ok, the saving water thread was very helpful so I'm going to push my luck and ask you how you reduce your electricity consumption. As with the water, I have a number of tactics already in the book, but I wonder if you can surprise me again with your innovation.
change your light bulbs to the compact fluoro kind and you save massive amounts of power. turning off your lights when you aren't using them. unplugging appliances when not in use, or flicking the switch on a power strip to stop the "phantom load". a well designed, well insulated house with natural lighting, cooling, heating properties saves so much power... of course, these are all the obvious things that they probably have in your book, huh?
I have covered all those points, Richard, but I thank you for your suggestions as it help confirm that I'm including the correct information for my readers.
saving electricity Having grandparents and parents who were ANAL about turning off lights trains you well. – I don't know how many times I've been in a room when someone has flown past and just turned the light out on me – it became such a reflex in our family - lights OUT! I have a totally un-solar crap 1920s weatherboard house that freezes in winter and boils in summer – I try to adjust my personal thermostat to suit. I wear thermal underwear and extra clothing in winter and in summer – well use the fan instead of the air-con. (sometimes I crack when its above 40). Ihave a solar hot water system – only use the elect booster judiciously in winter when it REALLY needs it – and then in off-peak times. I want a Sunball for Christmas – so a lot of the Christmas “excess” will be delayed to allow for this treat in mid 2006. I've taken all the appliances off their "standby" mode when I read how much this chews power. And I unplugged the spare room's clock radio and dug out an old wind-up clock instead. Nothing huge - just the little bits. I think electricity is harder to "save" than water cause you cant actually "see" or "hear" its consumption as you can with water.
Use the BBQ as often as possible assuming you have an electric stove, or even better solar cooking.... A friend of mine has a cardboard box cut on a diagonal as they often do in shops for display and he's lined the inside with foil. At 9-10 in the morning takea black heavy iron pot, put in ingredients for stew, curry, or whatever else your eating, lid on pot, then put pot inside a clear oven bag, then inside another clear oven bag. Place bagged pot into box facing the sun and leave. Change box angle once of twice during the afternoon to follow sun, then by 5 or 6 oclock you have yourself a cooked meal.... He cooks this way quite often in summer, keeps the heat down in the house, and you can reuse the oven bags over and over...
saving electricity Saving electricity. Huh. For some reason every 2nd Ozzie has now become some sort of Grizwald wannabe, with the whole Christmas lights-all-over-the-house thing happening. Some guy here in Syd now has 86,000 lights in his front suburban yard - Even my own back street in a back water hamlet now has 5 out of 12 houses with the xmas lights things happening. What's everyone think about this?
I don't like it at all, Heuristics. Bah Humbug. I think all those Christmas lights and trinkets are gross. I wonder why it's becoming so popular. I think it's because the lights and other plastic ornamentation are so cheap now - cheap in the sense of buying a box of it from the shop, not cheap in what it costs the planet. Joel, I think that's a fabulous idea. I'm definately including that in the book. Fancy, a solar slow cooker. Far out! 8)
H, I too think it is stupid, but when I took my daughter for a drive in the biodiesel family car the other night (her mother was in an alternative energy class) we went down this one street where the neighbours were all in on the christmas ligjts thing. They had really gone to town, with lit up reindeers, bears, penguins, all sorts of strange stuff actually. And of course, my daughter, 2.5 years old, couldn't get enough of it, "OOOOOOoooh! What's that Dad?! OOOOOooooooh!". I actually did feel like a big grinch explaining to her that it was a shocking waste of electricity, considering that it is generated by shipping coal all the way across the ocean...
I love all the lights and the displays, and am a sucker for the whole Christmas thing. I like the way people are nicer to each other (and yes I know that it would be nive for people to do it 12 montsh of the year instaed of just 1, but I will settle for 1 over nothing). I love talking about what everyone is making for their pressies this year (and most people do in my "Government" office) ... BUT I do acknowledge the waste it is envirnmentally to light up all the pretty displays....so when I heard about one the other night where they run it off a a battery they recharge from solar panels during the day...I figured I could have my cake and eat it too!!
Free lights form "Energy Australia" I try. . .I try. . . but then manage to leave an outside light on all night. I could kick me in the but I have just got a letter from "Energy Australia" who wants to give me six florescent lamps for free. I pick them up from local "participating" Post Offices. As I mostly have recessed lights and my wife hates the light from florescents I am not sure what to do about them