Everything You Know About Saving Energy is Wrong

[modi123]

Meh.. I find easy ways of keeping my cost down - and most of that starts with stopping needless energy being sucked by appliances. Sure my washer and dryer are mint 1980's speed queens, but I only keep them plugged in when using them. Energy Star be damned.

My microwave - yup that clock would be nice, but after I am done making my ramen I unplug it. That power strip used for only my fan and recharge ports for my devices - yup that gets unplugged as well.

There was a noticeable difference in my bill by removing these things.

 

[Nickbaldwin86]

Ya not to worried about energy... with my server and PC both running around clock.

my electric bill is to small to worry about saving energy lucky me

 

[Brent_Justice]

I don't have AC where I live

But the electric baseboard heating in the winter is harsh

 

[Ashbringer]

Meh.. I find easy ways of keeping my cost down - and most of that starts with stopping needless energy being sucked by appliances. Sure my washer and dryer are mint 1980's speed queens, but I only keep them plugged in when using them. Energy Star be damned.

My microwave - yup that clock would be nice, but after I am done making my ramen I unplug it. That power strip used for only my fan and recharge ports for my devices - yup that gets unplugged as well.

There was a noticeable difference in my bill by removing these things.

Wish I could do the same, but my family has a hard time shutting of lights and air conditioners. It sucks when the people around you don't care.

 

[weebling1]

I don't know if it is the study that was horribly concieved or the media reports of it.

The Washer / Line drying comparison: apples and oranges, not a straight comparison.

Turning out the light when you leave the room? Entirely subjective! I have 1000watts of light in my basement and I turn them off when i leave the room and probably dont return for 2-3 days.

It would really be nice if someone posted ALL the questions asked, even the scientific report just hints at them and states their interpretations

 

[modi123]

Wish I could do the same, but my family has a hard time shutting of lights and air conditioners. It sucks when the people around you don't care.

Easy - boot them out on the grounds they are increasing your carbon foot print!

 

[LightningCrash]

Meh.. I find easy ways of keeping my cost down - and most of that starts with stopping needless energy being sucked by appliances. Sure my washer and dryer are mint 1980's speed queens, but I only keep them plugged in when using them. Energy Star be damned.

My microwave - yup that clock would be nice, but after I am done making my ramen I unplug it. That power strip used for only my fan and recharge ports for my devices - yup that gets unplugged as well.

There was a noticeable difference in my bill by removing these things.

When you leave the house you should go ahead and throw the main breaker.

 

[Zarathustra[H]]

Why don't we have solar power in homes yet? It's doable, and I wouldn't hurt the environment. Plus, if I get a electric car I can power it with my homes solar. That way I can consume as much power as I want, and nobody will give a shit.

I've been thinking of putting in solar power in my home, but I could never find a good guide on how to do it.

While the energy itself is cheap, (the sun is free!) the upfront captial cost is pretty large to get a large enough solar array to put a real dent in your electric bill.

As it stands today, its just not cost efficient yet. Oil and Coal (both spweing CO2 into the atmosphere, one sewing much worse mercury and other poisonous chemicals into the atmospere) are much cheaper...

 

[Zarathustra[H]]

Easy - boot them out on the grounds they are increasing your carbon foot print!

I've been tempted to.

I am so tired of turning off TV's, air conitioners and lights everywhere I go, cause noone gives a shit. If not for the environment, at least do it for the electric bill...

 

[Michaelius]

While the energy itself is cheap, (the sun is free!) the upfront captial cost is pretty large to get a large enough solar array to put a real dent in your electric bill.

As it stands today, its just not cost efficient yet. Oil and Coal (both spweing CO2 into the atmosphere, one sewing much worse mercury and other poisonous chemicals into the atmospere) are much cheaper...

In most EU coutries you can get goverment funds covering part of instalation for houses.

As one of my italian friends told me if you are company you can even get country to cover whole cost for instalation of solar panels on factory roofs and you give it back over years selling energy.

 

[modi123]

When you leave the house you should go ahead and throw the main breaker.

Naw... I would need to reset my alarm clock each day and that's just too tedious for the environment. I took a few minutes to realize what I use on a daily basis and go from there. Done charging the ol' RazerII, Zune, and won't be needing my fan? Sweet.. I lean over and unplug the power strip. I don't use the microwave or washer/dryer every day so unplugged they go.

