home-assistant/automations/ac_precool_before_peak.yaml

# ac_precool_before_peak — pre-cool the house before the summer on-peak window
#
#   id / entity : ac_precool_before_peak  ->  automation.ac_pre_cool_before_peak
#   trigger     : 12:00 local (America/New_York)
#   purpose     : On summer work days, pre-cool before the 14:00-19:00 peak,
#                 harder when the forecast high is hotter (>=90 -> 68, >=85 -> 70,
#                 >=80 -> 71, below 80 -> no pre-cool).
#
# Summer only: pre-cooling for the WINTER evening peak (17:00-21:00) is marginal
# (the daily high has already passed by then), so winter is hold+return only and
# has no pre-cool. This automation self-gates on season == 'summer'.
#
# Graceful degradation (a broken dependency must NOT skip pre-cooling):
#   * workday sensor unavailable/unknown -> fall back to a plain Mon-Fri check.
#   * weather forecast fails or returns nothing -> assume a regular hot day
#     (88F -> 70F). continue_on_error covers a hard service error; the
#     `fc is defined and is mapping` guard covers an empty/None response.
#
# NOTE: templates are single-line on purpose (YAML folding can corrupt Jinja).
#
# v3 (2026-07-09): bounded to summer (Jun-Sep). v2 added the fallbacks.
id: ac_precool_before_peak
alias: AC - Pre-cool before peak
description: >-
  v3 (2026-07-09). Summer-only. Pre-cools before the 2-7pm peak on work days.
  Falls back to Mon-Fri if the workday sensor fails, and to a regular pre-cool
  (assume 88F high -> 70F) if the weather forecast fails. Managed in git; see
  AUTOMATIONS.md.
mode: single
triggers:
  - trigger: time
    at: "12:00:00"
conditions: []
actions:
  - action: weather.get_forecasts
    continue_on_error: true
    target:
      entity_id: weather.forecast_4315aspenhill
    data:
      type: daily
    response_variable: fc
  - variables:
      season: "{{ 'summer' if now().month in [6,7,8,9] else 'winter' }}"
      is_workday: "{% set wd = states('binary_sensor.workday_sensor') %}{% if wd in ['on','off'] %}{{ wd == 'on' }}{% else %}{{ now().weekday() < 5 }}{% endif %}"
      today_high: "{% if fc is defined and fc is mapping and 'weather.forecast_4315aspenhill' in fc and fc['weather.forecast_4315aspenhill'].forecast | default([]) | length > 0 %}{% set today = now().date() %}{% set entries = fc['weather.forecast_4315aspenhill'].forecast | selectattr('datetime') | list %}{% set match = entries | selectattr('datetime','search', today | string) | list %}{{ (match[0].temperature if match else entries[0].temperature) | float(88) }}{% else %}88{% endif %}"
      setpoint: "{% set h = today_high | float(88) %}{% if h >= 90 %}68{% elif h >= 85 %}70{% elif h >= 80 %}71{% else %}none{% endif %}"
  - if:
      - condition: template
        value_template: "{{ season == 'summer' and is_workday and setpoint != 'none' }}"
    then:
      - action: climate.set_hvac_mode
        target:
          entity_id: climate.t6_pro_z_wave_programmable_thermostat_with_smartstart
        data:
          hvac_mode: cool
      - action: climate.set_temperature
        target:
          entity_id: climate.t6_pro_z_wave_programmable_thermostat_with_smartstart
        data:
          temperature: "{{ setpoint | int }}"