Would turning off one light bulb really save oil?

[Peter]

Mmmmh, nuclear power. Another shining example about how to be careless about the world's future. Hey! We got deserts! Let's dump the radiating waste there for the next 10000 years! Not to mention what happens when things go wrong in such a power plant. Don't tell me it doesn't happen. We here in Europe have seen it happen. That was 17 years ago, thousands of miles away, and we're still not eating forest mushrooms nor wild animals.

On the other side of the spectrum, those pump-the-water-back-uphill plants that have been built (in mountain areas, mostly) are mostly going out of business because they're extremely inefficient. We have one round here, it's being maintained mostly because it attracts tourists. The current fashion is not to store the excess energy produced at night, but not to produce it in the first place - this requires building power plants in a way such that you can fire them up and shut them down with little delay and effort.

 

[KenGr]

When you deal with facts instead of emotion and images, nuclear power works very well in free societies. It's not a good idea for closed, totalitarian societies but in the Western world we have about 6000 reactor years of operating experience with no harm to the public. Very few technologies can claim that. Since decisions are being made based on short term politics and emotion, it's not clear that nuclear has any near term future, but anyone who tells you there are other practical alternatives to fossil fuels is dealing with hopes and wishes and not facts.

 

[Peter]

Well ... power saving here in Europe has worked well enough that the energy oligopolists actually shut down lots of plants because they aren't needed anymore. And now that the power companies here must pay for ALL the cost involved, including the material waste and the cost of deconstructing and disposal of retired plants, nuclear power suddenly isn't that interesting anymore, not even financially.
(Funny side note: Germany will shut down ALL their nuclear plants over the 25 years to come. Shortly before the elections, the conservative candidate announced they'd nix that law. Power companies were furious and said they WANT to shut them down.)

Question: Does nuclear waste magically disappear just because of a certain form of government?

Besides, there have been plenty of incidents with highly radiating material, including exposure of the nature and life around them, in what you call the "free world". Never heard of it? Well, that's because the power companies are at least as good in covering up as the Soviet government was. The proof comes from the outside ... e.g. we have a significant accumulation of leukemia cases in children around quite a few of those "safe western" type reactors, all across europe. Lawsuits-a-plenty. The money of course being on the wrong side.

Food for thought: One third of the average household's total electricity bill comes from stuff that's on Standby instead of being Off.

 

[Ipno]

Food for thought: One third of the average household's total electricity bill comes from stuff that's on Standby instead of being Off.

I think you made that up.

And your ideas of power conservation in europe are obviously going to be skewed. America, especially areas such as california, is growing a lot faster than europe. Its simply not a fair comparison. You can ask every house to turn off one light, but its not going to help when in 10 years your neighborhood grows by 50%.

 

[Peter]

I didn't make the Standby thing up. This has been genuinely researched here in Germany. Look at your own household: How many items do you have that don't have an actual, physical Off switch, and thus are consuming energy all day (5 to 10 watts usually)? Computer, monitor, TV, VCR, DVD, Hi-Fi rack, kitchen equipment, radios, everything else that has a detached power supply on the mains plug or on the cable ... plenty stuff that quickly adds up to hundreds if not thousands of Wh per day.
If you have access to your household's power meter thing, you can even measure. Turn the fridge off, and look at the idle consumption (not actually using any equipment). You'll be surprised.

With all the potential in energy saving technology, there's enough headroom to compensate for a 50 percent growth - without anyone freezing, melting, or reading books in the dark.

 

[Ipno]

Then provide a link to the research please with credible examples.

Kitchen appliances such as refrigerators don't count, unless you want to say we shouldn't refrigerate our food.

And lets take your example of 5-10 watts for standby mode.

Multiply that by 10 devices on standby... well, I don't have that many, I have 2 alarm clocks, a VCR and a TV that keeps a clock, but we're talking averages here, I'll even take the high estimate and we'll say the house is using 100 watts of electricity for stuff on standby.

2.4kWh per day. Sounds pretty astounding at first eh? But then lets look at some real facts.

According to this chart by the US Department Of Energy the Average American household uses 889 kWh per month. The 72 kWh that our "standby" utilities are using is HARDLY 33% of our electric consumption, and I was using a high estimate. If you want to really stretch I might let you get by with saying that 10% of our electric consumption is due to idle devices.

Here is another list of devices and some raw numbers of power consumption. In the text you'll see alarm clocks do in fact on average consume 10 watts. And most devices on standby are said to consume a few watts per hour in "phantom costs".