I've been tempted to.

I am so tired of turning off TV's, air conitioners and lights everywhere I go, cause noone gives a shit. If not for the environment, at least do it for the electric bill...

Do what my work did - throw everything on some sort of motion sensor switch. Do you like using that conference room light when you are calling India? Best wave your hand a few times every five minutes lest you get the light and wall monitor turned off. (I find banging my head on the table works just fine).

 

[Nathalex]

I found it most irritating using Hybrid sli and then start a game forgetting that it's active....so I turned the damn function off! But I'm not the greenest guy to talk 2. Check my stem specs below and you'll understand. My system 2 is a media center pc basicly. It's my old hardware in a retirement home only sometimes when friends come over I use it for lan gaming. My electricity bill is off the charts. last year they made me pay 2000 euro's xtra. Thats $2522,- US....money wolf Bastards

 

[mortonP]

I went to Walmart and bought about 6 LED light bulbs that were only 1.5w. I thought great low energy use! All but two of them have already failed, they were supposed to last at least 3 years at 24/7 usage. How much money did I save? Not a friggin' penny! They cost $10.00 each.

 

[Burticus]

There is a good book on solar power called "Got Sun? Go Solar!" $13 on Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Got-Sun-Solar...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1282774340&sr=1-1

But unless you live somewhere where constant sunshine is abundant (Cali, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada... desert states basically) don't expect to fully meet your power needs without spending a fortune.

And don't forget.... solar panels are less effective when they are dirty. So you have to wash/clean them periodically. Combine that with all the sand/dust from living in desert states and you just added a new weekly chore to your list.

I live in Texas (Plano) and I would have to either panel my entire roof or have a a huge tracking array to meet a third of my power needs (damn you, pool pump!). I'm sure the neighbors won't mind a giant robotic tracking array in my front yard.

Give it 10 years and the hopefully the efficiency and cost will be much improved.

Or I could buy a chunk of farmland in west Texas and put windmills everywhere. Of course cotton is about the only cost effective crop out there...

 

[Unknown-One]

lets just look at this part... a standard coffee maker... 120v 1200w... thats ten amps at the wall.. if you use a straight a/c to d/c pure sine inverter you would need to run 6 panels total in a 3x2 series/parallel configuration just to run your coffee maker (well..... and then some.. but not much more) this would give you 150v@12 amps at the panel output. because it is d/c you expect 5% loss (3-5% but always use higher) and 3 to 5% more at the inverter

5% to 150v@12a = [email protected]
and
5% 10 [email protected] = [email protected] amps

so you would have 15v of bleed over to deal with (not a huge deal) and just barely have enough amperage to cover the max draw of the coffer maker BUT... that is a area of 150"x150" or 12.5 ft square (closer to 13ft by 12ft 9in by the time you get done with panel gaps). thats JUST your coffee maker. to fully cover a 2000sqft household with a pretty standard 100a or 150a service, well... @ 100a that would be a 3x20 grid or a 3x30 grid at 150a

Nice of you to use a device with a heating element for your example. That drives the amperage requirement sky-high.

Just to put that coffee maker into perspective, a power hungry 42" plasma TV draws around 3.8 amps. You could almost run three plasma TV's in the same power envelope as that one coffee maker.

 

[sfsuphysics]

looked at the prices for the 290w solar cells which i was factoring off of, they are about 1100$ per. so for 100a service (3x20) your looking at spending 66,000$ just on the solar cells and 8000$ on the batteries, again not mentioning the other equipment and installation costs needed. so, add at least 72,000$ onto the cost of your home.

thats why solar isn't main stream.

And that's why home users should not design their own solar setups unless they know what they're doing

Really 60 - 290watt panels? 17.4kW is a HUGE farking system. The whole amps thing can be taken care of elsewhere. Besides why go for a 290w panel? It probably isn't any better than any other panel as far as efficiency it's simply bigger. You could easily buy panels in bulk if you needed that many though, maybe $40-50k for that same amount of power.

Besides most roofs wouldn't be able to hold that many panels as it is, unless you had a large enough property (more than a suburban lot size) where you could have a rack that held them on a piece of your property.

