Some Thoughts on TED

Thoughts about the Gadget:

Too Much Juice: TED delivers what it promises, but in surprisingly non-green way. I say this because the RDU (the "Receiving Data Unit" - the little white box with the LCD display) does not cache any of the data that it collects. Therefore, if you want to be able to analyze anything, you have to keep your computer on and logging data. For as cheap as flash storage is these days and as compact as these files are - why not throw a couple of GB in there and let the user download to their computer 1x per week (or live if they choose). TED brags that it only consumes 6 watts. Sure it does, but when you add in my computer, then you get a number roughly 10x that. So, if the TED designers didn't want to pay for the flash memory, fine, include a USB port that was thumb-drive compatible. Keep logging onto that device until it runs out of space.

Weak Software: The Footprints software is pretty much useless at this point. It installed just fine and connected to the RDU (the most important aspect) and began logging the information. Unfortunately, now I just get a blank white screen with the same symbol my browser gives me when it can't find an image. Impressive. And, if I turn it off to troubleshoot, it will lose data. Great.

Stupidly Aggregating Data: The TED 1002 model that I have gets two separate signals from the two separate circuit breaker panels that the MTUs are located in. Why does the log only include one total consumption number? The whole point of this device is to measure usage so that it can be curbed or eliminated. TED loses valuable segmentation on where the load is coming from when it is available for free. An astoundingly bad design choice.

Thoughts about the Data:
My average electricity usage over the displayed time is 5.01 kWh/hr - pretty high. That would mean (if I assume a similar average profile over the course of a month) that I could expect and electric bill of $328.01. This is built up on an $0.088/kWh (I believe the current Dominion average rate) * 744 hours in a 31 day month * 5.01 kWh/hr.

Last month (actually January 12 - February 9), I used a total of 7616 kWh, which I find astounding. That equates to roughly a 10.5 kWh/hr average usage rate. Based on what I've seen so far, that basically means that the heat pump (using resistive heat) upstairs ran continuously for the entire month. The heat pump must go!

Further Extensions:
It looks like there has been some hacking about the TED database. This could allow me to set up a process by which the tick data is uploaded real-time to a local MySQL server and the data available for jpgraph display and analysis in 'R'. Sounds like a good project for the kids. . .