Natalie Skeggs and Hayden Arthur have been named the tenants who will live for a year in PowerNet’s smart-tech house.

The mother and son were selected from a pool of applicants for the opportunity to live in an Invercargill house equipped with smart energy technologies.

PowerNet General Manager of New Energy Development, Kavi Singh said the PowerNet team could see the potential the family had to successfully promote the project in its second year and was delighted to be working with them. Natalie and Hayden were also enthusiastic about smart energy technologies.

“The house is equipped with solar panels, battery storage, energy smart appliances and hot water powered by a heat pump exchanger. The family will also have the use of an Electric Vehicle (EV) and an app-controllable EV charger installed at the address,” Mr Singh said.

The project is part of PowerNet’s drive to understand new energy technologies, their benefits and leverage these to create better efficiencies and services for its customers. The results of Smart Energy Home in first year show that 25% of energy consumed was generated by the solar panels, saving the tenants approximately $730, and a small amount of excess generation was exported providing further $70 benefit. The average daily running cost for the EV has been $3.60 per 100km, which is about a third of the cost of an efficient petrol hatchback.

The company has been operating a fleet of zero and low emission electric vehicles for more than two years and will continue to develop insights into their capabilities, uptake and economic value to businesses and residential customers.

In the second year of the Smart Energy Home project, PowerNet hopes to learn about how a different customer mix affects the profile and level of household and EV electricity usage, and the interaction between customer, technologies and weather.

Natalie Skeggs said she was excited by the opportunity to experience the technologies first-hand and to contribute their own insights about using smart technologies.

“Now that we’re all settled in, we’re keen to get some feedback about our power usage and see where we can save and make use of all the power saving equipment.”

The family moved into the house during the Easter break.

They’ll help PowerNet to promote the Smart Energy Home project over the coming year.