Energy Efficiency

This one took a little bit more brain power to think about a sufficient amount of tasks to on to become more energy efficient. The only things I could think of were unplugging appliances not in use, switching to compact energy efficient fluorescent light bulbs, clothes lining, avoiding heating/cooling, and solar paneling. Ok so solar paneling was definitely not in the cards but it's not a bad idea (with the exception of the e-waste factor...). At first I thought this was a short list of changes I could make and didn't expect them too make THAT much of a difference since it seemed all too simple. Boy was I wrong. It's true when they say that even the little changes make can make difference.

I'll admit it, I was never one to run around the house unplugging appliances not in use and I would constantly leave my cellphone charger plugged into the wall. I didn't realize that energy was still being used regardless of there being any appliances turned on or my cellphone being plugged in. Upon doing research on energy efficiency, my eyes were opened to the reality of the situation. Standby power, also called vampire power, refers to the electric power consumed by electronic devices while they're switched off or in standby mode. The most common electricity vampire is probably the power adapter since it has no off option. Although the wasted energy of individual devices may not be very much, the sum of the energy wasted among all households appliances can become quite significant.

Alan Meier, a staff scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) in Berkeley, noted that many household appliances are never fully switched off, but spend most of the time in a standby mode. His 2000 study showed that standby power accounted for around 10% of household power-consumption. By unplugging appliances not in use you can not only defeat the electricity vampire but also save money on your electricity bill as well. Although we do not pay for utilities at our house, our landlord has made a remark about the both the water and electric bill being on the decline this quarter. All thanks to the energy efficiency tips we've been following, I'm sure!

Fun fact I found on the energy star site:

“If every American home replaced just one light with an ENERGY STAR light, we would save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes for a year, about $700 million in annual energy costs, and prevent 9 billion pounds of greenhouse gas emissions per year, equivalent to the emissions of about 800,000 cars.”

Switching to from regular light bulbs to CFLs make can actually make a huge difference and they're also really affordable (4 for $1 at Costco). Naturally, we all took a trip to our local Costco and changed around 10 light bulbs in our house and now the lighting in our house is more energy efficient. Yep, it was that easy.

According to the EPA, in a home where electricity supplies all of the energy requirements, the average energy consumption is as follows:

Air conditioner and heater = 50%

Water heater = 20%

Lighting and small appliances = 10%

Refrigerator = 8%

Other = 5%

Ovens and stoves = 4%

Clothes dryer = 3%

Air conditioning and heating accounts for 50% of consumption, that is huge! I had no idea. While we don't have cooling in our house, we do have the advantage of an electric fire place. Although electric fireplaces do not produce combustion emissions at the source, the electricity to power them comes from a power plant that, in the US, is likely to be either a coal-burning or natural gas powered plant. Cutting back on heating alone can save a great deal of energy. The weather's hasn't been the most favorable but it's not something proper insulation and a lot of bundling can't fix!