Electricity is as expensive as it gets, so how can we adjust our budget better to our necessities, without wasting too much of it? Google is offering a solution that will help people become more aware of the electricity use in their home.

 

Most of us have no idea how much electricity the devices in our homes consume, and the monthly bill does little to clear that for us. Furthermore, we tend to waste electricity, which significantly increases our bill.

 

So how do we learn how to save energy and money? Google offers the Google PowerMeter as a real time measurement tool for electricity consumption available from the home computer. Although still in testing, the software tool is likely to gain success. Google said it is currently building partnerships with utilities and independent device manufacturers to gradually roll it out in pilot programs.

 

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to providing consumers with detailed energy information. And it will take the combined efforts of federal and state governments, utilities, device manufacturers, and software engineers to empower consumers to use electricity more wisely by giving them access to energy information, Google wrote in a blog post.

 

According a study by the University of Oxford, cited by Google, most household owners have only a vague idea about their electricity consumption. Furthermore, people need feedback in order to learn how to understand and control energy consumption. The study revealed that people with feedback usually save between 5 and 15 percent on their monthly electricity bills. A detailed study can be found here.