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- Living with Ed

(Originally posted on Eclectic Mind on March 9, 2007)

Two years ago I declared war on the kilowatt. It started as an effort to cut household expenses, but as I've learned more about how energy is generated in Texas, the nature of our emissions problems (the North Texas Metroplex has received an "F" from the American Lung Association six years in a row), and how backward my beloved oil state truly is when it comes to alternative energy generation, the War of the Kilowatt became a personal cause.

Yesterday I sat down and worked with the data I've been collecting and assessed my progress:
- 2005, total kwh: 23,113
- 2006, total kwh: 20,817

The numbers tell me that I've managed to lower our usage roughly 10% and I'm still plugging away. (Or unplugging away as the case may be.) Last month we had our lowest one-month consumption ever, 719 kwh.

Now, let me say that if I did not live with an elderly housemate who is extremely sensitive to temperature levels, I know these numbers would be better. I like a colder house in the winter and as long as I have a fan going, I'd be happy with a thermostat set higher in the summer. R.'s personal thermometer is all over the place on any given day and it isn't unusual for her to declare that she's freezing to death when it's 104 degrees outside or burning up when it's 72.

So, what did this overall kwh reduction get us beyond the environmental aspect of the effort? A savings of $724.41 at the current rate of 0.3155076 cents per kwh.
And, what did I do to start using less energy?

1. Changed every bulb in the house to compact fluorescent. They use 2/3 less energy, last ten times longer, and generate 70% less heat. (For more information see this page on www.energystar.gov.)

2. Began to use the stove less in favor of more energy efficient methods of cooking. (When it's on, the average kitchen stove actually pulls more electricity than the air conditioner!) I use the microwave, a George Foreman Grill, a rice steamer (which is great for all kinds of things including the best corn on the cob you've ever eaten), and a Crock-Pot.

3. Adopted the 15 minute rule. If you're going to be back in the room within 15 minutes, leave the light on. It's more energy efficient than turning the light off and back on. If you're not in the room, turn the light off. (This has been a real challenge around here since R. has this thing about "a dark house.") I don't even turn the light on in my room when I come in to use the bathroom in the evenings. I charge a solar light by the patio door during the day and it gives me enough light in here to come in and out of the room. I only switch the lamp on when I settle down to work.

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Verdict Is: Turn the Lights Off (March 12, 2007)

MythBusters (season 4) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Through numerous tests, the MythBusters calculated that the power surge from turning on a light would only consume as much power as leaving it on for a fraction of a second (except for fluorescent tube lights; the startup consumed about 23 seconds worth of power). Furthermore, the wear and tear of turning the light on and off repeatedly did not reduce the bulb's total life expectancy enough to offset the increased electricity usage. Therefore, it is far more economical to turn a light off rather than leaving it on." For a more extensive explanation of the methods used in the experiment see Annotated Mythbusters Episode 69.

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4. Use fans in the summer. The first year I really screwed up on this one. In my head it was wasting electricity to run the air conditioner and the fans until I did some research and realized the fans actually help the air conditioner to work less and the combination saves more energy in the long run.

5. Tinted the windows that get the most afternoon sun. This was a huge help in keeping the house cooler in the afternoons and helping the air conditioner to cool more efficiently. The windows in the dining room and R.'s room were acting like an oven. I bought do-it-yourself window film at Home Depot and did the job in an afternoon. (I didn't tint the patio doors because the cats love to sun there and they do get a vote around here.)

6. Unplug gadget chargers. This is a real insidious energy drain. Most power cables for things like laptops and cell phones continue to pull energy even when the device isn't plugged in. The new rule around here is that if the gadget isn't plugged in and juicing up, the charger is unplugged. (I also charge a few things with a small solar charger but I don't get enough light year round at the patio door to do that more than a couple of months out of the year. I'm continuing to research solar chargers and other devices, however, and am really hoping for a solar lamp for my room sooner than later.)

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(Article from Treehugger.com)

Is Phantom Energy Haunting Your House?: "Many of the electronic devices in your home stay on, even when they're "off." Chargers for cell phones, digital cameras, power tools and other gadgets draw energy even when they're not in use. Appliances like televisions, computer monitors and DVD players can also draw power whenever they're plugged into an outlet. All together, "phantom energy" use accounts for about 5 percent of an individual's home's electricity use."

