Five Percent: Conserve a Little Energy

People bought SUVs because their friends did. They got big houses. They lived large. Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous was famous. Malcolm Gladwell coined the term “Tipping Point” and we all used it. Ideas and trends caught on, and took root and thrived as social contagion.

Now, we have washed our hands. SUVs and big houses are out. The rich and famous are mostly in jail. A tipping point of an entirely different kind tipped.

We’re a little aimless these days, as a country. There was a groundswell of recognition that Obama’s course was right, and he got elected. Like a diet, we all got psyched to buckle down and get in shape. But we’re not very good at keeping our resolutions, are we (even if we know they’re right).

Can the same phenomenon — ideas that spread because it’s the “in” thing to do — apply to things like restraint? Could it possible be cool to have a small carbon footprint?

I hope so.

Can I, personally, make a difference in our attempts to reduce or mitigate climate change impacts? Or is this instead a problem that needs to be addressed through policy changes?

At a party last weekend, my friend Mike said he had just bought an electricity monitor based on my recommendation, and admitted it was a gift for his wife — he said that all of our little individual efforts add up to nothing significant. He didn’t really believe that personal action will affect things; his wife does.

I have written down my personal attempts to make change here in this blog, now in my fifth year. Much of what I have done involves making small changes that have indeed added up, so perhaps you might guess that I disagree with Mike’s view. Is it really true that all of the little things I have done add up to nothing?

Yes: the changes I have made add up to nothing.

Even our personal reduction of our energy consumption by almost one half of its former levels (probably more) over these years has resulted in a dramatic reduction of our impact, it means very little. The problem is that we need is to get the other several billions of people living in industrialized countries to make even modest changes. And our governments to concur and set in motion a new set of policies that lead us back to sustainable occupation of the planet.

So why bother making personal changes when a wasteful neighbor (not Mike) undoes our efforts five times over?

The answer lies in how big changes tend to happen. I see myself as part of a movement. I do what I can to make the movement progress.

Mike bought an electricity meter because I had one. Theresa and I have Prius’s now — we bought them to replace our older less efficient cars. We were the first on our street to have a Prius. But we told several neighbors and friends how much we like them (and that they really do get good mileage and are big enough for almost everything). Now our street has nine Prius drivers. Did I cause this — maybe not all of them.

But my personal efforts matter because:

• By making changes, I learn what works and what doesn’t
• My purchases and support of products that enable green choices help make their companies viable
• People see and hear about what I do and a few might start doing things on their own
• I have learned enough to participate in the debates with actual knowledge and facts
• As more people come to see various realities, and understand, they influence their leaders

In short, my personal efforts affect others’. And their actions also affect others. It doesn’t take long to get to billions of people, actually.

I am actively participating in a movement that was underway long before I was part of it. Buying an electricity monitor is just one way that my actions affect others.

Oh, and I pay about $250/month less for energy than I would otherwise.

I smiled today when I saw Energy Circle’s new “Moolah Maker” — my 11 year old son is away at camp now, so his younger sister will get the jump on him: she’ll earn money by saving energy around the house.

Moolah Maker is as simple as pie, and kids love pie. Make a contract with your kids — they get half, or maybe more (or less, Scrooge) of the savings. Enter this month’s electricity bill. Wait until next month, then add that bill. Moolah Maker creates an invoice you pay to your kids.

Anyone with kids knows the main method used by most of us parents to get children to do something is one of (and I quote),

• “Carter Christopher Harrison, did you leave the light on again???”, or
• “Charlotte, if you leave your computer on again, there will be no ice cream on ice cream night!!!”, or the time honored,
• “I don’t know who left that light on, but if it’s not off in one minute, no one’s getting birthday presents this year. One, two, three…”

Personally, I don’t understand why these don’t work. Sure, they just made me angry when my father uttered them, but I am so much nicer (when I yell at the top of my voice). Kids these days — it’s all about money. And video games. And texting.

So maybe Energy Circle has the right idea. Pay off the little munchkins.

And why not? If they are the ones saving the energy, shouldn’t they get a piece of the action? Shouldn’t they get a sense of how much money there is in making a small change like changing a bulb, or air-drying your laundry, or using a Smart Strip? Oh, and by the way, did you know that a computer left running all the time can cost around $100/year in electricity bills? Of course you did — you’re the Dad/Mom — parents know everything-ing-ing.

And, coincidentally, Energy Circle seems to sell just about everything you’ll need to make those energy savings come to pass. I have saved several hundreds of dollars with my Smart Strip power strips, for example.

