This post first appeared on the Green Building Advisor Website.
Part of my job working as an energy auditor is educating homeowners on electricity usage, reviewing and analyzing historical electricity usage is part of the process. Checking service conductors and individual branch circuits in an electrical service panel is also sometimes needed. This information lets me know if an appliance, motor, or other device is operating as expected. How about electricity usage of an appliance or other equipment over time? My visit to a home is usually under four hours, hardly enough time to figure out how often a device operates. For this, we need tools that can record data.