What the smart grid button does on an LG refrigerator
What the smart grid button does on an LG refrigerator is lower energy use or delay a function during a period of high grid demand, never shut the appliance off. Whether your power company supports it is not automatic, since you have to register the appliance yourself.
The manual LG publishes for a Wi Fi connected refrigerator states that pressing the Smart Grid button turns the function on or off, and a Grid text icon lights up when the refrigerator is responding to a Demand Response message, a signal an electric company sends asking customers to use less power during high demand. In this mode, the manual states, the refrigerator can control energy usage or delay some functions to save energy during peak usage periods, the busiest hours for the grid.
To use the Smart Grid function, you need to register your appliance with your electric utility company, provided that your electric utility company supports the function.
LG Electronics, in the manual it publishes for a Wi Fi connected refrigerator. Source 1.
Turning the button on does not connect a refrigerator to any actual utility program by itself. You can override the Smart Grid function any time, using the Smart Grid button or the LG ThinQ app, the manual states, and the function will not work if the electric utility company involved does not support it or lacks the capability to.
LG pictures a refrigerator as eligible for paid rewards
LG own energy programme page, ThinQ Energy, invites customers to opt into a Demand Response Program and join other electric homeowners to form what it calls a Virtual Power Plant, a group of connected home devices a utility coordinates together. The page states a participant will receive incentives and rewards for reducing power use, and pictures 7 kinds of connected appliances as part of the programme, a refrigerator among them, alongside a home battery, a heat pump, a heat pump water heater, an electric dryer, an electric range and a dishwasher. It names no specific utility, no dollar figure and no date.
The LG ThinQ Energy programme page count comes from source 2 and includes a refrigerator among the 7 categories pictured. The LG and OhmConnect count comes from source 3. The LG and KEPCO count comes from sources 4 and 5. This is a MAOWCE count of the appliances named in each announcement, not a figure any 1 source states as a total.
Show the numbers
| LG ThinQ Energy programme page | 7 |
| LG and OhmConnect partnership, 2023 | 2 |
| LG and KEPCO cashback pilot, 2026 | 4 |
The 2 real paying partnerships found leave the refrigerator out
MAOWCE looked for a real, dated, dollar backed program that actually pays for the pictured refrigerator and found 2, and both exclude it. LG and OhmConnect announced a partnership on September 12, 2023, that lets United States customers with LG room air conditioners access OhmConnect own Demand Response program through the LG ThinQ app, OhmConnect states, and separately covers LG televisions.
It is alliances like ours with LG that really make an outsized impact on enabling millions of residents to take control of their energy use.
Cisco DeVries, chief executive officer of OhmConnect, the company that runs the only dated LG appliance demand response partnership found. Source 3.
OhmConnect has paid its customers more than 17 million dollars company wide since it launched, across 30 integrated companies and manufacturers, though that total is not specific to LG or to any refrigerator.
LG and KEPCO, the Korea Electric Power Corporation, signed a memorandum of understanding on August 26, 2026, at the KEPCO Art Center in Seoul, for a Smart Appliance Cashback pilot that pays 100 won for every kilowatt hour used, capped at 300 won an hour, deducted automatically from the electricity bill. The pilot covers washing machines, dryers, dishwashers and Styler clothing care units, never a refrigerator, and only runs on weekends and holidays, 11 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon, inside 2 seasonal windows.
The months are converted to numbers here only to draw the chart, a conversion made for this article, the same kind of unit conversion already used elsewhere on the site, not a figure either source states as a number. Source 4 and source 5 both state the window as March to May and September to October. The pilot also only runs on weekends and holidays, 11 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon, within each window, source 4.
Show the numbers
| Spring window | March to May |
| Fall window | September to October |
Of the 2 real, dated, dollar backed partnerships found for an LG appliance, 0 pay for a refrigerator, a MAOWCE count, even though LG own programme page pictures 1 as eligible. Registering the Smart Grid button today gets a feature that can lower how much energy a refrigerator uses when asked, and that can be switched off any time, not a rebate. No dated program found in this reporting pays for that yet.