Kill A Watt, Eat for a Lifetime
Thursday, April 26, 2007
I don't want to be a hippie. I don't want to be "green". I do not, under any circumstances, want Al Gore to give me a pat on the back. I would be wary of any politician touching parts of my body because I am sure it leaves a slime that never goes away. I really hope my mom never let the mayor or county commissioner kiss me when I was a baby because that's disgusting. If you see me doing anything environmentally friendly, I am only doing my best to try to keep that scary Mayan snake thing from consuming the world just as he consumes his tail.In order to beat back the snake, I have issued a personal Jihad on myself to cut down on mindless wastefulness. I could list all of the environmental things I do as a self-congratulatory pat on the back, but to do so would be worse of a sin than saying aloud what you wished for over your birthday cake.
Anyway, I'm not an electrical engineer, but I do play one at work. Sometimes working on electricity messes with your head and makes you think about irrational things... like how Taco Bell flowing down your stomach is exactly like electron current flow. The experience at your mouth is positive but the only way to have any EMF is if for your stomach to become negative, so very negative.
Awhile back I remember a lunatic environmentalist lady telling me that I should unplug my cell phone charger when I'm not using it because it did something awful in the Rain Forests to make female gorillas go in heat, but not put out. This would cause the male gorillas to tear down acres of rain forests in fits of frustrated anger. I wanted to find out for myself if this was true. I bought a Kill-A-Watt meter to check how much gorilla anger not unplugging your cell phone charger really causes.
So here is the raw data to glaze over so you can decide for yourself. The Kill-A-Watt meter will tell you how much power in used in KWH. From the amount of time you leave the tester plugged in, you can calculate all kinds of nerdy numbers. From my electric bill I figured out that $/KWH = $0.082 (that's 13 blades of grass, Mongolian).
| Device | time/day | kw | kw/day | kw/yr | $/day | $/yr |
| 13" TV | 2 | 0.036 | 0.073 | 26.545 | $0.006 | $2.177 |
| 13W compact florescent* (60W equivalent) | 24* | 0.010 | 0.240 | 87.600 | $0.020 | $7.183 |
| 60W Lamp* | 24* | 0.060 | 1.440 | 525.600 | $0.118 | $43.099 |
| 23W compact florescent (100W equivalent) | 1 | .023 | .023 | .8233 | $0.002 | $0.675 |
| LED Lamp post (8 LEDs) | 12 | 0.000 | 0.004 | 1.460 | $0.000 | $0.120 |
| Cell Charger Standby | 24 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | $0.000 | $0.000 |
| Desktop computer always on | 24 | 0.177 | 4.257 | 1553.747 | $0.349 | $127.407 |
| Desktop with hibernate | 24 | 0.105 | 2.508 | 915.561 | $0.206 | $75.076 |
| Freezer / Refrigerator | 24 | 0.084 | 2.016 | 735.840 | $0.165 | $60.339 |
| Ionic Breeze | 24 | 0.007 | 0.174 | 63.553 | $0.014 | $5.211 |
| LED night light (5 LEDs) | 12 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | $0.000 | $0.000 |
| Uranium Cyclotron | 24 | 4000 | 96000 | 35M | $7872 | $2.8M |
| GE Microwave 's Clock | 24 | 0.005 | 0.120 | 43.800 | $0.010 | $3.592 |
| Roomba (Charged) | 24 | 0.005 | 0.120 | 43.800 | $0.010 | $3.592 |
| Roomba (Charging) | 1 | 0.009 | 0.009 | 3.266 | $0.001 | $0.268 |
| Shreader on Standby | 24 | 0.001 | 0.021 | 7.831 | $0.002 | $0.642 |
| Washer (2 loads/week) | .023 | .293 | .007 | 2.463 | $.001 | $.202 |
* KWH and Cost based on leaving the light on all the time like a filthy animal
--Pansonic 37" Plasma , Toshiba HDMI dvd player, Denon reciever, Nintendo Wii, Comcast HD cable box--
| Device | time/day | kw | kw/day | kw/yr | $/day | $/yr |
| TV + DVD + Receiver | 2 | 0.269 | 0.537 | 196.119 | $0.044 | $16.082 |
| TV + Receiver + Cable | 3 | 0.300 | 0.900 | 328.500 | $0.074 | $26.937 |
| TV + Wii | 2 | 0.288 | 0.575 | 209.875 | $0.047 | $17.210 |
| TV OFF + Cable + Music | 2 | 0.080 | 0.160 | 58.400 | $0.013 | $4.789 |
| Entire system standby | 24 | .060 | 1.44 | 525.6 | $0.118 | $43.099 |
Lessons Learned
- I used to leave the computer on all the time unless I was going on vacation. Now I let it hibernate after a few hours. Hibernation should save about $50/year.
- People will still pay over $100 for an Ionic Breeze, and all it does is effectively shred $5 a year.
- The Comcast cable box on idle is like leaving a 60W light bulb on all the time. I'm getting rid of Comcast and throwing the box into the river.
- Making tables with blogger is really hard.
- A nice man from Oman has offered to buy the Uranium Cyclotron. Now I'll finally have some beer money.
- LEDs are expensive but hundreds of times more efficient than compact fluorescents. Most indicator lights on your electronics are LEDs. The power use of many standby items is next to zero. Leaving something on standby does not necessarily mean that you'll bring down the entire power grid.
- And finally - CELL PHONE CHARGERS DO NOT CAUSE MONKEYS TO GO IN HEAT. My charger said it used ZERO power, but I am sure some trickled through the transformers. However, unless your charger has a 100W spotlight indicator bulb when it's idle, chances are polar bears will have just as much hunting ground in the summer whether you unplug it or not. Unplugging your charger is the equivalent of letting Al Gore goose you while you're bent over and will never solve any real problems.
posted by Ghengis @ 6:38 PM,
2 Conflict(s):
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At April 27, 2007 at 10:40 AM,
has news of...
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Wow, Dan, this is super timely for me, because I had just recently been sort of considering possibly unplugging my cell charger, toaster, etc when not in use. Now I see that I should definitely be better about putting the ole computer down when she's not needed.
How DOES one make tables in Blogger?? You must be a friggin genius.
ps--Thanks for saying I am not obese in your comment to me. -
At April 27, 2007 at 4:32 PM,
Ghengis has news of...
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Oh good. I'm glad someone could be inspired by this obnoxiously long post.
I added the fact that those computer stats are for the computer, monitor, speakers, and printer. For some reason the printer is an energy hog when it's idle so I've been wanting to get one of these to make it turn itself off.
I made the table just from copy and pasting from excel, but it's almost impossible to edit unless you can read in the Matrix.
I bet you could get your cell charger to bleed off energy if you put the end of it into a bowl of water. That sounds like a fun idea for the weekend.
I forgot to hook this up to the toaster! I'll let you know if that open circuit is wasting anything (which is about as likely as it using electricity when it's in the cupboard).
