I wrote this post to answer one question–Is a programmable thermostat worth the expense?
This was my second winter I have lived in my house. The first winter beginning in December of 2009, I neglected to buy and install a programmable thermostat. In November of 2010, looking for ways to lower my gas bill, I decided to make the purchase. The thermostat cost $40. Looking at the installation, average temperature, the historical price of gas, and the gas bills themselves, do programmable thermostats really save you money?
Let’s find out…
Installation
I joke that the only tool I own is a checkbook. In other words, I wasn’t born with the handyman gene. In all honesty, after purchasing the thermostat it sat in my closet for two weeks. I was afraid that if I installed it, I would break something.
It turns out, the installation process was much easier then I thought. It took only 30 minutes.
What I’m trying to say is, if I could install a programmable thermostat, ANYONE can.
Reviewing my Gas Bill
The first step to finding out if a programmable thermostat actually saved me money this winter is to compare gas bills for the winter months of this year and last.
Gas Bill for Winter 2009/2010
- December = $98.53
- January = $102.17
- February = $211.32
- Total = $412.02
Gas Bill for Winter 2010/2011
- December = $41.39
- January = $121.12
- February = 121.95
- Total = $284.46
- Total Savings = $127.56
What was the Weather Like?
I paid $127.56 less for gas during the three coldest months of the year this year over last year. Was this savings due to the programmable thermostat or was it just due to the weather?
Here are the average temperatures from last winter compared to this winter.
Average Low Temperature in Winter 2009/2010 for:
- December = 26 degrees
- January = 20 degrees
- February = 26 degrees
- Average = 24 degrees
Average Low Temperature in Winter 2010/2011 for:
- December = 21 degrees
- January = 20 degrees
- February= 25 degrees
- Average = 22 degrees
Even with a lower average temperature by 2 degrees, my gas bills were still $127.56 lower this year.
The Price of Natural Gas
The next variable I need to look at is the actual price of gas. Was the savings due to the programmable thermostat or from a decrease in the price of natrual gas?
Here is the comparison in cost from this winter to last.
Natural Gas Cost Per Therm
| 2009/2010 | 2010/2011 | % Change | |
|---|---|---|---|
| December | .5563 | .4655 | -16.3% |
| January | .6751 | .4933 | -26.9% |
| February | .6481 | .5238 | -19.2% |
| Average | .6265 | .4942 | -21.1 |
What was my Total Savings?
It’s hard to predict the exact savings from installing a programmable thermostat because I don’t know how to measure the impact of temperature changes. Based on my results, I did have considerably lower bills this year. Part of that was due to the price of natural gas decreasing. The majority came from the only variable that changed this year to last–the programmable thermostat.
By looking at the $40 purchase price of a programmable thermostat as in investment, I’m comfortable saying that I doubled my return in just three months. In other words, an $80 savings. One of the best $40 investments I’ve ever made and one that if you haven’t made yet, you should.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Congratulations, I agree, programmable thermostats are great. In addition to the cash savings you also save the environment. People should also consider high efficiency furnaces when they are replacing them – I did it last year and the saving are huge (I am saving over 35%) – mine also has high efficiency AC.
Wow…35%. I don’t use AC much but to just save $80 in a span in three months is well worth it.
Great number crunching. These thermostats are no brainers it seems. I’m pretty sure they are part of the building code here in Canada. This is the sort of thing our site discusses a lot – how being green WILL save you green.,
@Sustainable PF – Love the site concept. Looks great.
If you saved your utility statements (or can access them online), then you could eliminate the variable for the price of natural gas and just look at the units of energy used (ccf, I think–centi-cubic feet?). Besides, the full price fluctuations in natural gas markets doesn’t necessarily get passed on to you immediately.
Additionally, the average LOW temperature probably isn’t as good of a parameter to compare so much as just the average temperature during your evaluated period. Of course, we’d both expect the correlation between the two to be strong.
And finally, your comparison is also assuming relatively constant usage of hot water, the stove, a gas clothes-dryer, possibly; plus, environmentally, sunshine and wind levels–both of which have a much larger impact than most people realize.
There’s a sure path to madness in all of this. Still, I very much enjoyed your post.
Thanks for the comment Cooley. You brought up a lot of good points that I didn’t think about. There sure is a lot of madness to exactly how much I saved. I’ll probably have to do an update next year.
Wow! You appear to have done well, although the existence of other natural gas uses does complicate things.
I had exactly the opposite experience: power costs went up after I installed a programmable thermostat; went way down when I replaced it with a nonprogrammable. My house is heated and cooled with electricity, though; water and cooking don’t figure in to the electric bill, making the calculation a little more self-evident.
Interesting. Maybe the change is due to my old obsession with tweaking the temperature. Coley brought up a good point, there are a lot of other variables.
Funny about money –
This is what I realized yesterday from Get Rich Slowly, and what very well might have happened in your case…
You say “electricity,” which I assume means a heat pump. When your thermostat was maintaining a temperature, your relatively efficient heat pump was doing all of the work. Your programmable thermostat allowed the temperature to drift down, but then it suddenly demanded a comfortably warm house again. Normally, this would be fine, and it would still save you money, except for the fact that when the difference between setpoint and actual temperatures exceeds a certain value (maybe 5 degrees?), the system will activate the auxiliary heater in addition to the heat pump because it assumes that you desire the home to warm up more quickly. The auxiliary heater is electric resistance, which is just about the least efficient you can get. It’s essentially just running a fan across a giant toaster.
So you could tweak your system to not activate the auxiliary heat under these circumstances. Or, you might be able to sidestep it by having the system slowly step up the heat, perhaps one or two degrees per hour, so that the thermostat never sees that large differential.
Or, like we do, just forget about it altogether and keep it at 68. If we go away for the weekend or longer, we turn it down to 50.