(Article from Treehugger.com)

"Smart" Power Strips: Helping to Stop Idle Current Now! (TreeHugger): "Tipster Brahm has been hard at work looking for ways to reduce the amount of power drawn by computer accessories when they aren't in use. As we noted in this post, simply unplugging peripherals from the wall helps a lot, but that isn't always possible or practical with things like Brian's VoIP router. And, as anyone using a power strip to power a cubicle or home-office setup is aware, it doesn't take much to get a tangle of wires and plugs and cables. Enter the Wattstopper Plug Load Control and Smart Strip Power Strip. Both help stop the idle current drawn from your outlets when electronics aren't in use, though they go about it in different ways."
"7 outlet 1225 Joules Smart Power Strip WITH Coaxial protection, SCG5" (Smart Strip) $26.95

"Smart Strip 10-Outlet Surge, Lcg5" (BITS Limited) $36.95

(Amazon Affiliate Links)
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7. Watch TV over the Slingbox. This one is probably only for the real hard-core geeks. Most of the time when I'm working I have the TV going in the background. It helps me concentrate. I use my Slingbox to place shift the signal to the laptop. I get the "noise" I want and the Slingbox uses considerably less energy than the television set.
I won't lie to you. It takes discipline to change your behavior in regard to electricity. Most of us were raised to be power hogs. But over time, it will save money and it's definitely the right thing to do with the growing evidence of global warming (a fact that has been clear to some of us for several years now.)

My next major project is to divest ourselves of the extra freezer and refrigerator in the garage. Of course, I have to kill everything in them first, and I've offered the freezer to the Wookie. If we can't work that out, Goodwill is getting a call to come pick them up.
On a personal level, the best part of the energy reduction process is that I often hear my late father laughing over my shoulder. I can't count the thousands of times he growled at me and my mother, "Goddamn it! Do you wenches think I own the electric company?!" Oh Pop, if you were outraged at the prices back then, I shudder to think at what you'd have to say about the rates now.
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Killing the Kilowatt: First Quarter Report (March 29, 2007)

"Electricity Nazi." That's what MissMeliss called me the other day. My first Killing the Kilowatt post reported on my overall success in a more than two-year war with energy consumption here in our home. For the remainder of 2007 I'll be posting each quarter, sharing my on-going effort to keep the numbers headed down. Here are the first quarter figures for the past three years:

- 2005: 3,074 kwh
- 2006: 2,693 kwh
- 2007: 2,288 kwh

I won't make you do the math. The first year I brought our consumption for the first quarter down 381 kwh, and for the second an additional 405 kwh. Since I started keeping records in 2005, our energy use is down 786 kwh for January, February, and March. (Understanding of course that the energy figures are actually for the previous month. I just decided it was easier to go with the date of the bill.)

Using the same rate figure from my first post (0.3155076 cents), the 405 kwh we cut over last year saved us $127.78.

The biggest difference I have to report in the progress of this personal campaign is the fact that I've had to abandon the 15 minute rule. I, like many folk, used to think that if you were going to return to the room within 15 minutes it was cheaper to leave the light on. The Mythbusters, however, disproved that notion and so I've set about training myself to turn lights off no matter what.

I did not realize how much I relied on the 15 minute crutch and now catch myself turning around dozens of times a day to flip off a switch. As I've written before, undertaking this campaign with R. in the house is not easy. There's one light in the kitchen that she prefers to have burning all the time. Now, without discussing it with her, I'm going to leave it off during the day and until I put her to bed at night. Then I'll flip it on because she doesn't like looking down a dark hall into the kitchen. I can respect that.

In the evenings when we watch TV in the breakfast room, I'm being diligent to make sure all other lights in the house are off and that when I need to go into another room, I do it without turning a light on. The mercury vapor driveway lights throw more than enough illumination in my room to get me to the bathroom and back.

When I work in my tiny office at night, there's no reason for the lights in my bedroom to be on. The only "monster" apt to come out of that darkness will be feline and carrying a foam ball asking to play.

The next quarter will be harder. The numbers to beat are:

- 2005: 6,148
- 2006: 6,070

Obviously over the first quarter those figures illustrate the effect of the first half of a Texas summer. But look at what I'm facing in the third quarter:

- 2005: 9,897
- 2006: 8,666

Summer is really hard on my efforts because R., like many elderly people, is totally heat intolerant. We have no shade over our roof, so it's tricky to fiddle with the thermostat. Gradually through the course of the afternoon the house heats up and by five o'clock it's stuffy in here for about an hour. I now understand that running fans is not counter-productive to what I'm trying to do and will actually help the air conditioner to work less. So, stay tuned. The battle continues.