Is the TV Off? No, It’s Really on Standby, Using Current

New York Times ^ | August 7, 2006 | SEWELL CHAN

[neverdem]

Throughout the record-breaking heat wave last week, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg used his pulpit to underscore the urgency of saving electricity. He repeated his advice like a mantra, urging New Yorkers to set their thermostats at 78 degrees, to keep air-conditioners on only when at home and to avoid using household appliances like washers, dryers and dishwashers during peak periods.

“If we want to keep the power going, we’re all just going to have to conserve,” Mr. Bloomberg said on Wednesday. “I’ve done it in my house. Please — I cannot stress it enough — do it in yours.”

That same afternoon, Consolidated Edison, which supplies power to New York City and most of Westchester County, recorded an all-time record use of 13,141 megawatts.

Hundreds of organizations, from Nasdaq to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, took steps to reduce consumption. The number of residents who cooperated is harder to measure.

Peter A. Bradford, a former chairman of the state’s Public Service Commission, said that appeals like Mr. Bloomberg’s, while laudable, do not result in durable reductions in consumption.

“Advocating efficiency in the long term is not the same thing as the appeal on the day of the crisis to turn down thermostats,” he said. “One requires long-term planning, budgeting and capital investment — efficiency in buildings being perhaps the clearest example. The day-of-crisis stuff is equivalent to what the coach can do once the team is on the field and falling behind. At that point your options are far more limited.”

One obvious reason for the strain on the network is that the number of energy-devouring devices continues to grow. In 1980, 14 percent of households had a microwave oven. By 1987, 66 percent did, and by 2001, the last year for which federal statistics were available, 96 percent had...

[idkfa]

Executive Order
Energy Efficient Standby Power Devices

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the National Energy Conservation Policy Act (Public Law 95-619, 92 Stat. 3206, 42 U.S.C. 8252 et seq.), as amended by the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPACT) (Public Law 102-486, 106 Stat. 2776), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code, and in order to further encourage energy conservation by the Federal Government, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Energy Efficient Standby Power Devices. Each agency, when it purchases commercially available, off-the-shelf products that use external standby power devices, or that contain an internal standby power function, shall purchase products that use no more than one watt in their standby power consuming mode. If such products are not available, agencies shall purchase products with the lowest standby power wattage while in their standby power consuming mode. Agencies shall adhere to these requirements, when life-cycle cost-effective and practicable and where the relevant product's utility and performance are not compromised as a result. By December 31, 2001, and on an annual basis thereafter, the Department of Energy, in consultation with the Department of Defense and the General Services Administration, shall compile a preliminary list of products to be subject to these requirements. The Department of Energy shall finalize the list and may remove products deemed inappropriate for listing.

Sec. 2. Independent Agencies. Independent agencies are encouraged to comply with the provisions of this order.

Sec. 3. Definition. "Agency" means an executive agency as defined in 5 U.S.C. 105. For the purpose of this order, military departments, as defined in 5 U.S.C. 102, are covered by the Department of Defense.

GEORGE W. BUSH

THE WHITE HOUSE,

July 31, 2001.

[sarasmom]

LOL!
I try to tell people I know, that although I am certainly not an energy "expert", certain appliances draw more power than others.
Although I have a bit of an advantage, since I have been tasked for over a decade in calculating the minimum amount of electricity required to safely display the desired equipment at trade shows (talk about high electric bills!).
Easy test for people who actually know where their meter is spinning:
Turn everything with an "off" button Off.
Go to the meter and watch it spin slowly....that's still money.
That's just your refrigerator and idle draws of clocks and timers that are always on, since they are plugged into the "circuit".
Start turning on appliances one at a time, lighting, water heater, air conditioner etc, and watch the dial spin ever faster.
Now this is where we get to the fun part...turn on the fun stuff!
Fire up that computer system and leave it running 24/7!
The monitor still draws the same amount of current whether or not you have the "screen saver" set to blank.
The noise your PC makes when processing data does not draw any more current than when it sits at idle.
It never ceases to amaze me how many people never power off their "toys", when they are finished playing with them.
That $5.99 surge protector/power strip, just blows itself up, if it gets a sudden overload of undemanded electrical supply, before it blows up your more expensive appliances.
Would you leave your car running on idle 24/7 and think yourself prudently "saving start-up energy consumption"?
Myself, I frivolously leave my hot water heater "on" all day, 24/7, as I enjoy having "hot" water on demand, without waiting, and am willing to pay extra for that particular luxury.

[bitt]

so..........

either kill certain circuits or pull all cords and surge surpressors out of the wall when not in use...????

[Smartass]

"And an America filled with Electric Cars would help "HOW"???"

Come on now, that's a no brainer.   Cars with
two hundred mile extension cords...all tangled up!

 

[Old Student]

"Four scanners? What are you doing, digitizing the local library?"

No, we just sort of added one here, and one there... Started with a Lexmark X75 Printrio since the printer in it was compatible with the z22 or whatever it was I had then, then added another one when they dropped to $60 each as it was cheaper than buying new cartridges, and gave us a fully compatible backup. Then we got my wife's Dell, with a Dell 922 printer a package deal. Just the other day, I finally broke down and got one that will let me scan slides and 35mm negatives, since I have tons of them. (I used to be a professional photographer, and my slide projector died, and I can't afford to replace it with equally good pro equipment, and I can't get it repaired as it is SO old and obsolete.) We also homeschool, and all the kids have their own computers; one of the X75's is now set up so they can connect it to any of their machines. All do Photoshop (much better than Adnan Hajj, too!) and wordprocessing, Paintshop, Paint, etc. Thank heaven for Academic-license software.

