Day Five- Energy

       

       Day 5 focuses on cutting back my energy use.  During the Beavan’s project, they gave up electricity.  They didn’t use a laundry machine, lights, a TV, or even a refrigerator.  While I can't make such a drastic change, I can make small changes.

       Step One is to assess everything that uses energy to operate.  The items in my room that use energy are: a TV, laptop, desk lamp, mini fridge, phone charger/phone, hair straightener, and blow dryer.

       Step Two is to decide if I am going to eliminate use of these items or mitigate my use of these items.  Since I don’t watch very much TV anyways, I am going to eliminate TV use as well as use of my desk lamp, hair straightener, and blow dryer.  I can’t give up the rest of the items, so I will mitigate use of my laptop and phone charger.  I am also going to stop using the elevator in my dorm since it requires electricity.

       Step Three is to unplug and turn off the items that use energy.  I cannot unplug my fridge but I made sure to unplug my laptop and phone charger.

       Step Four is to assess what the hardest part about reducing energy use is.  I think the hardest part of reducing energy use is that a lot of items today require energy to run, and these are items that are a necessity (or at least I feel that they are a necessity, like a fridge, phone, and laptop).  Hopefully one day soon science will create a renewable energy source so we don’t have to worry about using too much energy.

       

       Here are some suggestions on reducing your energy use:

• Turn off the air-conditioning/heat.
• Use candles at night instead of lights.
• Dry your clothing on a clothesline.
• Plug your computer and all of its accessories into a power strip.  Turn the power strip off when you are done using the computer to avoid using “ghost power”.