Hardly 33%, but then I'm not looking at a german study. Just an american one.

 

[Mark R]

The estimate of 33% of electricity being used by standby appliances is probably quite close to accurate in Europe.

The reason it doesn't apply in the US is because of the startling quantity of electricity consumed in general - 890 kWh / month / household to me is mind-boggling. In the UK, the average is about of 1/3 that. Even my family, who are grossly profligate, don't use even half of that amount.

Of my families consumption I suspect about 25% is due to 'idle' power - I've measure the 'idle' power of the house and it comes to about 130 W. In fact, I hadn't really thought about what actually is taking that power, but then I counted 36 seperate devices that don't have a real off switch: including several mobile phone chargers, cordless phones, TVs, VCRs, PCs and assorted peripherals (each needing its own wall-wart).

It's the PCs though that really eat power: Sure the PC may only use 10 W when switched off, but what about speakers, modem, USB hub, network hub, scanner, printer - each one will take a few watts for itself (even when switched off).

 

[Ipno]

Actually, no, try again, those numbers work fairly consistantly for just about every country. I don't know what your consumption rate per household is in the UK (But please, do try to come up with some actual figures instead of hearsay before you berate my beloved country).

Do your research first.

In fact, I found at the IEA (International Energy Agency) this article which states quite clearly:

"Leaking electricity" is though(sic) to account for between 5% and 15% of power used in homes in OECD countries.

What is an OECD country? It stands for Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

This 26 member countries are Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greecm Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, and United States.

Notice that it says between 5 and 15 percent, not 5 and 15 percent on average. So even if the US is on the high end we're consuming 15% of our electricity through standby devices.

But NOT 33%. Not 33% in any of those 26 countries, not according to the IEA (Which you can read about here if you want to check the credibility of the study).

The truth is out there, you just have to know where to look.

Please don't make up statistics when you are berating my country, and please also try and back up your assertions with hard data instead of hearsay.

 

[Mark R]

. I don't know what your consumption rate per household is in the UK (But please, do try to come up with some actual figures instead of hearsay before you berate my beloved country).

Ofgem (the Office of Gas and Electricity Markets) states that the average UK household consumption is 3,300 kWh / year. This same figure is quoted by each of the numerous electricity suppliers that have pushed a leaflet through my letter box. This is the figure I used for my calculation.

Some articles about electricity consumption claim numbers varying between 2500 and 4200 kWh - though none of them have quoted any sources - I suspect they have less veracity than ofgem's figures.

Further point: I've done a quick web-search about standby power consumption - one recent small study calculated this at 8% of household consumption. Official estimates state between 5 and 10 %.

I was probably a bit quick to reply based on my own calculations and measurements - the standby consumption at home certainly would account for 33% of average household consumption - I just failed to proofread my post, and spot the error in my assumptions.

 

[Agent004]

When comes to statistics like this, you got to question a few things.

1) What electrical applications did they sample from? (Like which ones are excluded, lights may not count as 'wastage' similarly, electrical heating may not count either)

2) Where did they sample from, the physical location. From villages?, Towns? Cities? Different location have their own 'usage' standard, what may considered as wastage may not be so in others.

3) How many are sampled?

The numbers statistics are given by the govenment to the IEA, so personally I am doubting the accuracy of the data.

So I am not doubting IEA and their way of calculating but the statistics(data) that were given to them.

Also consider U.S refusal (the representative simply gave a statement of ' we will not participate in it ' ) to make any resolution what so ever in the last environment/energy summit, that adds even more clouds on creditbility of U.S' statistics.

Also, those number certainly does not work fairly consistantly for just about every country. The numbers you quoted are for the IEA members, but what about the rest of the world? China and India represents about 1/3 of the world's population and yet they are not a member? Okey, if you take India out of the equation, China itself still represent a large population that have access to eletricity.
IMO, I just collect a few years of electricity bills (my parent does them for some reason) and see how a new tv, pc, 4 vcr, new freezer and etc see for yourself. How much more am I using over the years.

Yes, I am pretty sure after turning all the VCR and pc off when not using (they are on 24/7) the monthly bill will be significantly reduced. Try it and see real data for yourself, before you accusing other people of berating your country.

 

[Ipno]

Do you want to know why I find that number suspect?

Go backwards from 3300 kWh per year and you get 275 kWh per month. Go even farther and its a little over 9kWh per day or 381 watts per hour.

Your PC is eating half of that. Turn on a PC and a lightbulb and run a few of those sleeper processes and you're taking more than your fair share. If your refrigerator kicks on for 10 minutes every hour thats eating 125 watts an hour. (and not to mention, one really efficient refrigerator)

I mean really, 381 watts per hour? It seems very sceptical to me, but I'm willing to accept it, but ...

