Microsoft opens Hohm to energy monitoring

Microsoft opened up its Hohm Web application on Monday to U.S. users, a site that gives people a starting point for cutting home energy use.

The launch of Hohm, still in beta, was marred at least for some people, including me, by a DNS problem on Microsoft's side, according to the Hohm product development team. An hour or two after the launch, a few other consumers on Twitter complained of sign-in problems that lasted a few hours.

Once that glitch was cleared up, I was able to finish creating a profile in Hohm for my old New England house. Overall, I'd say it's a useful service that meets its goal of being easy to use.

The "brains" behind Hohm's energy-efficiency recommendations is an existing database that Microsoft licensed from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy. That means much of the basic information on how to save money on energy bills has been available for some time from the Energy Department and other sources, if in a disjointed and less attractive form.

(Credit: Screen capture by Martin LaMonica/CNET)

I was able to create a nearly complete profile because I've been chipping away at my home energy use for years. (How many of you know what your home's air leakage rate is?) I also did some on-the-spot estimating, which I would expect most people would need to do.

In fact, some of the questions are incredibly detailed, such as what's the capacity of your refrigerator expressed in cubic feet? Rather than pretend that I'd be able to find the manual, I went online and got an idea of what a fridge like mine typically holds.

There are also some places where inevitably there will be gaps and guesses. For instance, I have radiators so I couldn't say where my ducts are located (in conditioned space or not) and being very precise about say, programmable thermostat settings, can be tricky. Also, there are a lot of questions which will no doubt scare some people away.

That said, it's a worthwhile exercise to run through the roughly 200 questions, even if you can't answer them. Why? It offers strong clues as to what matters most when it comes to cutting your energy bills. Whether your PC and monitor uses power-management features is significant enough for Hohm to care.

Man versus machine
But on your first visit, it's really the energy report that you're after. Although Hohm's recommendations perplexed me a few times, on balance it provided solid information.

Put another way, I'd say Hohm echoed the advice of the three energy auditors who have traipsed through my house over the past few years. It also features a "library" with generic recommendations to help people get ready for the summer and there are tips sprinkled on the News section.

Not surprisingly, the recommendations are extremely unglamorous: replace (more) incandescent bulbs, insulate boiler pipes, lower the temperature on the water heater, and so on.

A few things threw me off. Get a high-efficiency boiler for $1,000? Not where I live. But when I clicked on that recommendation, Hohm notes that's the do-it-yourself price and offers a ballpark cost ($8,000) for a professional job.

Hohm doesn't quite measure up to a knowledgeable human being. I paid for an energy audit, complete with a blower door test, this past winter and the recommendations were specific to my situation and very detailed.

But that's OK. Most people just want some good ideas on greening their home and Hohm does that. What I like most is that it creates a list, from which you can develop a plan. Because let's face it, nobody's going to weatherize their home in one weekend.

Where to start? Hohm gives you a starting point for making a home energy-efficiency plan.

(Credit: Screen capture by Martin LaMonica/CNET)

How does this compare to Google's PowerMeter or other home energy-monitoring tools?

Monitoring products tend to focus on providing a real-time read-out of energy use. In its first beta version, Google's PowerMeter, for example, surfaces information on how much electricity individual appliances consume and provides daily charts.

Down the road, both Microsoft and Google are interested in expanding their products so consumers can participate in demand-response programs, where a utility can remotely adjust appliances to save energy during peak times. In the meantime, though, many smart-grid products are just trying to give consumers more detailed information than a monthly bill.

Because my utilities aren't providing a data feed to Microsoft, I wasn't able to view my electric and natural gas use without manually entering the data. If a feed were available, I think I would use it to get a better feel for seasonal changes and improvements I've made.

Actual consumption data would also create a far more accurate profile for my home, particularly when comparing to others. For example, I had solar panels installed on my house last year, which has slashed my overall consumption but that's not reflected in the model Hohm creates.

If there were a feature that I'd like to have, on first blush I'd say it's the ability to add my own items to the recommendations so I could treat Hohm like my to-do list.

The community site is bare bones at this point though I could see that being useful and fun. But in the meantime, it's nice to see that, according to my profile, I'm no slacker on cutting energy compared to my neighbors

[kuraimauri]

microsoft is making too much independent products, hohm and lots of others like community clips should be added to windows live brand or at least promoted on the windows live homepage.

[Underavenue]

200 questions are a bit much, especially when it's asking me how many BTUs my water heater uses. It took too long for the paltry results.

[mlamonica]

yeah, there are a lot of questions but a lot are skippable. You need to be motivated to actually cut your home energy use.

[mishmash0101]

Useless.

[sanenazok]

What do you mean? It told me to put in CFL's and seal off leaks! Wow thanks! Oh and when I replace the furnace it should be with an efficient model. Thanks so much!

[discern]

Not another silent "h." How do we say it? Ho-hum. (I get that it's a play on home and Ohm). It does hold promise in being a superb waster of time that each visitor will use exactly once (and most won't bother to complete). Way to go Macrohard!

[lennie22]

if u dont want to try and save on the cost owning a home then thats your problem. I bet you don't even know how to change a speedy valve. you probably don't even know what that is. there are people who actually want to save money and not waste it. this might be a waste of time for you because you probably don't own a home.

[walletless]

To be fair, most of the questions seemed optional and relavant. If you really want to conserve energy, these are all fair questions to ask for assesment. Unfortunately, for me, there were a lot of "don't know" because I do not own the house but rent it, and only the owner would know the answers. Still a good effort, and for a change, it does not require you to have windows or office or live installed. I am glad it is not bundled into other live products and encourages individual users like me to try it out without needing any installs or OS dependency.

[4smartgrid]

Looking at some energy saving suggestions from Hohm, they are nice points but wouldn?t they be good to have regardless of the user?s energy consumption? Also does one need to continuously use the service once they learn and change their behavior? is it sustainable biz model, in other words

[jacomo]

Both systems are missing a key ingredients and appear to be focused on the wrong entity.
1. Monitoring and reporting is very limited unless one can manage the consumption of the whole house Energy as well as the individual appliances.
2. the focus appears to be on the Utility being able to gain access to and manage the energy, versus the systems allowing the Home or Business Owner to get access to and be able to manage the various devices that are actually consumming the resource.
What is needed is a series of devices (in this case Internet Communication Modules) assigned to the various systems involved in energy use (ie. Thermostat-Lighting-Water and Electric Meter) that allows both Utility and Owner the ability to remotely access the home and the individual device in order to manage/control the usage.
In addition, the focus remains on the Electric grid while the home also has a need to manage the water consumption, provide access to Video Surveillance systems, Door entry systems as well as Security/Alarms systems.
Take a look at a company called In2Networks and what they offer. They address all of the above capabilities and allow the consumer to monitor and control all of the above mentioned devices.

Jim. A
Service Provider

[open4energy]

At the heart of the issue is our attitude to energy saving.

In our studies we are finding that the majority of saving come from being aware of how energy is being used (reading is a good way to find this out) and then willing to make changes.

Like, buy an energy saving bub, and replace the old one in your home office. Saves 3 times the energy your computer uses. For facts see - http://open4energy.com

Frequent use of the "e-finger" - will save 24% of laptop energy, and that on top of the best power settings.

I have found the "e-bend" works well - unplugging the older vampire power devices when not needed.