The Truly Energy Efficient Home

It’s hard to get away from the idea of energy efficiency and conservation in the modern home. With the rapid expanse of technology in the energy sector, consumers and homeowners are presented with new ways to “go green” on a daily basis. Developers and home technologists alike have responded by striving to build more energy efficient homes and incorporating the latest technology.

There’s no shortage of options on the market that claim to increase energy efficiency at the press of a button. Everything from “smart” thermostats to wi-fi light bulbs offer the promise of a smaller carbon footprint in your home. While these technologies allows you to control and monitor your home remotely, and respond to certain cues to help reduce your energy consumption, they still rely on end user management. With GMI’s concierge level service, we take steps to ensure your system is working behind the scenes for a fully energy efficient home, without you having to think twice.  

We integrate thermostats directly into standard residential HVAC systems using industry standard wiring, and back to a Crestron control system processor for integrated control. The control system automatically adjusts temperature settings, enabling energy savings. The integrated security devices in your Crestron control system can even be programmed to send a signal to adjust your environmental systems to an energy efficient level when the home is unoccupied.

Automating your home’s energy use is not just programming components to adjust based on occupancy and schedules. Integrated lighting solutions achieve significant energy savings with fixed or flexible daylight harvesting, and advanced scheduling based on ambient light levels, season, time, occupancy, temperature, humidity and other conditions.

When tied into a high-level control system, shades are more than simply privacy measures. Shade systems can be automated in many of the same ways lighting can, such as season, time or actual ambient light levels. Automating your shades will also allow them to block direct sunlight, minimize glare and reduce air conditioning use, as well as use the direct sunlight to enhance heating system efficiency. Interfaces to shade motors provide true feedback to panels, indicating shade position in a bar graph or percentage gauge. Shades can be manually controlled via a graphical slider on the touchpanel or automated to adjust to the sun’s position.

It is for all of these reasons  and more that a DIY “smart” energy management system simply does not stand up to a truly automated home. By building clean and reliable automating systems according to lifestyle, and automatically managing corresponding sub-systems based on time of day, occupancy, and other environmental conditions, GMI makes your life and home greener.