Well lets look at lifestyles here. Do you own a refrigerator? How do you heat your home? I use Gas but the blower on it is electric. Do you use a washing machine? Do you cook at home?

If you want to really look at it, all things being equal, how could I as an American reduce myself to your "Superior" energy consumption rates? I already have installed low wattage lightbulbs (Florescent bulbs that use 17 watts are in most my fixtures). I turn off everything but my computer when I leave because my computer is running UD for Team Anandtech as well as a file server that both my wife and I use, but the monitor is off.

There are however some things to keep in mind:

If you're going to a public laundry you're not using less electricity you're just transfering the usage to the laundrymat.

If you're eating out you're not using less energy to prepare your food you're transfering the costs of storage (refrigeration) and preparation (cooking) to the restaurant.

But 889 is average here. However, thats factoring in the southern states, most of which use upwards of 1000+ kWh per month, the main reason being air conditioning. The southeastern states like Florida, Alabama etc. being the worst, where its not only hot but also very humid.

Tell me, how many days has it hit above 37 degrees in the UK? According to your government ... once. That happens all the time here in the United States.

Judge us on a fair playing field before you condemn us. Spend a summer at home in southern alabama and see how you would like to sleep in 35 degrees at 100% humidity.

Can it be done? Is it a creture comfort? Yes. In fact it is. In fact people who drive SUV's don't need them. (I don't drive one, I drive a small practical car but hey)

But you know, there are villages in the Amazon who don't use ANY electricity. Compared to them your ecologically superior country looks like a vast pit of waste. I mean do you actually NEED a computer?

Apples to Apples my friend. The closest we can come I think is comparing our New England states to you, and their average is 595 kWh per household. Why do we use that much? And is that much too much? Thats not for me to say.

But there are plenty of studies where you can actually research energy consumption.

None of them that I've found say that anyone uses 33% of their electricity on standby power consumption.

 

[Ipno]

Again, HARD DATA to the contrary is what I'm looking for.

Look, I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong but you haven't presented any real evidence to the contrary. You keep presenting anecdotal evidence about how you got a flyer in the mail, or how you know this to be true because the United States wouldn't join in the Kyoto Treaty which does not present the real facts about why it was denied in the first place.

The fact is, I'm not trying to be a patriot, I'm not trying to berate you. I'm trying to understand your position that America is wasteful but its hard to see for me, because you see, I can't understand how I could personally reduce my power consumption to fit your 3300 kWh per year model. I'm trying to understand where you're coming from. Why is your system better overall.

Is it better to have cheaper energy which fuels a stronger economy or to restrict energy and place a limit on growth? These are things to evaluate. Yes, some Americans are not energy concious. I would like to think that I am. However, you're giving me nothing to the contrary other than as I said, heresay.

This may not be this thread, but "America Bashing" in general is really getting on my nerves, as its been said, its the opiate of the intellectual. Complaining about Americans makes you feel smart, until you take a step back and realize how bigoted you sound.

 

[KenGr]

At the risk of derailing a good argument, I think I know where the 33% came from and it's a good example of how information is misapplied. As I recall (and I'll admit up front I'm not going to try to find the study again) a study established that at least a third of the electricity use of appliances WITH STANDBY MODES was used while on standby. This is probably valid but, of course, it doesn't include refrigerators, most kitchen appliances, furnaces, etc.

I'm all in favor of common sense in energy use, but I don't like decisions being made for me by people with political agendas and limited scientific knowledge. I don't care if my TV takes 10 seconds longer to come on but I don't want anyone telling me when I can or can't run my air conditioning or what kind of a vehicle I can buy.

 

[KenGr]

Originally posted by: Peter
Well ... power saving here in Europe has worked well enough that the energy oligopolists actually shut down lots of plants because they aren't needed anymore. And now that the power companies here must pay for ALL the cost involved, including the material waste and the cost of deconstructing and disposal of retired plants, nuclear power suddenly isn't that interesting anymore, not even financially.
(Funny side note: Germany will shut down ALL their nuclear plants over the 25 years to come. Shortly before the elections, the conservative candidate announced they'd nix that law. Power companies were furious and said they WANT to shut them down.)

Here's a story based on an interview with the head of one of Germany's largest utiities:

PlanetArknull

Basically says they don't want to shut the plants down. Shutting them down will make it impossible to meet Greenhouse Gas goals.

