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 | | RA PLUS-W RADIATOR THERMOSTAT FROM DANFOSS COMMUNICATES VIA Z-WAVE | | | Danfoss | | 12/02/2008 | | | Controlling heating intelligently and saving energy costs.
February 2008 - Danfoss, a vendor of thermal and refrigeration engineering, has with RA PLUS-w introduced a Z-Wave based radiator thermostat into the market providing for location and time independent heating control for the entire house. Using this innovative device home and apartment owners can also „remotely“ control the temperature in their rooms and by doing so save on energy costs. The thermostat can be linked into a whole home control network by means of Z-Wave enabling it to be controlled, via PCs, PDAs, remote controls, mobile phones, or over the Internet. The RA-Plus-w is sold as part of home automation solutions from manufacturers such as Merten, Innovus, Electronic Housekeeper and others.
Heating is one of the biggest energy consumers while also an essential part of living comfort. However, the rapidly increasing energy prices are compelling house and flat owners to carry out saving measures particularly in older buildings. According to the heating index in Germany the cost of fuel oil has, increased by 44.3 per cent and the cost of gas by 57.8 per cent since the year 2000. Energy conservation has become a financial imperative for most homeowners.
Same comfort at reduced heat output
Even reducing the room temperature by 1 degree saves as much as 6 per cent of the energy costs. The radiator heating thermostat developed by Danfoss provides for reducing the room temperature by 3 degrees at fixed intervals during the day. The Z-Wave chip integrated into the thermostats additionally provides for linking the device into the home control network. Using Z-Wave RF, technology the RA PLUS-w can communicate with other Z-Wave devices enabling remote management of heating control, via a centralized web interface. Since this can be applied via the Internet users can take control from outside the home and manage their home energy usage based on their changing schedules or remotely adjust the thermostat to ensure that their vacation home is comfortable when they arrive. A living room can, for instance, remain warm over the day while the bedroom is heated to a pleasant temperature just before going to bed and again at the time to get up. The RA PLUS-w can be mounted with old as well as with new radiator heating valves. The device features a mechanical freeze-protection mechanism preventing the „freezing“ of a room, even if the battery ever ran down. Given that there are more than one billion radiator heater thermostats currently installed, upgrading to the RA PLUS-w would provide energy-saving on a significant scale. | |
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