I've always loved data, ever since I had my first interaction with a computer, back in 1985, I fell in love with spreadsheets and from there I have always tried to learn new tools to help me analyze and forecast, especially with the appearance of the machine and deep learning algorithms libraries.
A few months ago, we decided to install solar panels at home and I have started to collect data with the software provided by the company we chose to do the job. We had been thinking about installing solar panels for quite a while but it was last year's big energy cost increase that made us finally decide to move forward.
After several months of experience having a tool to check home production and consumption in real-time, we have realized we not only have a passive "energy production system" in the house, but we also have started to change our habits depending on the hour of the day or the weather conditions as we try to make bigger consumption during the hours we have excess production from the solar panels.
Regular things such as which day/time to do laundry, what you have for lunch to use the oven or any other cooking appliances are decisions that have a direct impact on our consumption and can make a big economical change a the end of the month.
Lately, as the introduction of AI has started to disrupt some industries, I have been thinking how nice it would be to have a system that would use AI weather forecast to advise you on how to deal with your daily habits to optimize your home energy consumption and try to get the most out of your solar installation.
We, in western countries, usually live without paying attention on what are the appliances which have big energy consumption at the house as all we have is a meter showing the total amount and the invoice at the end of the month, now with the new digital meter and new Apps have started to appear in the market helping you learn best ways to reduce your invoice
The new solar installation has driven us to reduce 40% our home energy and I would love to see a way to add the production info, your consumption habits, and an AI system to forecast the weather prediction to help you get the most out of your solar installation.