Have fun — we will. And maybe I won’t need to remember my childrens’ middle names any more.

Today’s Times reports that the new Camaro from GM is selling well. The base V-6 model gets a mediocre 22 MPG. A quote from the article sums it up for me, discussing

… Scott Wilbur, a 40-year-old elementary school principal who bought a silver V-8 Camaro in June.

Mr. Wilbur had not purchased a G.M. vehicle in a decade, and traded in his Honda Civic hybrid to buy the Camaro.

He even gave up his California-issued sticker to drive in hybrid-only carpool lanes to get behind the wheel of his new muscle car.

“I might not be as environmentally friendly, but at this point I don’t mind waiting in traffic to drive this,” he said.

To be fair, he says might buy a Volt next year (by the way, how does an elementary school Principal afford two new cars, one very expensive, in two years?).

But c’mon, folks — this is not what we need. We love our hot cars, and have for years. Do we need to define a new “hot”? In the 1980’s women with big hair were “hot” (for that matter, in the 1680s, women with big thighs were “hot”). Tail-fins were in then out. Pocket-rockets were in. Why can’t we figure out how to make a car that people love that they don’t love because of the roar of its internal combustion engine soaking up gasoline?

I see why GM needed to get bailed out, and I see GM changing their views on the way things are. I don’t see the American populace picking up the cues.

I am writing now from Europe. There are a lot of nice cars here, but very, very few are large. Perhaps that’s because gas costs 1.32 per liter, or $6.95/gallon. So people have made some very hot (or cool, or funky, or interesting) cars that also happen to be far smaller.

But perhaps more important, people have created better ways of travel that work (and are not cars).

Days over 90° in Boston (click to enlarge)

This is how I summarize the report issued today titled Authoritative Assessment of National, Regional Impacts of Global Climate Change from the United States Global Change Research Program. All regions of the country are discussed, so pick yours and see if you like what’s coming. Here’s a link to the summary of my region, the Northeast US (pdf).

Right now Congress is considering the Waxman-Markey Bill (officially, “American Clean Energy and Security Act”, and the official summary).

Views from the right and left have taken issue with the legislation. In my book, this is a sign of a bill that is about as good as a bill can get. That’s not to say it’s “great”, but it is a start.

To those who would hold out for something more perfect, I encourage you to carefully look at the Assessment report that came out today. (more…)

This weekend I saw the TV show Wa$ted and the documentary Born Into Brothels — two entirely different shows, but I think I saw the heart of a problem we have: we have become accustomed to a way of living that will be difficult to part with.

Wa$ted is a TV show — they come into your house, find how you’re wasting energy, propose and install solutions, follow your progress for a month, give the first year’s annualized savings in cash. The episode I watched resulted in a modest reduction in energy consumption by the family, and several refusals to part ways with some of their things. Born Into Brothels is about a photographer living in Calcutta who realizes the plight of the children of sex workers, gives them cameras, knocks down numerous barriers to help get the kids raised out of abject poverty, and has both success and failure.

These are very different shows, but it helped me see that regardless of outcome, even when the result is positive, people are resistant to change. (more…)

My Mom is visiting, taking a well-deserved rest from care of my father, who is no longer able to care for himself. After a few days of catching up, I found myself unable to restrain myself from reciting my manifesto. Sorry, Mom.

Condensing the details into a big picture that makes enough sense for a smart, but not-so-technical, and not-as-young person as I is a good opportunity. Throughout my life, I have observed that I only really understand something when I am able to present it in straightforward, no-jargon and instructive manner. For example, I have taught several software development languages to novice computer users — I often learn as much as the students I have taught.

Clean Coal?

We discussed clean coal and carbon sequestration, amongst other things. The simple explanation (more…)

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a method of evaluating the entire cost of a given product, from cradle to grave. It’s a very, very important aspect of understanding our consumer society and it’s impact on the earth. It’s also a very highly technical process and one that is susceptible to error; it’s quite easy to miss some subtleties and get the whole thing wrong. The New York Times printed an article about life cycle assessment today, and I think the authors may have done more harm than good.

To be fair, the article appears to be accurate. Its authors discuss the trade-off between a reusable stainless steel water bottle and a single-use plastic bottle. They explain, in a large graphic, how the process of making stainless steel impacts the environment and incurs costs in energy, transportation, toxins, and so on. One could read the article and conclude that a reusable cup is a bad choice, especially after reading statements like

One stainless steel bottle is obviously much worse than one plastic bottle.

