Black & Decker EM100B Energy Saver Series Power Monitor

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Average Customer Rating:	4.5
Brand:	Black & Decker
Model:	EM100B

Product Categories

Black & Decker; Voltage Testers; Black

Product description

Black & Decker's Power Monitor is the instant and easy way to help control your energy consumption. This easy-to-use device tells you - in real time - the amount of electricity you're using, as you use it! The Power Monitor consists of two parts - a wireless transmitter that easily attaches to your electric meter, and a wireless handheld device that uses data from your electric meter to display information about your energy consumption. Using information about your electric rates, you can track minute-by-minute changes in electric consumption as major appliances are turned on and off. Take control of electric bills and save up to 20% a month!* *As documented in published research using similar feedback devices.

Features

Take control of electricity bills and save as much as 20% percent each month

Monitors rate electricity is consumed and transmits

Calculates in real-time how much electricity is used and cost in dollars and cents

Appliance Mode feature isolates cost of individual appliances or electronic devices

Customer reviews

« Very Useful and Very Easy »

When I first received this unit I was a bit intimidated. There is the primary unit for inside and then an attachment to your electric meter for outside. Without looking at the instructions it felt a bit daunting. Like many other reviewers I have an old spinning disk meter outside. The Black and Decker meter mount was installed without any issue using a flathead screw driver.

When reporting to the indoor unit the screen is updated every 30 seconds. The kilowatts used per hour estimate are given. You can then try unplugging or activating other devices to see if they make a difference. It is not automatic and does not provide any fancy reporting but it does do the job.

I did like this unit. For whole house monitoring it is a nice way to monitor usage. I would really like to have it be able to talk to my PC for instance and do more with the data.

Rating: (4 out of 5) @ 2008-11-20

« Easy to setup & use and very effective step in controlling energy costs »

The entire unit comes in 2 peices - a circular bracket which goes around the energy meter and a handheld device.

The bracket needs to be installed around the power meter which measures the power consumed and transmits to the handheld unit.

The main setup that is required to be done is on the handheld unit where you need to enter the energy costs - cost per kwh (you will find this on your energy bill). Once this setup is complete, you can measure the amount of electricity consumed by each of the devices in your household.

Once you measure it, you should know how to control ! It is simple logic that Air conditioners are power hogs, but there are lots of others which consume a lot more power - if you go to your bathroom, if you find 5 incandascent lights burning above the mirrors - it is high time you replace them with flouroscent lamps/LED lamps (LEDs are a bit more expensive, but last a lot longer).

Overall, it is a lot of fun to play with to see how much power is consumed(thats how I took it) and then get down to the serious stuff of making some good investment in replacing your lamps to start with and maybe get into your washer/dryer to get energy star compliant devices.

Rating: (4 out of 5) @ 2008-11-15

« Simply Amazing! »

In this day and age with sky rocketing fuel prices and global warming everyone needs to try to save energy here and there. This product will help you along the way! Installation was very easy (took about 10 minutes) and it is simply amazing (and shocking) to find out with the help of this device how much fuel I am using each day. I highly recommend this product for every household out there.

Rating: (5 out of 5) @ 2008-11-10

« Useful Information - A Constant Reminder to TURN OFF THE LIGHTS! »

I purchased a Kill-A-Watt monitor and found it to very informative, but most of the energy gobblers are either 220V or the plugs are well hidden and not easy to get to (i.e. dishwasher, refridgerator). The B&D EM100B solves this problem by getting its information from the outside power meter rather than at the outlet. The installation is rather easy. We have a "spinning meter." It is not intuitive so don't try and figure it out without reading the instructions. Once installed you have access to "real time" electricity usage which allows two things: 1) Verify that you are being billed accurately 2)Actually know in tangible figures what different appliances cost to run. This dollar-figure information may give you and your family addtition incentive to conserve. In the end, the EM100B confirms what you already know: that A/C, washers, dryers, dishwashers and the like consume most of your electic each month.

Rating: (4 out of 5) @ 2008-11-09

« Did You Know Your Electric Meter Has an Optical Port with an LED Constantly Tramsmitting Your Electrical Usage? Check It Out. »

There are 3 different types of electrical meters. Even the old dial style has an optical post on the face. Type 3 meters has one on the top. Look for a small round protruding pipe which is an optical port with an LED (Light Emitting Diode) in it. It is constantly transmitting your real time electrical usage. Why not tap into that resource, and be able to go through your home with a hand portable receiving unit, which also has a snap on desktop base, so you can monitor usage on the fly.

The refrigerator kicks on and you can instantly see what a difference that makes in your dollars, or Kw usage. Maybe the old fridge is costing you more per month in electricity than the payments for a new more efficient one, or maybe not? How do you know? Black and Decker Power Monitor to the rescue. It even does the calculations for you. Input the numbers off of your electrical bill once, and wah lah, you have the dollars and cents of it show up right on your screen.

Setting it up seems like a few minutes, but in reality it takes you more like an hour, but everything is easy. The instruction manual takes you through it with illustrations.
1) This is how you strap the sensor to your outside meter; including how to get it centered over your optical out LED. Once centered the sensor starts to blink, and then you tighten it down; done.
2) Then you want to determine your billing mode; peak/off peak, tiered, or flat rate billing, and the billing individual rates, which are printed in a column on your electrical bill; for example, generation charges 0.06840 + transitions charges .00560, plus distribution, and transition charges. If you add up all of those individual rates, the total sum is your total cost per kilowatt hour; then multiply that by 100 and you get your "billing rate". Keep that number handy for when you program your main unit, they refer to as your digital display.

Other than that all you need is your "Power factor", which is a number printed on the meter; e.g. usually 7.2Kh for an electro-mechanical meter, or 1.0Kh for an electronic meter. You can go outside and see what yours says; it is printed on the face.

So armed with your "Billing rate" number, and your "Power factor" printed on your meters face, you simply hit the program sync button on the top of the digital display, and enter the information when it asks you for it, as well as the day of the week, and the time, and your done. The manual walks you through all of this step by step.

The first time you go through the setup, as you read each part, you will say, "Oh I see". After you do one, you will say, "I could install another one of these in less than 3 minutes".

The Power Monitor will show you; Your current electrical usage, the usage of a single electrical appliance, your accumulated electricity usage over an hour, a day, or any time period, and your estimated monthly usage.

So to summarize; you may be using some devices like a small electric space heater in a bedroom, that you discover is consuming $50 per month worth of electricity, and you computer monitor plus a couple of light bulbs are only drawing 1 or 2 cents per hour. It is all at your fingertips. With the 2 double A battery driven digital display, you can sit in your armchair, and continually know what the total per penny/per hour usage is costing you. If someone is using something that costs you a fortune, within 30 seconds (the refresh results rate) of when they turn it on you know it. On the other hand you know when to not sweat the small stuff, and just what that small stuff is.

I don't know whether to place this in the "something for somebody who already has everything" category, or something for the frugal who want to put a lid on wasteful spending. Month after month, year after year amounts can really add up, especially if you don't know where the leaks are. For the latter it will more than pay for itself after a few months. Overall highly recommended. Well designed, engineered, and setup is a breeze as long as you do it one step at a time.