Z wave water shutoff to operate a gas valve?

Devices & Integrations
1

I was wondering if one of these would be able to shut a gas valve off. Not sure if they would be strong enough

2

I have installed the Dome Water Shut-off valve and it is pretty strong on my 25 year old valve.

I would imagine that this Z-Wave device could handle any rotating shutoff valve as long as the rotation is workable by hand.

3

Thanks
Im just waiting for a couple dome energy monitors. If they work out ok Ill order the Dome water shut off
Thanks

4

In my old home in Italy we had a valve that would shut off the gas if a leak was detected. It was installed outside in open air and it shuts off gas automatically but it CANNOT turn it back on. User intervention is needed for safety reasons. This is one reason I opted not to automate my gas valve as I am afraid of what might happen if the valve is opened remotely allowing gas to fill the environment. Say for example a burner was on, and for whatever reason the valve is shut off remotely, the burner will stop burning but will remain openā€¦ Then, for whatever other reason the valve is opened again and the gas starts filling the house causing a huge explosion risk if left to do so for too long. The ā€œwhatever reasonā€ for closing the valve may be a system fluke, user error, automations misfiring/misbehaving, programming errors, user poor judgement in the automation setup, earthquake, aliens, etc.

The only safe way would be to enable an automated cut off, but force a manual ā€œopenā€ so that the user can ensure there are no leaks and enabling the gas flow is 100% safe. Even if this may only happen in corner cases, it can cause loss of property and life so too much risk in my opinion.

Something like this:


.image

2 Likes
5

One could certainly modify the Dome custom DTH to only accept a ā€˜closeā€™ commandā€¦

6

That would reduce the risk as long as there is zero support for the open command, be it manual or automated (within the DTH/SmartApps/WebCore/etc). I still tend to prefer a physical barrier to turning back on, such as the need for manual intervention on the device itself. There may even be laws requiring this in some places. I read an article about automated gas shut-off valves in California shutting off with strong enough earthquakes and they ask people to have the local utility check everything and to let them turn it back on. That may be overboard for non earthquake prone areas so I am sure the requirements will be different. Either way it boils down to oneā€™s tolerance for explosions :wink: - I have none, not even 0.00000001%.

1 Like
7

Thanks Guys