This is a true statement, and is only qualified in a sort of vague way, namely that while there are costs, they are mitigated over time as the mug is re-used. They present this data as:

…if your stainless steel bottle takes the place of 50 plastic bottles, the climate is better off, and if it gets used 500 times, it beats plastic in all the environment-impact categories studied in a life cycle assessment.

Read this statement carefully. (more…)

From today’s New York Times:

“In my view, nothing has really changed” Rex W. Tillerson, the chief executive of Exxon Mobil, said after the election of President Obama. “We don’t oppose alternative energy sources and the development of those. But to hang the future of the country’s energy on those alternatives alone belies reality of their size and scale.”

From this assertion, I can conclude nothing other than it appears Rex Tillerson and I must be living on different planets. The facts, however, sadly suggest we are indeed living on the same planet.

Read the article. I’ll be tearing out my hair.

In a sea of bad economic news, it’s good to see that there are jobs coming — the stimulus to states is beginning, and the New York Times published a list of stimulus projects, by state. It pretty cool to see how many of these are repairs and improvements to public facilities. When I pay my taxes, I do like to think that this is the kind of thing I am paying for. Even cooler still, many of the projects I saw on the list for my home state of Massachusetts (pdf) improve energy efficiency.

I am sure there will be graft, corruption and frivolous projects done as part of this. But judging from those on the list for my state, they are mostly just “things that were on the list to get done” but didn’t make it. And, on the radio this morning, I heard that even high-priced law firms are laying off lawyers and (gasp) reducing their billing rates. So perhaps there will be work for the poor lawyers, too.

I have several household energy reduction projects in mind and am hoping to get some advice about which one I should take on first. I am considering:

• Tankless (on-demand) Hot Water Heater
• Foam Spray Insulation combined with Energy Audit
• Geothermal Heat Pump
• Solar (PV or Water Heat Assisted)

I have a lot of questions about which ones make sense, how to tell which one is best, how much they’ll cost, and how to measure all of it. (more…)

Here’s a chart of our electricity use at home over the last four years, showing an almost 50% reduction in use over the course of four years, saving us $118 per month at our current rate. You can make the same kinds of changes we have — nothing we have done is exotic, and nothing has really affected the quality of our lives.

One Half As Much Saves $118 Per Month

Conservation is about as un-sexy as it gets; but it works and is easy for electricity. Measuring our gas bill is a little harder, but I have to think we have made some progress there, too. I did a calculation on our water bill, and that one is stunning, as well.

Conservation may be dull, but saving money is cool, and it’s very easy to save a pretty substantial amount. One way to think about saving money by conservation is that it is like tax-free income! Between state and federal taxes, you probably pay from 20% to 50% of your income; if you got a $118/month raise, you would see less thant $100 of it, maybe as little as $59! But if you conserve, it’s tax free income. (more…)

Since 1973, we have been grappling with the vagaries of a market we no longer control: oil. It’s an important market mainly because our country has become dependent upon it for our economy to work. The current financial crisis was a disaster waiting to happen, it seems, but one could argue that it was oil that pushed us over the edge as prices rose ever faster until it all crumbed. But now we’re getting payback: as demand crumples its price has fallen even faster than it rose (except that we’re not, since a failing economy isn’t good for anyone.)

Or is it?

We have an opportunity now to do just what we said was most important just six months ago: get off the stuff. But we now have a new problem: in a time when credit is flowing like molasses, we have great uncertainty, and we’re faced with numerous other problems like job losses and business failures, there will be a growing impatience with any solution that seems … indirect. When blood is pouring out of a vein, you put on a tourniquet. For the millions of people whose jobs are lost, the analogy is apt.

But we must avoid simplistic solutions, and we must be patient. (more…)

As the US Presidential election draws near, I have renewed hope that we’ll finally get serious about energy independence. In a moment of (uncharacteristic) optimism, I also think it may be the case that the financial crisis will provide the opportunity for us to take exactly the right kind of actions to address energy independence and a host of other issues.

(Of course, it could go the other way)

As I have argued before, energy, global warming, the economy, consumption, conservation, and even the Iraq war, obesity, disease, global food, and water issues are not separate. In so many ways, these issues are all linked. (more…)

If you want to save electricity and reduce your electricity bill, follow a few simple tips, make a few inexpensive changes, and you could cut your electrical usage by 40% or more, as my family has. It’s not hard, and it’s worth it!

We will save about $1,250 per year on electricity than if we had not made these changes (more…)