I fueled up our car yesterday. After paying the bill and chaffing as I walked back to the car I remembered discussing energy drains on Bootrib the other day. I have been blessed with a husband who is very digital/electronic/electrical adept. He fixes all sorts of things that I would have once pronounced deceased and to this day continues to amaze me with newly restored treasured appliances and gizmos that I thought had bit the dust. I asked him if he wanted to write this diary but he says that diaries aren’t his thing though he is happy to consult.
As we charge forward into our future train wreck with crude oil, this may be the time for some of us to inventory some of the energy drains in our lives (no, not your mother-in-law). I don’t know about the rest of you but I am seeing a little penny pinching soon in my tea leaves. I am also getting this funny feeling in my elbow that we are all going to become a whole lot more energy conscious in a short time here than we ever imagined because we have some important decisions to make about ENERGY POLICY, and who is full of shit and who may be talking some sort of real policy.
Someone asked the other day if leaving their computer on Standby was more cost efficient than turning it off and restarting it. From this article I have discovered that having our computers on Standby is costing most of us around $50.00 a year.
I also found an article that explains a bit about how adapters continue to use energy when they are plugged in even though the appliance that they are attached to is off.
Other drains are our cable boxes, satellite decoders, and stereo theater systems all left plugged in along with our television set.
Yeah, we are talking energy drains all right! A couple of years ago I put power surge strips on all of my plugs that would normally just have one or two things plugged into them (tv, stereo, microwave, etc). Greatest thing is I don’t have any more power problems, or appliance problems that I used to have occaisionally (old wiring don’t you know). And. . .I can turn the power strip totally off with a switch that is on the strip. Pretty nifty and I have noticed the difference in my power bills.
Thanks for the reminders.
We had most things power stripped also in our old house. Since doing this diary I have realized that when we moved we just kind of put things where we thought they ought to probably go and we haven’t done any “energy” organization for this house.
By the time this administration and it’s loyalist get through with us, we’ll be riding public transportation to their business’, working for peanuts, living in communal housing, or sharecropping for their fuel in their SUV, so they can vacation, except me!! (I’ll be hunting, and not all four legged creatures ; )
It feels that way to me sometimes. Energy use has always been a subject and problem that intrigues both me and my husband. Before leaving Colorado we discussed having our own wind generator. After my husband retires we have settled on building an earthship in the West or Southwest of this great land that we are going to take back from these thieving evil bastards!