Lets see how much 17.4kW would get you

If you lived in the worst areas pacific NW, at 3.5hours of average sunlight per day (now obviously they have more sunlight, but this is peak sunlight), that's be 61kWh per day you would produce, which should be enough for most anyone, being as you live in an area that probably doesn't need things like A/C that's well more than what you need.

Bottom line look at your electric bill, it should show the average use per day, don't be a hero that wants to be completely off the grid, go grid tie if you can, and let people who know what they're doing design/build the thing.

I live in San Francisco, what? sun there?, yeah I get about 5 hours a day on average, so my 3.24kW system gives me on average around 16kWh per day of power which is more than enough for me... with some exceptions.

 

[sfsuphysics]

And yeah solar is expensive, but unless you live some place like some of the NE which has insanely low electrical prices, solar panels will end up paying themselves off, incentives do help however.

 

[stevedave]

I don't go out of my way to save energy, nor do I go out of my way to waste it.

I hold the electric companies responsible for converting to renewable energy which means it doesn't leave a carbon foot print to use it.

And by hold responsible I mean I sit and complain about how incompetent everyone is because they haven't switched to Wind, Solar, and water. I fall under the complacent which is easily the majority or shit would have changed by now.

 

[Runningflame570]

I don't go out of my way to save energy, nor do I go out of my way to waste it.

I hold the electric companies responsible for converting to renewable energy which means it doesn't leave a carbon foot print to use it.

And by hold responsible I mean I sit and complain about how incompetent everyone is because they haven't switched to Wind, Solar, and water. I fall under the complacent which is easily the majority or shit would have changed by now.

I do a bit more than that, I pay the extra 5 cents a kwH for the 100% renewable power. Thats about $10-11 a month with how much power I use right now, so I'd say I'm doing alright as those things go.

 

[stevedave]

I do a bit more than that, I pay the extra 5 cents a kwH for the 100% renewable power. Thats about $10-11 a month with how much power I use right now, so I'd say I'm doing alright as those things go.

Shit I didn't even know they offered that. I'll look into that as it doesn't require any real effort on my end just a few extra bucks.

 

[Thor]

Nice of you to use a device with a heating element for your example. That drives the amperage requirement sky-high.

Just to put that coffee maker into perspective, a power hungry 42" plasma TV draws around 3.8 amps. You could almost run three plasma TV's in the same power envelope as that one coffee maker.

well.. is your house wiring desgined to handle a 3.5a load or a 15 amp load??? i assume because you are so against the 10 amp load i used as reference, you wont be running a vacuum cleaner.. EVER. when you deal with electric circuits you always plan for worst case... what COULD someone run that a smaller system would not support. i only used a 10 amp coffee maker because it was a nice round number that actually exists, is VERY common in most homes and sees daily usage. a gas dryer still consumes 3.5a and a washer is between 3.5 and 5 amps.. if your like me, you still do your washing and drying at the same time, and worst case, you would have to have 4 and 6 amps available to do both at the same time.. that's still 10 amps...

 

[Unknown-One]

well.. is your house wiring desgined to handle a 3.5a load or a 15 amp load??? i assume because you are so against the 10 amp load i used as reference, you wont be running a vacuum cleaner.. EVER. when you deal with electric circuits you always plan for worst case... what COULD someone run that a smaller system would not support. i only used a 10 amp coffee maker because it was a nice round number that actually exists, is VERY common in most homes and sees daily usage. a gas dryer still consumes 3.5a and a washer is between 3.5 and 5 amps.. if your like me, you still do your washing and drying at the same time, and worst case, you would have to have 4 and 6 amps available to do both at the same time.. that's still 10 amps...

Missed the point, a bit...

Sure, I'll make coffee and use a vacuum cleaner, but those are extremely high load devices to base your estimates on panels size on. You'll end up with a massively overbuilt solar array, and not use most of its output 90% of the time. That wastes a lot of money on panels that you aren't using.

You want to aim for average power consumption when setting up solar. Strike a good balance and you can sell to the grid the majority of the time, but buy back from the grid when you start those high load devices. Your bill should be around $0 if you calculated the average right.

 

[Thor]

Missed the point, a bit...

Sure, I'll make coffee and use a vacuum cleaner, but those are extremely high load devices to base your estimates on panels size on. You'll end up with a massively overbuilt solar array, and not use most of its output 90% of the time. That wastes a lot of money on panels that you aren't using.

