Posted on 04/02/2007 4:46:13 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
Early U.S. Daylight Savings a bust in power savings Mon Apr 2, 2007 6:56PM EDT
By Lisa Lee
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The early onset of Daylight Savings Time in the United States this year may have been for naught.
The move to turn the clocks forward by an hour on March 11 rather than the usual early April date was mandated by the U.S. government as an energy-saving effort.
But other than forcing millions of drowsy American workers and school children into the dark, wintry weather three weeks early, the move appears to have had little impact on power usage.
"We haven't seen any measurable impact," said Jason Cuevas, spokesman for Southern Co., one of the nation's largest power companies, echoing comments from several large utilities.
That may come as no surprise to the Energy Department, which last year predicted only modest energy savings because the benefits of the later daylight hour would be offset.
For example, households may draw less electricity for lights at night, but will use more power in the early in the day as they wake to darker and chillier mornings.
Residential lighting comprises only about 10 percent of the average homeowner's electricity use, while air conditioners, heaters and refrigerators consume much more power. Washers, dryers and plasma televisions are also bigger users of electricity than lighting.
"There might have been a small increase in morning lighting, and a slightly larger decline in evening lighting usage," said a spokeswoman at New Jersey utility Public Service Enterprise Group Inc, but that modest decline will have no impact on its overall sales or earnings.
The U.S. Congress will evaluate the effects of the earlier switch to Daylight Saving Time.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
What? What updates? You go in and change the damn time..what’s so hard about that?
Yeah, mine is finally ok, just today. First I had to remember to subtract one hour, then last week, my son finally fixed it, only to have it jump ahead automatically this past Sunday ( the old date). I hate DST and I think they should repeal this law asap.
Or just add an hour until last Sunday at 3 am. All is well. I love DST.
they also forgot that most folks don’t care about ‘power savings’ but the extra hour of light in the evening—sorry early birds ;<)
Pretty foolish move although it makes sense in the fall for the trick-or-treaters.
I didn’t have to do anything with my MacIntosh! :-)
Besides that, I love the change! I wish they’d put Maine with the Maritimes timewise.
Actually there were at lot of system that needed to be updated. Microsoft did not issue it’s final patch until a couple weeks before the change.
Mowed the lawn after I got off work late and when I can get away from work at a decent time - golf!!!!!!!!!! So I love the early daylights saving time.
Usually when Congress gets involved things immediately improve.
What, you say you want me to prove that?
OK, just give me a minute...
chirp...chirp...
Get rid of DST altogether.
it’s about commerce, not energy savings and not about schoolkids waiting for their bus in the dark or getting home off their schoolbus in the dark whichever it is and we don’t have dark then anyway since it is already light 16 hours from 6 to 10, which was 5 to 9 in regular time.
I’m happy for you !
Sorry. I hope you are getting better.
Thanks, I am!
Several components were missed and we had service calls out the buttocks because recorders, cameras, motion sensors, etc... were either completely off line, or out of sync.
A prosecutor can loose a case if the time-stamp on the video feed is off.
What is your new tag?
But the New York city stock traders got another hour to trade with England. Oh I forgot, that was who were really pushing it in the first place.
I’m still stuck in Y2K.
Did Australia make it? What are closets filled with ham & lima beans going for on eBay?
Daylight savings time? Which year?
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