 

[Keysplayr]

Ask yourself this: If you didn't have any oil, do you think you could light up the bulb?

Keys

 

[Matt]

Ipno,

It is a fact that many americans aren't very conscious about the environment or about their high consumption of energy.
I'm also very aware of the fact that the US isn't very popular around the world at the moment due to the actions of the current administration.
However, this has nothing to do with the reality of the current energy consumption and definately nothing to do with bigotry.
I'd be glad to discuss this further, perhaps under the forum: "Off topic"? IMO, bigotry is not an issue in this thread.

Btw.. yes, even turning off a single light bulb matters in saving whatever energy resource we are utilizing at the moment.

/Matt

 

[Peter]

Well ... "there is no oil shortage, there is enough energy".

You're dreaming. Just look at how the ups and downs of energy pricing directly, and almost proportionally, affect the ups and downs of the economy in the western hemisphere. Our economic fate is stuck to whatever the energy oligopolists are up to - and the way out does not lie in pretending that everything would be fine if they'd be liberated to sell us more of their energy.
And yes, even though we have alternative sources of energy (be they messy nuclear or renewable sources), energy pricing still is solidly following the oil price.

The only way to release our future selves from that dependency is to bring energy consumption down. Every single citizen on their own.

 

[Mark R]

Ipno,

Well, my consumption figure did come from a report by the electricy generating companies regulatory office - I don't know who else would have a more accurate figure.

While you are quite right in that it is not possible directly to compare electricity consumption between one area and another - it may be helpful to demonstrate the differences, so that one can look at the reasons behind it. I was surprised at the size of the consumption figure you quoted, and had not put sufficient thought into my original reply - I don't mean and undue criticism.

The problem is that people don't look hard enough to save energy - the problem seems to be that of apathy and ignorance, and is the same worldwide.

Simple things like loft insulation or cavity wall foam insulation can make an enormous difference to energy consumption, particularly in terms of heating. There have been numerous campaigns in the UK promting this, yet there are still plenty of houses which have uninsulated lofts and walls - even though the payback time for installation of such installation is often less than 5 years. One of the most common reasons I hear about people not getting such insulation installed is that it will make their house too hot in Summer; in fact, it actually makes it cooler. If you used active air conditioning, insulation would certainly reduce its running costs.

Similarly, A few years ago I was out shopping for a new freezer with my parents. We looked in one store, at a range of equipment. I took the trouble to enquire about the energy consumption of each appliance - as at the time, the figures were not displayed on the price tag. We were looking at capacities of around 10 cu ft, but what startled me was the difference in power consumption between different brands - the highest used nearly 3 times as much electricity as the most efficient - I think the range was about 500 kWh - 1500 kWh per year. This is supposed to be easier now as these figures are frequently displayed. As a domestic freezer is the heaviest electricity consuming appliance in a typical UK house, people should pay attention - though I suspect they don't.

My personal thoughts are that there is as much scope for reducing pollution from electricity generation, by attention to energy saving in the home and workplace, as there is in developing alternative technologies for power generation. When I was at uni, an internal 'energy efficiency' campaign manage to cut the total annual electricity charge from £2m to £1m. A single institution was able to save 14 GWh (approx). Compare this to a large 'wind farm' currently being planned - current specs are 16 towers, each with a 300 ft turbine - total annual output is expected to about 40 GWh.

 

[jarsoffart]

I have my computer and all accessories plugged into a surge protector. If I turned off the surge protector at night, would my things still be drawing power? If I'm going to be gone from my house for 1 hour, should I turn off my computer? I've heard, what could be a myth, that during boot up your computer takes a lot of power. Can someone give me some practical ways to save energy?

 

[dzt]

sure you will lower down your electricity cost, a bit. but for the oil thing, its just like running a big home generator set at constant torque ,speed and fuel rate, to light up less lamp. it will not consume less fuel.
but if it's a nationwide thing, there will be differrent (less torque at constant speed, less fuel rate).
but anyway, will we lack out of energy ?

 

[Peter]

Any inductive electricity generator will vary in torque as the load changes. So even the small ones consume more or less fuel at a constant rpm depending on how much current you draw ... even the one in your car.

 

[Agent004]

Well lets look at lifestyles here. Do you own a refrigerator? How do you heat your home? I use Gas but the blower on it is electric. Do you use a washing machine? Do you cook at home?

Life styles, if you are around the same kind of people on the same kind of life style, you are obvious not going to think it's not excessive. It's like this, why should a rich person buy a 200k car when a 10k car will just do as well? If you are in a wasteful style, and can afforded, it's obvious you are not going to think it's wasteful.

