By Madison Gas and Electric

Focus on Energy is offering an incentive for eligible customers to save $75 on a smart thermostat.

If you’ve been thinking about upgrading your thermostat, smart thermostats are now an even smarter purchase with a $75 incentive from Wisconsin’s Focus on Energy program. The smart thermostat incentive offer is available to Madison Gas and Electric (MGE) customers with some qualifications. To learn more, visit focusonenergy.com/smart.

Advancing new technologies is an objective under MGE’s long-term Energy 2030 framework. As part of Energy 2030, MGE wants to work with customers to give them more control over their energy use and costs through new technologies, like smart thermostats.

Why a smart thermostat?
Smart thermostats can control the temperature in your home remotely via a smartphone, tablet or computer. They also analyze data to automatically adjust how your home’s heating and cooling systems operate for increased comfort and energy efficiency.

Smart thermostats vary widely. First, check the Focus on Energy website to make sure the model qualifies for the $75 incentive. In addition, here are some specific features you may want to consider before purchasing:

• Temperature alerts to avoid frozen pipes or overheating.
• Reporting on the cost to run your heating and cooling systems and coaching you on how to save more.
• Detecting problems with heating and cooling systems (and notifying your contractor).
• Learning your preferred settings and automatically scheduling temperature changes.
• Remote sensors to improve comfort in rooms other than where the thermostat is located.

So how much can you save?
Compared to leaving the thermostat at the same temperature all of the time, a smart thermostat could save between $40 and $100 per heating season (natural gas) and between $10 and $30 per cooling season (electricity). If you already set back your thermostat when you’re sleeping or gone, savings will be smaller.

For more ways to save energy, visit energy2030together.com.