Save Energy With Your Smartphone

As smartphones are becoming more and more popular, it seems that there is a need for an ’app’ for everything. Besides plenty of games and business applications there are now also a lot of ’green’ ones available, which can even help people to save energy.

Energy-saving apps

There are four basic types of apps available in various app stores, which offer energy saving solutions.

Some give daily advice and information for users on how to consume less electricity, gas or water, and some even include consumption data of various home appliances, like Kill-O-Watts [1], Green Outlet [2], Watts Plus [3] or TV Energy Labels, which specifically lists the consumption data of various TV brands [4]. Shopgreen [5] logs the carbon-dioxide savings with an integrated EcoBank providing rewards for users, while MyEnergyTips [6] offers customised advice, and the This is Green app [7] lists a wide array of useful information.
Numerous apps offer direct connection to home electronic systems and networks, acting as a ’remote control’ for managing devices. These can be useful, for example, when the user forgot to switch off the lights before leaving the house, but can easily do so with the help of these state-of-the-art apps. Some examples include the ecobee Smart Thermostat [8] working via a WiFi network, Control4 My Home [9], or the Schlage LINK [10], which even enables the remote monitoring of doors.
A third type of app allows users to track their consumption, either that of gas, electricity or water in their homes, or the fuel used when driving.

Household consumption can be traced with the official British Gas App [11], through which also meter readings can be submitted; as well as with Meter Readings [12], MeterRead [13], or the My Water Diary [14] app.

Fuel consumption tracking is offered, amongst others, by the Carbon Footprint [15] or the GreenMeter [16] applications.

There are also a number of apps available for various types of smartphones, enabling interesting solutions and methods for saving energy.

The AlertMe Energy Map [17] shows the average total energy, electricity and gas consumption per household per year in a certain neighbourhood in the UK. Users thus can even compare their local data with other British boroughs.

The Sun Tracker app [18] gives information for users specifically to their location about the hours of direct sunlight for calculating solar energy for installations, while the SunPower Monitoring app [19] helps in monitoring the energy level generated by an already installed home solar system. Another interesting app is the The Create Green Energy [20], a guide on how to build cheap solar panels or wind turbines at home.

Overall, there are more and more apps available for the growing number of smartphones based on Apple’s, Blackberry’s or the Android operating system, which can help everyday people not only in saving energy but also at saving money.

[1] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/kill-o-watts/id330311949?mt=8

[2] http://itunes.apple.com/app/green-outlet/id329692231?mt=8#

[3] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/watts-plus/id305683166?mt=8#

[4] http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/tv-energy-labels/id405310644?mt=8#

[5] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/shopgreen/id303014966?mt=8

[6] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/myenergytips/id427176407?mt=8#

[7] http://www.eco20-20.com/this-is-green-iphone-app.html

[8] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ecobee-smart-thermostat/id339159185?mt=8

[9] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/control4-my-home-for-ipad/id364304056?mt=8

[10] http://www.appstorehq.com/schlagelink-iphone-28868/app

[11] http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/british-gas/id340473961?mt=8#

[12] http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/meter-readings/id320551309?mt=8#