Sense’s business model is as much about long-term granular data storage (and user access!) as it is about the hardware. Sense’s abilities, in the near term, with device detection in its infancy, seem limited but it’s data vacuuming ability is in a different class than other options. The incremental introduction of seemingly-magical deductions from that data (not only about device detection) and carefully staged integrations is Sense’s core strength.
For example, applying the “detection” paradigm to the Solar input data may be unnecessary but with the right data analysis you can expect that Sense will be able to optimize your solar usage for emergency escapes and beyond. These are not things that observing rudimentary energy usage information is going to tell you.