Nest Learning Thermostat

reply on April 19, 2012 by stephenpace

@qyudtcat says Nest will not save energy but not why. I think that it is true that a properly configured automatic thermostat will yield much of the savings of the Nest; however, two points on that: 1) many people have difficulty setting their smart thermostats and end up with blanket settings that they never change and 2) no thermostat on the market I'm aware of has a motion detector that can detect when you are actually home and away. Unless you remember to tell your thermostat that you are leaving EVERY TIME YOU LEAVE then yes, the Nest will save energy. The Nest will also adjust your program over time, for instance, if it sees you getting up 15 minutes earlier every day. The argument really is, will the savings the Nest provides ever recoup the initial cost over 10 years? I don't know the answer to that, but every time I change the temp via my iPhone I smile, and yes, it looks cool. @quidycat may feel something better may come along in the future, but for me, the future is now.