Learn about Home Environment Sensors

Sensors of a variety of environmental conditions in your home, that can be connected to your home automation hub to give you feedback and help control your heating, cooling, ventilation, and energy systems. The most basic sensors measure temperature and humidity, two important variables for home comfort. Beyond that, you can look for sensors of carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide, volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and other gases, as well as particulate matter in air.

Many kinds of sensors are available, so the main thing is to figure out what variables to monitor in order to achieve your goal, and then look for simple, affordable sensors that are compatible with the home automation systems that you want to connect them to.

By knowing more about the environmental conditions in your home, you can adjust systems accordingly to provide healthy conditions without spending more energy and money than you need to. A great example is ventilation. If you know how much humidity and carbon dioxide is in your indoor air, your ventilation system can moderate its fan rate according to how much air exchange is actually needed to maintain desired conditions.

The sensors in a building can be used to create beautiful artworks. In an installation called "Patches" in 2010, artist Stephen Kelly installed an array of colourful LED lights in the Mona Campbell Building at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada, that change colours and patterns in response to the building's indoor environmental sensors. Changes in temperature, carbon dioxide, light levels, and energy use of the building are reflected in the shifting pattern of the lights.