Electricity Supply Providers are already penalising home owners who exceed their set maximum demand. A properly designed automation systems will constantly monitor your energy consumption and intelligently shed certain loads during peak periods.

An Example is if you have two water heaters (Geysers) in your house and your Automation system "senses" that you are approaching the critical electricity usage level (i.e. where you would be penalised / fined), the system automatically sheds one of the geysers for a short period of time and alternates between the two ensuring that no two geysers are on simultaneously, while still allowing you to run hot water.

This is a bit of an over simplification as the system can control a host of other loads e.g. underfloor heaters, pumps, stoves, etc. The system can easily also control your geysers to only switch on at certain times of the day and so cut down on your total monthly energy consumption

Intelligent Communicating Thermostats and Remote Temperature Sensors strategically placed in your home will allow the system to "sense" and control wastage of energy. Both of these options will significantly reduce your electricity bill. There are other indirect ways of reducing cooling and heating requirement which should also be considered such as automated curtains and blinds that can be programmed to close automatically to either allow sun heating in or out depending on the season.

A properly designed automation system will also include clever dimmers which can be set to run below maximum level and also to switch your lamps on and off "slowly". This will greatly extend the life of you "light bulbs" and can be also be set to lower light levels at different times of the evening, saving you energy and saving you money.

An automation system should do occupational switching (Switches on only when it detects you and switches off when you leave) of lights in passages, Guest W/C's, Pantries, Walk In Dressers, etc so that these lights and never left "On".

Automatic switching of your security lights on a sunset/sunrise timing cycle to ensure that the lights don't get switched on before they need to be and are switched off in the morning. Scenes can easily be programmed into your system that only switch on the lights you need and at the levels you dictate with the touch of a single button.

When you go away for vacation and arm your system in "vacation mode" the automation will swith off all water heaters, underfloor heating, stove, etc and place your house in a "hibernate Mode". I know some of you folks are saying you don't want to come home to a cold shower and icy floors? You don't have to, all you do is phone your house a few hours before you are due home and tell it to get ready for you.

It is important for you to meet with your Systems Integrator and discuss your total requirements including energy management. They will also go through all the possible lifestyle systems with you so that you may choose what you need installed initially and which possible systems should be planned for phasing in later.

This is a very important meeting which will save you money by planning the routing so that wireways may be built in. The cost of installing PVC conduit is minimal during the building phase of a project but can be prohibitively expensive to "chase" a finished home as well as very disruptive to your lifestyle. Ask your automation specialist to show you planning drawings and management systems of their current projects. A quality CEDIA professional will be happy to explain to you how the work will be planned, monitored and carried out.