Last year at Solarfest I attended a home energy efficiency workshop run buy a local business owner. He installs solar power for people's residences. But he spent the first 5-10 minutes of the workshop bluntly getting through to us, with numbers and charts and everything, that it was pointless to even think about installing solar, or wind, or anything like that, until we've first made basic efficiency improvements to the house to save on heating, cooling, and cut down excess electricity use. He then spent the rest of the workshop on how to do that, and no time at all on solar (even though that's his business), which only brought the lesson home further.
The most important thing, he said, was to have your house inspected by someone for the air envelope (I forget if that's the right term) : what "holes" are there in the insulated virtual container that keeps hotter or colder air inside? Sometimes it's a porch or an attic, sometimes it's bad insulation in a wall, or holes that were cut by some utility like cable TV, sometimes it's bad windows or windowframes. Fixing these things can save a lot more power in an average year than solar panels or similar things would generate for you, and generally costs a lot less too.
One nifty, obvious yet I hadn't thought of it, tip he gave that I've been using ever since: given that: "wall warts" for electronic equpiment suck some power even when the device is off, and that: it's too annoying to constantly unplug and re-plug all of them, do this: Plug the ones you frequently turn off together, into their own power strip that has a switch. When you're not using them, switch that power strip off.
I do that for all my computer stuff (external drives, usb hub, speakers, etc.) now, so I can turn off that strip whenever I don't have the actual MacBook connected and in use, like when I leave the house for work of a trip.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2008-07-02 07:48 pm (UTC)The most important thing, he said, was to have your house inspected by someone for the air envelope (I forget if that's the right term) : what "holes" are there in the insulated virtual container that keeps hotter or colder air inside? Sometimes it's a porch or an attic, sometimes it's bad insulation in a wall, or holes that were cut by some utility like cable TV, sometimes it's bad windows or windowframes. Fixing these things can save a lot more power in an average year than solar panels or similar things would generate for you, and generally costs a lot less too.
One nifty, obvious yet I hadn't thought of it, tip he gave that I've been using ever since:
given that: "wall warts" for electronic equpiment suck some power even when the device is off,
and that: it's too annoying to constantly unplug and re-plug all of them,
do this: Plug the ones you frequently turn off together, into their own power strip that has a switch. When you're not using them, switch that power strip off.
I do that for all my computer stuff (external drives, usb hub, speakers, etc.) now, so I can turn off that strip whenever I don't have the actual MacBook connected and in use, like when I leave the house for work of a trip.