I live in the subarctic. My home water situation is "different" from most places on earth. I have a water tank buried in the ground and a pump that draws water to supply my home. As you might imagine, that pump is absolutely mission critical to my home's operation. Put simply, I wasn't going to trust it with a cheap $10 WiFi plug. The typical draw is approximately 800 watts, with even higher startup peaks.
I use Home Assistant for my home automation platform. Using Z-Wave JS, this switch enumerates on/off status with switch control, amp draw, voltage level, watt draw, KwH usage and ping. Most important to me, this unit can be configured to remember "last state" or be "always on" - meaning, it will always return to on state for my application. Also important, this device can be monitored for "alive" and "dead" status, which I can then alert on. In my application, I actually use two methods for this assessment - a UPS battery status over WiFi and this switch - both of which tell me whether the pump has power.
Interestingly enough, I wasn't really interested in turning my pump on and off with this device, almost ever. We've burned through a few expensive tanks of water due to leaks and faucets left open, though. I really wanted power draw because it allows some interesting analysis. I can now measure and alert on "abnormal" power usage, which can indicate higher or lesser than normal operations. (Such as "pump running when we aren't home.") Though I haven't actually done this yet in my automation, I can kill power to the home water pump in the event abnormal usage is detected. For now, I'm using alerting & manual switching based on alerting and that's probably good enough for me.
For me, the return on investment will be the prevention of just one of those events. It took me a little bit to figure out how to do the analysis in Home Assistant, but I think I figured it out. Essentially, I'm taking power draw for the previous 15 minute increment, determining if that exceeds a "known normal value" and send an emergency level alert to my phone if that event occurs. Sure, it triggers sometimes when we take a long shower or water the garden, but we know about these things and I want it sensitive enough to detect even a slow leak. I also have a secondary alert that tells me if the pump is active at all while we're away, which really shouldn't ever happen.
I gave some serious thought about getting into "water monitoring" side as an alternative to my application. When I looked at general cost, managing water is much more expensive than monitoring electricity. It was kind of a "stroke of genius" when I realized that monitoring my pump electrically could get me there just as easily. So, that's a win for this platform in my opinion.
So far, this product got me where I wanted to be, has been reliable and seems to handle a serious electrical load without issue. If anything changes, I'll be sure to update this review. While it's on the "more expensive" side of energy monitoring and switching these days, I'm usually willing to pay a bit more for the highly reliable Z-Wave technology and a quality product. I'm thinking about getting a few more to monitor my furnace and a few other important applications, so that's about as good of a recommendation as I can give.
Edit: I've used same device in a few more applications now, still love it. I use them on my furnace and fridge, both mission critical applications. (It took some serious trust building to put one on my furnace!) I also use them in my shop. This unit is the only one I've found that deals well with large startup (inrush) current. Things like shop-vac's and my compressor would "pop" other devices I tried, but not this one!
| Manufacturer | ZOOZ |
|---|---|
| Part Number | ZEN15 |
| Item Weight | 10.8 ounces |
| Product Dimensions | 20 x 2.6 x 1.1 inches |
| Item model number | ZEN15 |
| Is Discontinued By Manufacturer | No |
| Style | Power Switch ZEN15 (1 Outlet) |
| Item Package Quantity | 1 |
| Batteries Included? | No |
| Batteries Required? | No |
