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The True Cost of Standby Power
Luther19 writes, "How much do all of our computers and electronic devices sitting in standby mode cost us? The author of the article concludes that he could save $24.44 per year by switching out wasteful power supplies. The article also touches on a global initiative to cut down on standby power, called '1-Watt': 'The idea has been promoted by the IEA, which first developed an international 1-Watt plan back in 1999. Countries like Australia and Korea have signed on officially, while countries like the US require 1-Watt in government procurement, which will have ripple effects throughout the economy. The goal of the program is to have standby power usage fall below 1W in all products by 2010.'" It's estimated that in industrialized countries, devices on standby consume on average 4% of the power used.
You can buy a low cost wattmeter that you plug your equipment into and simply read out the power consumption. I've found that a lot of devices in standby take almost no power. Other devices aren't so frugal. I'd like to see some real statistics on this and something like the energystar ratings you see on refrigerators put on computers.
Why cut all the devices down to 1W draw, when I should be able to drop ALL my devices to 1W *total*. Put a 1W IR sensor on my power strip, and then I can turn the strip on and off from a remote! For modern programmable remotes, it's just one more line in my power on macro, and instead of 6 or 8+W (1W for each device, when you consider TV, VCR, DVD, Receiver and my 2 powered tower speakers), you just have the 1W from the "sleeping" power strip.
It'd get even better if I could teach my Tivo to turn on/off my cable box!
-Moracq
"Huh?"
Why apply this only to standby mode? Why not apply this to devices that are completely powered down as well? I've noticed a significant reduction in power consumption when I've unplugged appliances and other electrical devices (most notably my PC) when they're not in use. Is it that difficult to implement a hard switch within the device? Understandably, we wouldn't want this for devices that are operated via remote.
Everything I say is a lie. Except that... and that... and that, and that, and that, and that... and that.
Right, because look how well that worked for gasoline...
Most old videogame consoles use less than 1 watt on standby, but this seems to be going away The PS2 already used 2 watts on standby, and the XBox 360 is following suit. We don't have firm data on the Wii and the PS3, but given the numbers of the PS2 and the Wii Connect24 feature, I'd be surprised if either of the two go back to the 1W barrier
A cheaper 80+ 250W PSU would cost a little under $40 before taxes. (I think 80+ is the new buzzword for 80% or more efficient PSUs). Older PSUs, say 2+ years, were typically in the 70% efficiency range. There are a bunch of articles at http://silentpcreview.com/ and other sites about this sort of thing.
I ran the numbers a while ago for one of the PC's around here. The last time I ran the calculations, it costs around $50/year to power that PC for about 6 hours per day. So the break even for me is somewhere around 5-8 years! So while the power grid would get a bit of a break, financially, I wouldn't.
I still might get a new PSU, but that's more because I have serious doubts about the quality of the power coming out of the current one (a suspicious # of hard drive deaths...) but that's a separate issue.
For new purchases, definitely go for the more efficient PSUs... as far as "upgarding" goes... it's borderline at best, at least for me.
Cutting 96% of the 4% standby power is relatively easy to do, much easier than cutting 4% of the other 96%, so guess what??? Its cheaper and more effective to pick the low hanging fruit.
There's also a convenience cost. Is it worth $2 a month to you so your entertainment devices can rapidly turn on?
I found a great way to handle those little "wall warts" such as chargers for cell phones and my electric razors: I put them all on one big power strip and have it plugged into a timer that only runs for 2 hours overnight so when I wake up my stuff is usually ready to go and the other 22 hours a day they are all turned off.
I thought maybe the timer would be wasting what I saved but,it seems a good timer uses less than 1 watt while running but,YMMV
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Seriously, here's a question. I noticed that my APC UPS has SmartTrim enabled and the line voltage is high. Now it hasn't always been this way and seems to happen every fall around here. My question is, if I'm paying for kilo-watt hours and watts are volts * amps, am I paying more when the voltage is higher? If so, is the power co. ripping me off?
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Right, because look how well that worked for gasoline...
Ok, you're trying to be sarcastic. Ask GM and Ford about this. They're both on the ropes because they tooled up for SUVs and then the price of gas went ballistic. Sales of hybrid and other higher efficiency cars have spiked and they're not going to come back down. Toyota is about to pass GM as the world's biggest, and they sell SMALL CARS. They have a sellers market. I know because I was at the dealer two days ago. The salesman was polite, but uninterested in talking. All his Camry's were gone.
So the point is valid; jack the price of electricity and we have new incentives to save power.
Best regards.
But, the point is that if the industry had spent just a few dollars (maybe pennies) more in designing the devive, they'd be saving you money and it's be worth the extra costs.
Yes by all means. Let's get rid of those stupid little LEDs on the front of all my new A/V components telling me "I'm turned off right now, but if I were turned on this light would be off". Sure the power bill effects are marginal at best, but it is the annoyance factor of all those things with lights on at night. There is no good reason the A/V center should look like Shuttle Mission Control when everything is off fer cryin out loud.
My Suburban burns less gasoline than your Prius.
Disk drive suck power at a terrific rate. Reducing the power consumption of mass storage is one of the opportunities in saving electricity. Between reducing CPU power consumption, replacement of CRTs with LED displays, and reducing rotating mass of disk drives, there's a lot that can be done to improve the power profile of a PC. When you've reduced the PCs requirements for power, you can downsize the power supply to add even more power savings.
Best regards.
Don't go for the solar cells first. Consider that it makes a lot more sense to heat up water in one go from the sun than going from solar to electricity to heat. I'm surprised that there aren't any solar airconditioners out there - that's another situation where heat input on a fluid is really what you need and not electricity.