Smart Furnaces: A Look At The Pros And Cons

Posted on: 14 September 2020

When it is time to pick the type of heat system you want for your home, you will be faced with a fully impressive list of options, especially if you are going with an electric furnace. However, a type of electric furnace that may stand out to you are those bearing that attractive "smart" label. Going with a smart furnace could mean a lot of things depending on the model, but there is an automatic expectation that a smart heating system could potentially simplify your life and save you money. Here are a few pros and cons of smart furnaces to help you decide if heating installation would be a good investment for you and your home. Vi

Pro: Smart furnaces can be remotely controlled. 

Con: You do have to have the furnace connected to the internet. 

One of the biggest attractors of the smart furnace is the fact that it can be controlled remotely via a mobile device. For example, if you want to turn the heat off or down after you leave for work, you can get n your phone and do so, which will drastically cut your energy usage 

Pro: A smart furnace can actually learn your schedule and adjust heat levels to accommodate. 

Con: Smart furnaces can learn, but what they learn is not always accurate. 

Some of the more modern smart furnaces are equipped with the ability to learn your everyday schedule. At first, this can sound a little too AI and futuristic, but the reality is, the system uses motion sensors to know when you are home and memory functions to recall when you normally turn the heat up or down throughout the day. This automated adjusting essentially means you have a furnace that adjusts itself to make you comfortable and save you money. Of course, this "learning" function is not intuition; it is merely following your patterns, so you may still have to do some manual adjusting.

Pro: Your smart furnace may be equipped with maintenance sensor technology to detect problems. 

Con: Maintenance sensor technology is relatively new and not full proof. 

Maintenance sensor technology is showing up in every type of home appliance you can imagine, including the electric furnace. These sensors are designed to detect certain problems and alert the owner when something needs to happen. For example, the system may send you an automated alert if a sensor detects the furnace is overheating or when the filter needs to be changed. As great as this technology is, it is relatively new, so measuring its long-term effectiveness as a worthy feature to pay for can be questionable. 

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