I’ve got grand ambitions to use home automation to optimise the energy efficiency of my new build, as well as for other convenient ways to streamline my daily life. I’ve written here about a very inspiring off-grid home using home automation to manage power use really impressively. And I’ve written here about Home Assistant, the open source (free) software that I’m using, and all kinds of energy efficiency wins that people are getting from it.
Why did I pick Home Assistant?
My starting point was researching good solutions for CCTV systems. In some of my previous renos I’ve installed various hard-wired systems – alarms, smart heating, CCTV – that never really fulfilled their potential, and some of which fell out of use. My ideal was a solution that was primarily local, cheap, flexible, and did not tie me into a relationship with proprietary hardware or software, and Home Assistant turned out to fit that bill well. The flip side of that is that it’s very DIY, can drive me nuts trying to figure out how to do something, and I’m not expert enough to tell you how it’s stability, security or long-term viability may compare to any of the other options.
Also, it dawned on me that I didn’t have to wait until I’d built my house to get started with Home Assistant. I will likely be wiring various things in to my new home, including CCTV, that I’ll run using Home Assistant. But, I looked around my sitting room and realised that I already had a few devices that I could connect to it in the house I was renting, and I could use those to start learning the system.
What have I done so far?
Although my interest originally was based on CCTV, and a lot of my long term ambitions revolve around energy efficiency, and really optimising how I’ll use the solar power I’ll be producing, I’ve already been able to implement things that I’m finding useful!
- An alert to my phone when the washing maching finishes.
- An alert to my phone when the dishwasher finishes.
- During the hot, hot summer here in Perth, Western Australia, an alert to my phone in the evening, when the outside temperature drops below the inside temperature, and it’s time to open the windows to start flushing heat. As we moved through the season, this happened anywhere from 3pm to 11pm (or sometimes, not at all, and I knew that I needed to run the aircon overnight). This heat flushing is a traditional, very effective, and completely free way of managing the excess summer heat, and my nifty little alert gave me summer evenings that were both more comfortable and cheaper! Win win.
- In the sitting room, if I say “Alexa, TV please”, Home Assistant turns on the TV and soundbar (using a little infra red blaster that I bought) and my Fire TV stick (using both infra red and Bluetooth, I believe), and clicks the Fire TV through to the last app that I was using there.
- I can do the same thing with the three lamps in my sitting room. They also come on automatically 15 minutes before sunset, and turn themselves off at 9pm to encourage me to start going to bed.
- I can control the TV, soundbar and lamps as well from the Home Assistant app on my phone, so I’ve been able to tidy away the remotes.
- I’m also using the Home Assistant app on my phone to maintain several shopping lists and To Do lists, which I’m finding handier than other places that I’ve used for this previously.
I’m working on controlling my two airconditioners using Home Assistant – an old dumb one using infra red for remote control, and a newer smart-enabled one using WiFi, but I haven’t cracked either of those yet. I bought a touchscreen monitor on Facebook Marketplace for AU$40 (US$27) that I’m planning to turn into a Home Assistant wall panel, but I’m still working on that too, I need to also buy something like a Raspberry Pi to run the screen. Patience, patience. Perseverence, perseverence. Step by step by step!
How did I do that?
Full disclosure, you’re better off looking elsewhere for any kind of step-by-step instructions on this! I’m totally fumbling around. But, I’m getting there, just using Google, YouTube and the Facebook groups. It’s all very do-able if you’re happy tinkering around and working it out.
What did I buy?
So, I’ve got Home Assistant interacting with a bunch of things I already had in the house, including:
- My WiFi router.
- My smart phone.
- An Alexa smart speaker.
- My TV, sound bar and Fire TV stick.
- And I’m working on adding in my two airconditioners.
And I bought:
- A Home Assistant Green minicomputer, to run the Home Assistant software for AU$150 (US$101). You can also use a Raspberry Pi, and old laptop, or lots of other things, I believe. I chose the path that looked easiest!
- An air temperature and quality monitor (IKEA VINDSTYRKA), as pictured at the top of this post for AU$59 (US$40), which uses Zigbee to communicate.
- A Zigbee dongle (ConBee III) to add Zigbee functionality to my Home Assistant Green for AU$69 (US$46).
- A smart plug (IKEA TRÅDFRI) to control my three lamps AU$12 (US$8), I forget how that communicates.
- Two energy-monitoring smart plugs (TP-Link Tapo P100), for my washing machine and dishwasher, which use WiFi to communicate for AU$15 (US$10) each.
- An infra red blaster (RM Broadlink RM4 mini), to add remote control functionality AU$35 (US$24).
Everything has a wired power supply, I’ve been avoiding battery-operated devices because of the hassle of changing them, plus the environmental impact.
What did it cost?
So my total cost to date is AU$355 (US$239). This doesn’t stack up financially relative to the small things I’m using the system for at the moment, but it’s going to be foundational to energy savings, home security, and more, for my new build.
Portable from house to house
Nothing I have so far is hard-wired into the house, it’s all portable. I actually just moved house, and thought that would be a nightmare, but I just plugged it all back in and it carried on working perfectly.
Adding cloud functionality
I also signed up to Nabu Casa, a cloud service for Home Assistant (US$65 per year), which if I recall correctly is non-profit and puts funding back into the Home Assistant open source project. This is optional, there’s nothing stopping you from having an entirely local Home Assistant installation.
In the first instance, I did it so that I could tick off my To Do list in real time in the supermarket. In the longer term, so I can access all the features of my Home Assistant while I’m away from home.
A work in progress
I’ll give you an update one day, when I progress from baby steps to toddler steps!
In the meantime, head over to my blog’s Facebook page to let me know what you think 🙂