You want to aim for average power consumption when setting up solar. Strike a good balance and you can sell to the grid the majority of the time, but buy back from the grid when you start those high load devices. Your bill should be around $0 if you calculated the average right.

true.. or massively over build it any way and sell like a mad man.

 

[westrock2000]

We shouldn't find ways to make A/C and Heating more efficient, we should find ways to get rid of it all together.

One of the easiest ways to do that is to simply build underground. If your house was underground it would sit at about 68-72*F all year round. You would never need to use the AC or heat. It just costs more to excavate the Earth and people like their big houses to be visible to others.

I would love to have an underground home somday. Hell I'd be happy with just an underground garage ^_^.

Plus if we built everything underground the Earth would still have lots of space for grass and trees and all that junk that gets rid of CO2 for us.

 

[[Spectre]]

We shouldn't find ways to make A/C and Heating more efficient, we should find ways to get rid of it all together.

One of the easiest ways to do that is to simply build underground. If your house was underground it would sit at about 68-72*F all year round. You would never need to use the AC or heat. It just costs more to excavate the Earth and people like their big houses to be visible to others.

I would love to have an underground home somday. Hell I'd be happy with just an underground garage ^_^.

Plus if we built everything underground the Earth would still have lots of space for grass and trees and all that junk that gets rid of CO2 for us.

Here ya go buddy:

http://www.missilebases.com/properties

 

[sfsuphysics]

Sure, I'll make coffee and use a vacuum cleaner, but those are extremely high load devices to base your estimates on panels size on. You'll end up with a massively overbuilt solar array, and not use most of its output 90% of the time. That wastes a lot of money on panels that you aren't using.

....

or realize you can make the amps up if you have the voltage, which most solar panel arrays run extremely high voltage because they wire panels series, so 50volts x 10 panels on a string and you have 500volts at 6amps when it hits your inverter, ignoring the loss for now, that turns into 120 volts at 25 amps. So you don't need the current to be made at the panels, the electrons are there, it's just a matter of if there's a small amount moving fast, or a large amount moving slow, the end result its the same amount that powers your home.

Want enough to run a 1200 watt coffee maker, get 1200 watts of solar panels (plus 10-20% for conversion losses)

 

[Spewn]

Want enough to run a 1200 watt coffee maker, get 1200 watts of solar panels (plus 10-20% for conversion losses)

If you want to have a house that runs on nothing but solar, no grid tie-in at all, yeah you need a lot of panels. If you're smart and do a grid tie-in, you only need enough panels to generate as much energy as you use over the course of an average month; your connection to the grid will take care of the peaks and you'll still break-even. Install extra panels and you'll profit.

 

[Spewn]

Edit: It's also worth noting that, depending on where you live, power generated by your solar panels and sold back to the power company may actually net you more money than what it costs to buy the same amount of power from the power company in the first place. In Ontario right now it's something like 40 cents a kilowatt-hour that you get paid if your installation is under 1000kilowatts, but to buy it you'll pay between 7 and 10 cents per kilowatt-hour. It would take significantly less solar capacity to break-even financially with prices(subsidies) like that.

 

[sfsuphysics]

Yeah there are many ways to go about solar. If you're in an extreme rural area grid tie might not be an option. In a city you'd almost be stupid not to, although ironically if the power lines go out during the day your inverter will most likely shut off your solar power too (as it's dumped directly into the grid).

And yeah you can often sell back for more, but usually that's going with a time of use scheduling, so if you're lucky you'll be at work while you're making power (and not using energy) however if you can't change your habits then you might get screwed on the back end as using power during "peak" times often is more expensive.

Everyone's situation is different. I have quite large coral reef fish tanks, so I'm using power all the time, sure I could change things like the 800 watts of lighting to the night, but I like to sleep too!

 

[Snowdog]

The survey is completely ridiculous and set up conditions in an attempt to trick people. Surprise it worked.

Like the Washer settings versus line drying question. First I hope they actually pointed out that they meant switching to cold water washing, from Hot.

I wouldn't guess which uses more. But there are a lot of variables on the wash side. How many gallons of water are used (this is highly variable), what is the initial temp of the water, what is the final temp...

Both running a dryer for an hour and heating water for a hot wash use a lot of energy. If you really want to save energy do both. They aren't mutually exclusive.

You want to know a real waste of energy. This lame survey.