[This is] my solution of how I have saved some heating costs/energy use and to seed the thought into you, so it can be adopted into your home or modified to suite your needs.
In the Spring and Autumn months where the outside air temperature can be around 11degC I noticed my house lost little to no temperature to outside. I also noticed that in the morning the heating would come on for some time (upto 30minutes) then stay off until the next day. I saw this as a waste of energy as on a sunny day or as at warms above 12degC outside the house will naturally warm to a comfortable temperature. Normally this would be the time of year that I would turn my heating off to save Gas usage. This project is to automate this process based on local outside air temperature and utilising some of my existing household temperature sensors, the project has the advantage of knowing the temperature predicted and acting upon it but if the house lost too much temperature it will allow the heating to come back on.
Adafruit has had paid day off for voting for our team for years, if you need help getting that going for your organization, let us know – we can share how and why we did this as well as the good results. Here are some resources for voting by mail, voting in person, and some NY resources for our NY based teams as well. If there are additional resources to add, please let us know – adafruit.com/vote
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
