Busted! Dad uses home energy monitoring to catch party-throwing teen daughter
While traveling, telephony hardware and software developer David Rowe decided to remotely check in on the energy performance of his Adelaide home though a Fluksometer, an energy-monitoring device connected to his fuse box that sends real time electricity consumption data to his Android smartphone. Although his home was supposed to be empty — his 16-year-old daughter Amy was staying elsewhere with friends — Rowe was curious as to if the hot weather nearly 500 miles away in Adelaide would effect the power consumption of his vacant home. Explains Rowe: “I’m just sort of a power-geek.”
Fair enough. So Rowe opened up the Fluksometer app only to make a shocking discovery: his home’s electricity consumption was off the charts and it was evident that someone was there and running the air conditioner. At around 7 p.m., the electricity usage jumped even further as if someone had turned on the television and all of the lights. Had the Kevin Robertson craze made it all the way to the greater Adelaide area?
