Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowVectren, the gas utility serving most of central Indiana, will offer $100 rebates on WiFi-enabled programmable thermostats in 2015.
The offering comes after Vectren ran a pilot study with Google-owned Nest Labs and found the homes with the smart thermostat cut their gas use an average of 69 therms a year, or 12.5 percent.
Vectren designed, funded and conducted the study, which began in the fall of 2013. The company replaced manual thermostats in 600 homes. Half received the thermostat made by Nest, founded by two Apple engineers in 2010. Half received standard programmable thermostats.
The Nest thermostat costs more than $200, and a basic installation costs $99 to $250.
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