2 Thermostats - Run only one AC to Save Money

[c4steve]

I want to install two thermostats to run two AC units. When they both run at the same time my power demand charge is very expensive. Can the Control4 thermostats be programmed so only one AC unit will run at any given time? If yes, how is the programmed?

[RyanE]

You would have to manually write code (which you could do in ComposerHE) to change the mode of the thermostats programmatically. You could cycle between one being on Auto and the other being on Off mode with a timer.

Of course, this doesn't take into account if one of the units is asking for cool while the other is happily not needing it. You could certainly make this more complex to handle that sort of thing.

The biggest issue with this is that you're at that point having to do the handling of the setpoints basically yourself.

RyanE

[bebster]

You'd need to think through how complex you'd want this to be, as Ryan points out. You might consider having the setpoints set at 72 for example for each. Test to see if both are calling for AC.

And then execute code to figure out which of the 2 thermostats is the highest above 72, and turn that other one off, and after a short delay, turn the highest one on. That assumes that one doesn't have priority over the other. If one is the bedroom and the other the LR, then you might give priority to the bedroom after lights out. Lots of possibilities.

[jberger]

You could also use a TED with the Control4/Peak server to monitor your total power consumption and trigger events based on thresholds such as appliance use, demand charges, etc.

I'd think it would simplify the programming since you could force load shedding only when you were exceeding your thresholds.