The ecobee Smart Thermostat is a standards-compliant solution that supports a variety of interfaces including WiFi, ERT, ZigBee SE and ZigBee HA. By using a cloud-based web service, we're able to provide an interface for smart phones and personal computers.
The ecobee Smart Thermostat ships with WiFi 802.11 b, g with WEP, WPA and WPA 2 security protocols. Additional radio options include ERT and ZigBee.
ecobee is a ZigBee Alliance Participant, and our products are ZigBee Smart Energy 1.0 certified. Our implementation of ZigBee SE 1.0 includes support for ECC encryption and CBKE. We'll soon be able to deliver a ZigBee SE 2.0 certified product once the specifications are approved.
Yes. At the centre of the ecobee Open Energy Management Platform is ecobee's hardware and core web services tier. The ecobee Smart Thermostat hardware provides full HVAC thermostat control as well as in-home display and gateway capabilities. The hardware is built around a system-on-a-chip 200 MHz ARM 9 CPU with 64 MB of RAM and 64 MB of flash memory. It includes a full-color, dynamic touch screen with optional WiFi, Zigbee SE and ZigBee HA communication capabilities. This gives you plenty of hardware headroom for future scalability. With everything integrated into a single device, ecobee delivers a lower long-term cost of ownership and a better customer experience.
The web services layer is based on a cloud (Software as a Service) n-tier architecture that provides fault tolerance and linear scalability as your device population grows. The web services and firmware are wrapped with open APIs that allow you, ecobee or others to add applications and/or integrate with other CIS systems you might have over time.
Yes. ecobee EMS is designed specifically for commercial installations (you'll be interested to know that it recently won the 2011 ASHRAE/AHR Innovation Award for Building Automation Product of the Year™ one of the top awards in our industry). The ecobee EMS is based on a similar hardware platform to the ecobee Smart Thermostat but has been optimized for commercial operations. ecobee EMS is fully integrated with the ecobee Utility Portal and accepts demand response and messaging events.
In addition to the features of the ecobee Smart Thermostat, the ecobee EMS web portal supports the control of thousands of thermostats, multiple users with roles and responsibilities and advanced analytics. It also supports fresh air damper and economizer control as well as automation. Our remote sensor board allows you to add up to 4 remote sensors which can be used for zone temperature averaging or for monitoring walk-in freezers or coolers.
Our EMS solution can be found in thousands of retail locations, schools, churches, and restaurant locations across the country. Some of our customers include West Side School District, Netflix, Subway Restaurants, Kitchen Stuff Plus as well as numerous other retail outlets and banks.
We do! Our Utility Portal features a Load Control Management System (LCMS) that enables utility operators to manage customers, initiate and manage optional and mandatory demand response events and group customers. You can also use the Portal to send messages to customers and view reports analyzing demand response event data.
Here are some more things you can do through the ecobee Utility Portal:
Keep track of customers participating in load management programs, their locations, commissions and decommissions, HAN and other load control devices, dispatches utility initiated pricing signals and monitors customer participation. You can also employ two-way communications with customers.
Select a given group of thermostats and send a demand response event. Demand response events may be optional or mandatory and can be scheduled to occur now or at a later time.
Yes, we do. The ecobee Utility Portal logs all curtailment requests including status information. The status information contains data such as:
Start date/time
End date/time
Event ID
Customer response (accept or decline)
Actual absolute temperature settings used during curtailment
Actual duty cycle of HVAC system
Failure status including error number and error message
You can use our Utility Portal and web services to manage thermostats in the field. The Utility Portal allows you to view device statuses, error log messages, and heating and cooling profiles as well as perform firmware upgrades. You can also download a CSV file with all thermostat performance data.
ecobee fully supports load control switches and smart plugs, which can be controlled either through the Smart Thermostat or through the Utility Portal. The web portal applications support thermostat control, whole home energy reporting including time of use rates, load control switches as well as reporting and analytics.
We do! The ecobee HAN manages both optional and mandatory demand response events. Options for load control include duty cycling, relative temperature off-set, absolute temperature and turning the device off as well as load control switches disabling electric water heaters and pool pumps.
We do recommend installation by an HVAC technician, especially for larger utility deployments. The ecobee Smart Thermostat features a step-by-step installation Wizard so installation is quite easy. The thermostat also features an installation test mode to verify that it has been installed correctly. At any time, an installer or maintenance technician can access a wiring diagram locally on the thermostat which displays how the ecobee Smart Thermostat has been configured and should be wired. There are no special tools required, and all menus and wizards use plain language.
The ecobee Smart Thermostat ships with a Quick Start Guide, but you can also download detailed User and Installation Manuals here.
Yes. The ecobee Open Energy Management Platform provides a web services API for integrating with your back-end systems. The web services interface is fully documented and uses a JSON interface to pass data between ecobee and your back-end systems. Connections between our servers and your back-end servers are SSL encrypted for authentication and confidentiality. Other integration techniques such as flat file import/export or integration database tables are also possible.
Of course! The ecobee Smart Thermostat supports WiFi Radio for Internet Communications standards. We also support WEP, WPA and WPA2 security for connecting to WiFi networks. In addition to the wireless security protocols above, the ecobee Smart Thermostat uses an SSL connection to the web services in a deployment using an IP network. All data transmitted to/from the ecobee Smart Thermostat is encrypted and authenticated at both ends of the connection.
ecobee uses 1024-bit asymmetric keys for authentication in its certificates and 256-bit AES symmetric keys for bulk encryption. The use of SSL protects against loss of data, 'man in the middle' or third-party attacks. There are no open TCP or UDP ports on the ecobee Smart Thermostat except for the UDP echo port, which enables external devices to "ping" the ecobee Smart Thermostat.
ecobee data servers are stored on a Tier 1 data server which includes additional data and physical safeguards.
Yes. Demand response events can be optional or mandatory, allowing the customer to opt out during an optional demand management program.
Yes. Demand response events can be optional or mandatory, allowing you to determine if customers can override a utility event.
We do! Our hosted solution enables customers to simply connect their ecobee Smart Thermostats to the Internet and access them from any Internet-enabled PC or mobile device. No special software is required, and there's nothing for you to install, monitor or provide servers to support the ecobee line of products.
Yes. The ecobee Smart Thermostat can display up to 500 characters, allowing you to have rich, one-on-one communication with your customers.
Absolutely! The ecobee Smart Thermostat is designed to be a future-proof platform, offering a very flexible architecture that's not limited by the typical constraints of CPU, RAM and Flash memory during upgrades. It was also designed to be software upgradeable over an AMI network or the Internet. And as your utility requirements evolve, the ecobee Smart Thermostat can be upgraded to support changes or new applications.
Our scalable CPU architecture, 64 MB memory and 64 MB Flash, multiple radio support, dynamic color touch screen and Over the Air upgrades provide you with the most robust IHD/PCT platform on the market. You can easily add support for other load control, distributed generation, Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) and smart appliances.
ecobee also provides an Administration Console for managing Over the Air (OTA) upgrades.