tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1822047565011119265.post4170837996314242245..comments2024-02-17T01:02:23.042-08:00Comments on Metro Green: Can One Household (Or One Business) Save the Planet? No, but...T. Pollockhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11704988282790357273noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1822047565011119265.post-45215485312988446332009-02-17T22:29:00.000-08:002009-02-17T22:29:00.000-08:00Another interesting topic is peak demand flattenin...Another interesting topic is peak demand flattening.<BR/><BR/>During the hottest part of the summer days when everyone's air conditioners kick in full blast, the Power companies are required to fire up their oldest and most polluting power stations to handle the peak load.<BR/><BR/>The Greening Greater Toronto study (http://www.greeninggreatertoronto.ca/) was able to reduce peak load by providing an in house meter to the consumer to educate them on when power was the most environmentally costly. A 1% reduction in peak usage would reduce the carbon emissions by 10%.SeamusMcDuffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09748340839646897292noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1822047565011119265.post-43449491117179260702009-02-17T17:20:00.000-08:002009-02-17T17:20:00.000-08:00As a couple who live in a tiny community in The Bo...As a couple who live in a tiny community in The Boon Docks – who share a generator with my folks because the power goes out on a regular basis – we've become very aware of which appliances draw the most electricity.<BR/><BR/>It’s been utterly astonishing to experience first-hand the impact of simply unplugging one’s battery backups, surge protectors and unplug-able appliances. We used to think it was enough to just turn those things off. However, with last weekend’s 2-day power outage, we learned that even though my battery backup was turned off and ITS light was out, my cell phone charger continued to draw power. We had no clue it was doing so until I unplugged the backup, and the charger beeped at me...<BR/><BR/>Wow...<BR/><BR/>Thinking consciously about power usage has become, well, a way of life: “one bird at a time.”Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1822047565011119265.post-15626671516757743542009-02-17T12:03:00.000-08:002009-02-17T12:03:00.000-08:00Seamus: Re your comment above. While 100 billion a...Seamus: Re your comment above. While 100 billion <I>anythings</I> sound "scary" and high, and some form of "smart metering" makes sense, the actual sum of energy consumed by appliances and apparatuses in standby mode only amounts to about 1/3 of 1% of our total energy consumption. Today's (Tuesday 2/17/09) post features <A HREF="http://metrogreen.blogspot.com/2009/02/architect-ed-mazria-and-2030-challenge.html" REL="nofollow">Ed Mazria and the 2030 Challenge.</A> In the second, longer video he asserts that the United States uses roughly 100 Quads of energy annually. A Quad equal 1 <I>quadrillion</I> BTU. 1 KWh=~3400BTU. Extrapolating the math (yes, that's a lot of zeros to keep track of and exponent numbers to subtract) shows us that 100B KWh = ~1/3Quad. Not so much energy in the big picture. On the other hand, this useless siphoning of $11B in real dollars would build a lot of schools and would fund a lot of green architecture and engineering scholarships.T. Pollockhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11704988282790357273noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1822047565011119265.post-31645499823630763732009-02-16T06:47:00.000-08:002009-02-16T06:47:00.000-08:00"...standby power (alone) "accounts for more than ..."...standby power (alone) "accounts for more than 100 billion kilowatt hours of annual U.S. electricity consumption, and $11 billion in annual energy costs," according to Katharine Kaplan, EPA team leader for Energy Star product development."<BR/><BR/>This is a very scary statistic. It points to the need for smart metering in houses that would know when products were expected to be in use and turn them on and off based on a profile. <BR/><BR/>Why do computers or televisions need to be using power at 3am when everyone is asleep?SeamusMcDuffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09748340839646897292noreply@blogger.com