Oh, heck. I forgot to mention the thrift-shop iMac, too... and the hulk and spare monitor laying around. I hope one day to buy 20" LCD's for everyone... (and my dream personal computer is a Cray X.) I'm working on a master's in special education, and expect the kids to be ready for college starting in about four years.

[mysterio]

Conservation is not an energy policy.

[neverdem]

Conservation is not an energy policy.

Conservation should be a part of any energy policy, especially when increasing any part of the energy infrastructure is almost impossible.

[mysterio]

That's why we need to replace it. But we can't conserve the problem away.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[John Jorsett]

Oh, heck. I forgot to mention the thrift-shop iMac, too... and the hulk and spare monitor laying around. I hope one day to buy 20" LCD's for everyone...

At the rate LCD prices are falling, they'll be putting them in cereal boxes in another couple of years.

[Old Student]

"At the rate LCD prices are falling, they'll be putting them in cereal boxes in another couple of years."

I can hardly wait!

As far as conservation goes, I'm trying to find ways to reduce consumption here, like waking the kids up when I find they've left their computers on at bedtime. Eventually, I hope to have everyone on a UPS, as well, and instead of having them on commercial power, put in a battery bank and solar panel(s) to keep the batteries up. I figure I need something over 2KW, with surge capability to about 4 or 5KW, to run the computer lab.

[Old Student]

"Of course ethanol is heavily subsidized by taxes and is in no way a good alterantive fuel."

Like gasoline IS a good fuel? NOT! The advantages of ethanol are that it is a renewable resource, and it is relatively easy to make, and that it is relatively safe and non-polluting. Disadvantages are that it is low in energy density, and expensive to make. It is quite versatile, chemically, however.

Gasoline is high in energy density, but relatively unsafe, not so good relative to pollution, and both dangerous and expensive to make. It was originally chosen, IIRC, because it was cheap, a waste byproduct of the production of kerosene for lamp oil. It's also a non-renewable resource.

(caveat: according to what I taught my geography students, renewable is based on human time scales; if we can get more of it in a human lifetime, it's renewable. If it takes more than a lifetime, like for instance oil, which supposedly takes millions of years to renew, it ain't. I've seen arguments that oil is also a renewable resource, but I'm not educationally equipped to evaluate them properly.)

Problem is that nothing is really a GOOD fuel. Some are less un-good than others, is all. Which is best depends on your circumstances.

[norraad]

"Good night, Chris..and unplug that electric clock, you can't tell time while your sleepin'!"

Father on Everybody hates Chris

[norraad]

Think of it this way.

Say water is the blood of the planet and oil is like the lymph system.

In terms of scale that's about right.

The x{=has been}~spurts{drip under pressure} are very ignorant of the real nature of petroleum (from the Latin ~ rock oil).

Get it?

It's rock oil!

The Earth makes it in quantizer we'll never ever put a dent in, . . ever.

That's why all the estimates always have to be revised upward.

It's under pressure from deep down and is always looking for ways to come up.

If we didn't use some of it, it would be all over the place, like in Jed's swamp.

[HKMk23]

Thomas Gold promoted the deep source theory of oil.

Good overview and some links here:
http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_182.html

[Old Student]

"Get it?

It's rock oil!

The Earth makes it in quantizer we'll never ever put a dent in, . . ever."

I know what it is. I know, generally, the theory of how it is produced, and from what. I also know that there are other theories, as well. I also know that some oil fields have dried up. My point was not that we'll run out of oil, or not run out of oil, it was that gasoline, made from oil, is not necessarily the best source of energy. Nor is it the worst. What is best depends on circumstances and resources. If you've got lots of oil, and little land to grow corn (or sugar cane, as the Brazilians do) you use oil. If you've got lots of land, and no oil, you use ethanol. If you have neither, you either trade or you're screwed.

Since no one KNOWS which theory is right on the availability of crude oil, and I do know something of what is required to actually understand the details of the theories, I stated that I'm not up for evaluating them. My degree is in education, particularly social studies. What is yours? Unless it's chemistry, or geophysics, or something similar, or equivalent knowledge, you aren't either. Personally, I'm inclined to wait and see, not jump on any particular bandwagon.

[Old Student]

From a quick skim of the link you provided, he also seems to think that coal is produced in much the same way. My dad used to work in a coal mine, and brought us fossil ferns and such that he found in the shale above and below the coal seams.

I don't know about oil. I do know that coal could well be formed from great masses of vegetation compressed and heated over millennial. Not necessarily is, but certainly could be. I can see how oil could be squeezed out of such a mass, too. After all, there are commercial processes that do it now, and I've seen the same thing done in a lab. Heck, it's even possible both theories are right.

[Centurion2000]

What kind of sick bastard lives at 78 degrees.

I guess I'm just a sick bastard then :) At 70 degrees I'm freezing.

[TChris]

The monitor still draws the same amount of current whether or not you have the "screen saver" set to blank.

The noise your PC makes when processing data does not draw any more current than when it sits at idle.

Umm... I understand the sentiment, and your advice is mostly good. But these two statements are simply not true.

EnergyStar power saving technology has been a part of computer hardware for a while now.

* Monitor power management (MPM) can save $10 to $30 per monitor annually by placing your inactive monitors into a low-power sleep mode.

* Computer power management (CPM) places inactive computers (CPU, hard drive, etc.) into a low-power sleep mode, which can save $15 to $45 per desktop computer annually.