HOMEOWNERS could save money thanks to a clever new thermostat developed by the University of Southampton.

Researchers from the university are aiming to develop a 'smart' thermostat to help households save money on energy bills.

The prototype allows users to control their heating based on the price they want to pay rather than setting it by temperature, which existing smart thermostats such as Nest do.

Three designs for the thermostat were tested through a month-long study involving 30 UK households. The energy price was changed every 30 minutes, which could be viewed by the participants.

The results showed participants used all three thermostat systems to effectively manage their home heating and create temperature preferences based on real-time prices.

University of Southampton PhD student Alper Alan, pictured, co-author of the study, said: “People were more aware of their energy consumption and were happy with the autonomous system controlling their heating on their behalf given real-time prices.

“We saw that people liked being able to control their home from anywhere they are. We also observed in all three treatments, most people reduced their temperature at high price levels.

“We found that people are ready to incur a reduction of four degrees celcius to save money. They said that even though the house was a bit colder than normal, they were okay with it since it was not that cold and they were saving money.”

But as well as price, other key factors including outside weather, occupancy and daily activities within the house changed the way people managed their heating.

The research was funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through the ORCHID and CharIoT projects.

Dr Sarvapali Ramchurn, co-author from ECS, adds: “Smart energy systems that use machine learning techniques are increasingly integrated in all aspects of our lives. These findings will assist designers in improving user experience, which in return will help us in controlling home heating with real-time pricing and benefit from them.”

The study will be presented at ACM CHI 2016, the top conference for Human-Computer Interaction in San Jose, the United SAtates, in May.