Because demand for electricity continues to increase, dangerously close tothe maximum capacities of electric utilities like Com Ed. Duringparticularly hot days last year, Com Ed and other midwestern utilities hadto buy power from other utilities at severely increased prices, and still wewere close to major brownouts and blackouts. Because electricity demand(our consumption) has been continually increasing, companies like Reliantare building several Chicagoland peaker plants to capitalize on thoseemergency days.
We can reduce the need for them by reducing our consumption of electricity.This does not have to mean lowering our standard of living. Instead, thereare many ways that we can improve the efficiency of our household energy useand prevent wasting electricity. Often it takes a controversy like this(construction of a local power plant), or a dramatic increase in the priceof electricity, to get our attention.
There are common sense ideas that have been around for a long time, liketurning off lights or appliances when they're not being used. We can reduceour need for air conditioners (a real power hog) by installing ceiling fansand using stand-alone room fans to circulate the air - causing a "windchilleffect". We can close the curtains of sun-lit windows in summer andshadowed windows in winter, and make sure the windows are double-paned with"low-e" thermal coatings. We can make sure our houses and attics haveplenty of insulation, and that we caulk around windows to prevent leaks.Also, we can pay attention to buy the most efficient appliances and lightingthat we can - it saves money over the long run.
Each new major appliance has a yellow energy-use sticker, telling its energycosts over the course of the year. Make sure to factor these costs in oversome number of years, when choosing an appliance. Some appliance types areinherently more wasteful, for example, side-by-side refrigerator/freezerswith an ice and water dispenser on the door. Also, compact flouescentlights, which fit into standard light sockets, cost more than standardincandescent bulbs, but provide large savings in energy use and costs overtheir lifetimes.
Say that, for security, you run three 75-watt standard incandescent bulbs atnight (8 hours/night) at your garage and front porch. Also, assume thatthere are five 75-watt lights in your house that you run for an average of 4hours/day. If those lights cost $1 each and if each lasted for 3000 hours(four times their advertised lifetime), then at 8.77 cents perkilowatt-hour, your lighting costs over 4 years would be $22 for bulbs and $422 for electricity - a total of $444. Compact flourescents generallycost more ($10), but last at least 5-10 times longer and use only 25% of theenergy to produce the same amount of light. (Regular incandescent bulbsconvert 75% of its wattage to heat, which is especially wasteful in summer.) So, if 18-watt compact flourescent bulbs had been used (same lightoutput), the bulb costs would have been $100 (two broke in four years) andenergy costs only $101 - a total of $201. Besides saving 3660kilowatt-hours of electricity, you would have saved over $240.
If each household in Chicagoland took these steps, it would make a huge dentin the need for more new power plants.
Please help conserve!
[More info at website locations like Rocky Mountain Institute and others.]