Is There Costly Electrical Loss In Your Home
When looking into saving energy using green products, have you forgotten those little 3 inch square power supplied in almost every power socket in your home? Those little black supplies are consuming power whenever they are plugged in.
Every time we purchase some new green products, phone, small portable vacuum cleaner, radio, battery charger, computer speakers or audio surround sound speakers to name a few they come with these little power supplies. When you look around; you will be surprised how many you will find plugged in.
When looking for other power consumers look no farther that your TV/audio/video system even if they are one of the new green products. If you have an ON/OFF switch on the remote the component it belongs to has a standby power supply.
In business small and large alike we all have those little power supplies connected to our printers, USB hubs, network hubs, desk lights and a few personnel items wither they are green products or not. Each one of these devices and even many of those new green products are consuming power even when an electronic device is not connected to it.
The consumption continues to occur after the lights are turned off. Under every desk, is a little power sucker or two draining energy all night. For example, a normal cubical with a desk and a computer may have 3-5 of the little black power supplies plugged in. Multiple those by 100 employees and you have 300-500 plugged in every night continuing to use electricity all night long.
But the cute little boxes and my new green products couldn’t use much electricity!
Many of the energy companies who love green products have stated on their websites or in their literature that 15% of your electric bill is paying for equipment that is sitting in standby mode or those small power supplies.
So what does green products, video components and black power supplies have in common? They all have a step-down power supply connect to the power grid. What is a step-down power supply? It is hundreds of feet of small copper wire. Both sides of this wire are connected to the plug and when the unit is plugged into the wall socket, it is using tiny amounts of power. Don’t believe me? Feel one that is plugged in, its warm isn’t it?
In order for a TV/stereo/DVD to respond to the ON/OFF button on the remote it must have some power supplied to the unit that senses this action. This sense unit requires electricity to operate and is where the other end of the transformer is connected. So in order for it to work it must be supplied power 24/7 to operate.
So how do we prevent all this power consummation?
A simple method is to connect all your TV/audio/video equipment and small power supplies to a power strip with an on/off switch.
Make sure you buy power strips with an on/off switch; this is the only way to make sure there is no connection to the 120 volt power in your home. When you turn the switch off you are truly disconnected from the power company and therefore no power consumption.
I know it seems inconvenient, first you have to find a power strip with a switch, then disconnect everything and plug it back into the power strip. Now every time you want to watch TV you have to walk over and flip the switch on. In a week or so it will become a habit and most likely you won’t think about it anymore.
Does this really work?
I pass my electric meter daily and see it spinning away even though I am using many new green products. I have also noticed my neighbors meter rotating about 1-2 rotations per minute when there is nobody home.
After buy some power strips, I plugged in the computer systems, video equipment, and battery chargers.
With the power strips turned off I checked the meter again. Wow, it had dropped to 1 rotation every 2 minutes, what an improvement and without having to invest in additional green products.
With everything there is an initial cost. Mine was around $20 dollars for these new green products, look around for the strips on sales. Maybe you can get them cheaper, try it you may find you save some money and reduce your carbon footprint at the same time.
Michael