Tell me, how many days has it hit above 37 degrees in the UK? According to your government ... once. That happens all the time here in the United States.

Luckily I spent a few years in China where 37 degree is not a rare event at all, quite often we have to sleep in such high temperature without any air conditioning. And during the Winter, no heating of any kind at all.

Also, that stats according to the data is incorrect, as even between the forecasters can't agree, the usual discrepancy is +- 1-3 degrees. In the last 3 yrs, there are quite a few occasion where, BBC, ITV, Sky-news reported temperature between 35-37 degrees and some say higher. They all have different locations measuring the same thing. The main point is even the data from government-official can't not be taken in completely as truth. That's why I place such important on those aspects of how and where the stats were collected and analysed

But you know, there are villages in the Amazon who don't use ANY electricity. Compared to them your ecologically superior country looks like a vast pit of waste. I mean do you actually NEED a computer?

I was brought up in one such village. Candles are great, sleep early too, around 7 pm.

 

[dzt]

perhaps lowering your consumption is one thing. how about lowering your AC current by "fixing power factor" using capasitors. It will lower down current and "reduce power loss".
anyone can explain us details ?

 

[PowerEngineer]

Originally posted by: dzt
perhaps lowering your consumption is one thing. how about lowering your AC current by "fixing power factor" using capasitors. It will lower down current and "reduce power loss".
anyone can explain us details ?

Yes, I can!

You remember that in a simple DC circuit, the power delivered to a load is simply the voltage drop across the load multiplied by the current passing through it: P=V*I. Well, it's still the same in AC circuits but it gets a little more complicated to think about because both the voltage and current are sinusoidal waves that are therefore varying in magnitude from millisecond to millisecond. If you take the magnitude of the voltage at an instant in time and multiply it by the magnitude of the current at the same instant in time you'll get the power being consumed at that instant in time. Of course, both magnitudes change in the next instant and therefore the power does too.

Now remember that the product of two sinusoids will be another sinusoid, making the power delivered a sinusoid too. Of course, a cycle of power delivery in North America lasts 16.66.. milliseconds. What really counts in most cases is the average power delivered over a longer period of time. That's where the concept of root-mean-square or RMS voltages and currents come in. The RMS value is just the peak value of the sinusoid divided by the square root of 2. Multiplying the RMS voltage times the RMS current gives you the average power delivered to the load every cycle -- but this statement is only true if the voltage and current sinusoids are exactly in phase (i.e. their peaks occur at the same instant). This isn't a condition that occurs without effort because the inductive elements in the power system (i.e. lines, transformers, etc.) tend to cause the current to lag behind the volatge, while the capacitive elements (shunt capacitors, etc.) tend to cause the current to lead the voltage.

If you want to do some exploring, take two sinusoids that are out of phase and calculate the instant-by-instant power delivery over one cycle and then average them to come up with the average power delivered. You'll see that power delivery averages to zero(!) when the phase angle between the two sinusoids is 90 degress (either way!), and that power reverses when the phase angle is 180 degrees (i.e. now it's a generator!).

If you do this, then you'll understand that the actual power delivery is the product of the RMS voltage and current multiplied by the cosine of the phase angle between them. This is often called the real power (megawatts for us power engineers). The product of the RMS voltage and RMS current is often called MVA. And the square root of the sum of the MVA squared plus the real power squared is the reactive power (megavars). And the cosine of the phase angle is called the power factor!

Anyway, it's not hard to see from this equation for real power that (using a fixed voltage) you need more current to deliver the same real power as the magnitude of the phase angle increases. Since resistive losses through lines and transformers rise as the sqaure of the current, your effeiciency is best when the current is lowest (and therefore your phase angle is lowest).

And that's why power companies spend money buying lots of shunt capacitors to offset the line inductances and keep line losses low. It keeps losses low (and it allows more power delivery through transformers because their ratings are based on their current carrying capacity). It's not hard to spot these capacitors on the poles of your local overhead distribution circuits; they look something like a handful of cereal box sized "cans" with small insulators on top. You might also see much larger collections inside substations.


Sorry this got so long. The bottom line is that power companies already do quite a lot to control the power factor on their transmisison and distribution systems, even compensating for the inductive nature of customer loads. There's not much more that a customer can ecomonically do to reduce losses by improving their power factor.

 

[dpopiz]

you shouldn't think about how much it saves and whether it's really helping...just turn anything off you're not using and encourage others to -- THAT will make a difference