Right, and this is a strictly opt-in scheme. Austin Energy partnered with Nest to do this last year, offering customers an $85 rebate as an incentive to help smooth out the spikes in energy use during hot summer afternoons. Austin Energy had actually been doing this before with a less sexy programmable thermostat; they also had a program in which customers would receive SMS messages requesting that they voluntarily reduce energy usage when heavy load was expected.
Increasing energy consumption is a real problem, both in terms of environmental impact and in terms of the power grid itself. A solution that mitigates these problems using attractive consumer technology without requiring significant lifestyle adjustments on the part of those consumers is admirably pragmatic and, in my view, most welcome.
At a glance, this seems fairly useful/progressive. I'd imagine there are plenty of people willing to sacrifice a few degrees of cooling during peak hours to save a few bucks, and this gives them a way to do so.
Of course, these (presumably price-sensitive) consumers will have to buy a Nest to do so.
It is useful, but not particularly progressive. It's typically called "residential demand response". I worked at a company that has been building programs like these for many utilities for a long time. Typically the utility pays for the thermostats (or cheaper equipment attached directly to an A/C compressor) and gives the customers some sort of incentive for participating, like a yearly rebate.
Nest is an interesting entrant into the market because they can come to a utility and say "we already have X of your customers hooked up, you don't have to pay for anything besides the service!" One potential downside is that it is likely the utility will want more of their customers to participate in their demand response program than the number of Nest-owners. Despite its success, the Nest is still a luxury item, and these programs work best at scale. This could make it awkward for the utility to work with another provider, unless Nest is open to partnerships (which they may well be). It's a great play for Nest though, because now they have utilities aligned with their goal of selling more of their thermostats, which is probably really good for marketing.
Increasing energy consumption is a real problem, both in terms of environmental impact and in terms of the power grid itself. A solution that mitigates these problems using attractive consumer technology without requiring significant lifestyle adjustments on the part of those consumers is admirably pragmatic and, in my view, most welcome.
https://nest.com/energy-partners/austin-energy/
http://kut.org/post/meet-answer-texas-air-conditioning-issue...