save energy

You know, at this very moment you are losing money at your home. In fact you aren’t just losing money, but you are wasting a valuable resource at home. A resource we have gone to war for.

No, your home isn’t leaking any oil. No, your faucet isn’t leaking (well, it could be and you should fix that too). It’s the appliances war. Just kidding.

Did you know that your household appliances might be using electricity even though they are not in use? You know that cell phone charger you left plugged in at home, well those little guys have been known to continue to use electricity even though nothing is plugged into it.

If those little cell phone chargers are slowly wasting electricity, can you guess how much? What if everyone’s cell phone charger is still plugged in, how much electricity are we wasting? Shocking, I know.

Using my trusty Kill a Watt(tm) from P3 International gadget I just purchased off of Amazon, I wanted to see how much juice (electricity) is being used from leaving your cell phone charger plugged into the wall. So, I want to test three of the most ‘trendiest’ cell phone chargers, and one older cell phone charger as a ‘control’. (You have to blame Discovery Channel’s television show Mythbusters for my technique.) So, i’ve listed below the cell phone charger tested and we will see how this plays out:

iPhone = $0.00 (tested 17 hours)
G1 (Google’s phone on T-mobile) = $0.00 (tested 24 hours)
Blackberry = $0.00 (tested 24 hours)
Nokia 5190 = $0.00 (tested 170 hours)

I failed. So, battery chargers might not exactly be wasting energy as I suspected, but imagine what other appliances are consuming energy through out the day. Say a blow dryer (~900 to 1500 watts), your personal computer (~200 to 400 watts), or your alarm clock (~50 watts)?

if you aren’t going to buy a Kill a Watt, here are three things you can do to prevent your vampiric appliances from leeching more electricity:

Check to see if it’s warm. If it’s warm, it will most likely be draining some power (because only electricity keep things warm).
Buy a electric strip (or something like it) with an on/off button. That way you can keep things plugged in and save some money. (Speaking from a few frustrating experiences, just remember to turn on the power strip or else your phone won’t get charged for the next day.)
Unplug, it’s simple and free.