathroom floor and in the hallway are controlled by thermostats. But how can she avoid the hot water tank switching on when the electricity price is highest, and how can she avoid using too much electricity at the same time so that the electricity rent does not rise? She therefore wants to test out Strømkontroll – a newly developed smart system from Futurehome.
The power control package contains a Smarthub, a HAN sensor, a thermostat and a 16 A relay. The smart hub is the brain that connects the smart products together and enables an energy-smart home. It is assumed that you have internet – because the smart hub must be connected to your router and power. The HAN sensor measures your power consumption in real time, while also providing historical data. The network company must open the HAN port before installation. The thermostat makes it possible to control the heat so that it takes account of high electricity prices and large loads. And with the relay, you can also control your water heater so that it does not heat the water when the electricity is most expensive. The price of the package is approx. NOK 10,000 – and then four hours of installation by an electrician is included in the price.
– The power pack is sold at a fixed price. But if you connect it to a hot water tank and at least one heating source, you can get 35 percent of the amount back from Enova, says service electrician Fredrik Friis Nielsen from Ørnulf Wiig installation, who has come to install the package at the Öberg family.
– If you have had an Easee, Zaptec or Defa electric car charger fitted within the last 20 months, and connect it to the smart hub, you can get support from Enova – a total of up to NOK 10,000. Then the StrømKontrollpakken will basically be free, points out Nielsen.
At Linda Ørstavik Öberg’s home, Nielsen has recommended that she expand the system with two more thermostats, and in addition install smart sockets in the boys’ rooms.
– When we bought panel ovens for the children’s rooms, we chose the cheapest ones instead of those with wifi. I have considered loose smart plugs, but I did not know that we could also switch to smart connectors, says Ørstavik Öberg.
Fredrik Friis Nielsen shows us a smart socket. It basically looks like a normal socket with the exception of a small push button next to one socket. He only takes a few minutes to replace the old one.
– A double connector like the one I’m installing here has one smart connector and one that is completely normal, he explains. The heaters are plugged into the smart part and can then be controlled together with the rest of the system.
A short time ago, smart water heaters were also launched. But the Öberg family’s hot water tank was only a couple of years old, so replacing it was completely out of the question. A small 16 amp relay included in the smart package from Futurehome makes it unnecessary to change the tank. It is installed by the electrician at the power outlet for the boiler and becomes invisible inside the wall.
After installation, electric car chargers, underfloor heating, panel heaters and hot water tanks can be controlled through an app. Futurehome also supports heat pumps through the external thermostat Sensibo Sky. The app has four different main modes, explains Nielsen: At home, away, night and holiday.
– The electrician who sets up the system sets how much the temperature should be lowered based, among other things, on the type of house and wishes, but can be changed by the home owner later. The modes can be used to activate day and night lowering, if, for example, you want to lower the temperature a few degrees at night or when the house is empty in the middle of the day.
The main point of the Strømkontroll package is to enable dynamic management of larger power loads in relation to the price of electricity and high simultaneous consumption, so that high network rent is avoided.
– But is it possible to prioritize what should be cut first, wonders Linda Ørstavik Öberg. Sometimes it is necessary to charge the car, while at other times it may be important to have enough hot water.
– Yes, it is possible, but in that case it must be programmed, replies Fredrik Friis Nielsen. Such programming is outside the set-up included in the fixed price
