While Internet of Things innovations have become commonplace in the lighting and home security industries, they’re also transforming commercial water heating. The ability to use an app to get real-time performance data offers benefits to water heater manufacturers, plumbing contractors and commercial businesses who depend on a steady, cost-effective supply of hot water.

Before IoT, contractors and business owners had to rely on programmable water heaters that required a user to be physically present to change settings on a touch screen. All the data was stored locally, but now status and settings live in the cloud where they can be easily accessed on a mobile app.

This Wi-Fi connectivity service is a built-in feature. It is especially beneficial for businesses that have all-day hot water demand to ensure the units installed provide the thermal efficiency and modulating performance required for showers, food prep and laundry.

Pre-installation benefits

Because manufacturers now have access to real-time performance data at businesses of all types — including full-service restaurants, hotels, college dorms and hospitals — they can make a more informed recommendation on the commercial water heating system that best meets the duty-cycle demand of each business. By knowing the stored tank capacity and Btu input most commonly needed, they can recommend a unit that’s appropriately sized for that application based on historical usage patterns.

Around-the-clock visibility

Via the app, customers receive precautionary alerts, which can help prevent temporary business outages and lost revenues. Business owners and their contractors who have an IoT app, however, receive an instant notification of a problem via text or email.

Even regional facilities managers can benefit from these instant alerts. For example, if a hotel chain manager notices that one hotel has higher water heating bills than the others, he/she can remotely lower the temperature set point at that facility via a mobile app.

Improvement capabilities

IoT can improve product quality and service of commercial water heaters for installers, facilities managers and end users.

Both facilities managers and contractors have the ability to sign up for alerts and change settings remotely, gaining increased visibility into water heater usage over time.

Further, monitoring and managing multiple water heaters or water heating systems from the same app allows the user to increase efficiency with less down time.

Finally, configurations can be tuned remotely to improve energy usage and performance. RJ 2.0

"This article was originally posted on www.reevesjournal.com."