Time to quash that dirty power addiction forever. Green fatigue. All that resolve drained away by the perpetual effort of it all. But with peak oil, global weather going berserk, coal dust in the air and filthy nukes copping eco cred, I figure I can’t afford the lethargy.
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My personal goal is to revisit the conscious choices I’ve made, shore them up and get a grip on the wasteful temptations that have slowly worked their way into my life with all sorts of creative justifications. Here’s my eight-step refresher.
1 TAKE UP VAMPIRE HUNTING
It’s easy to ignore the impact of energy choices, but being a tenant can make you downright oblivious. My rent, for example, is all-inclusive, so there’s no bill to pore over. Bad scene.
It took me a while to realize I was giving my energy vampires free rein. I start by noticing my computer is perpetually in standby mode. The printer, too. They’re consuming well over 350 watt-hours each day. Nice that my screen goes off, making it seem like everything’s cool, but the drain is massive.
I’ve already got the power bar right there, so I shut down the PC and click the bar. Instant computer tasks like weather updates, Google checks and quick emails can easily be handled by smartphone, so why keep the desktop warmed up?
Hell, as a nation we drain 5 to 10 per cent of our energy use for electronic devices by leaving them power-napping.
There are fancy-pants power adapters that shut down devices when they go into vampire mode, but power bars do exactly the same thing – if you remember to press “off.” The trick is to consolidate your charging (iPods, cells, digital cameras, batteries, etc) onto one bar, charge in the low-peak night and turn off in the morning.
A fully charged cellphone attached to the chargers can still pull 2 watts, and a game console on standby can suck over 20. Even a plugged-in coffee machine is good for a couple of phantom watts. It snowballs, and we pay for it.
2 BURN MIDNIGHT OIL, GAS, ELECTRIC
Sure, you’re dead at the end of the day, but just remember this: conservation means getting used to off-peak energy use. I’m now making late-night dates with my local laundromat. There’s the added bonus of not feeling weird about people fighting you for underwear-folding room. A machine at home is convenient and all that, but there’s nothing like the cozy, neighbourly feeling of a public laundry room at 11 pm and the sensation of heading out into the cool night with a bundle of freshly cleaned clothes.
And by the way, my local just switched to front-loaders. These are a good choice. They’re typically more efficient, often washing in half the time. These machines also require less powder or liquid, and by using cold water you cut into, well, the laundromat owner’s bill. Maybe that (and the fact that some of his washers couldn’t tell the difference between loonies and quarters) explains why the proprietor bought new machines.
3 THINK SMALL TO THINK BIG
I’m training myself to think like an amateur home energy auditor. (At least I work for free.) My first aha occurs when I notice that even though it’s October, I haven’t taken out my window A/C unit.
It’s easy to forget it’s there, hiding behind a curtain, acting as a conduit for air to go out and for the chain-smoking neighbour’s fumes to come in. Now it’s gone and the heat’s staying put.
Luckily, I rent a place where I actually have access to the thermostat. In my last apartment, I waged a quiet war of degrees with the main-floor guy, but here I set it and forget it. Having fallen into the habit of locking in the gauge without reading the temperature, I lower it to 20 degrees for the winter (17 when I’m out).
Walking onto the porch (my home is the first floor of an apartmentified Victorian), I recall that I’ve already warned the landlord the panes on my front storm windows are missing. That was well over a year ago, when he switched our outside lights to timed ones. Now I have to get him on those winter windows. He did say they were lying around – somewhere.
4 BE A CONSERVING COOK
You might think the less you have in your fridge, the less you have to cool, but the fact is, a well-stocked fridge doesn’t need to work as hard. Can’t argue with that a full refrigerator keeps you from ending up with just the T and mayonnaise on a sad bun when you want a BLT.
Now that I’m thinking about all those in-season bell peppers I invested in to fill the fridge, I might as well cook something. The microwave gets a lot of love for being fast and cool (good for summer, not as good for winter), but mine is a scary unit I found on a street corner. It lives in a cupboard now even though it passed the check for radiation leaks. I don’t trust that thing.
So the go-to device is a toaster oven, especially for quick meals like melting cheese onto something or defrosting a pizza. I generally avoid the 4,000-watt-plus oven except for entertaining. The rest goes to stove-top, which is gas, so at least it’s a little more efficient than electric. Anyone who does a lot of baking can cut 25 degrees out of a recipe by going with glass or ceramic. Slow cookers are pretty great, too.
5 UNPLUG REGULARLY
Since the point is to consciously revisit my daily home routine, I decide to make one day a week an energy-free entertainment day. It has to be a day that matters. Monday it is!
Instead of video games, movies or Maury, I’m going to read something. If it gets dark, I’ll light a really big bright candle (or two), the point being to break away from routine, use a bit less wattage and tune in to my head.
The candles act as their own warning: I’m not going to leave the living room with candles aflame the way I often leave lamps on.
6 CONTROL CAR CRAVINGS
You’re smart if you don’t have one at all, but my clunker keeps calling to me from the yard beyond. It’s so easy to walk past my two-wheeler and into the four. I’ve done it without thinking. With thought applied, however, I’ll reserve the car for emergency use (“OMG, I cut off my finger and need to drive to emerg!”) or as explicit luxurious escape to a remote lake or hiking trail, and never resort to it as an easy way to get my lazy ass to the late-night drive-through.
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7 INVEST IN THE FUTURE
It’s nice to walk by those big houses and see the Bullfrog Power sign on the lawn that means residents have chosen a green power option for an extra $30 a month. I don’t have that choice, but I can invest my money in WindShare. By “invest” I mean put at least $25 into the program. You won’t become a millionaire, but it gives you a voting share. So you and Moneybags, who just (hypothetically) invested a cool mil, have the same voting power.
As it stands, WindShare is working hard to get a couple of projects moving – particularly the Lakewind farm off Lake Huron, but it’ll be a few months before they’re taking on new investors. The return isn’t going to make you insurance-trader rich, but you’re going to feel a lot better.
8 THINK CLEAN POLITICALLY
Sometimes it takes an effort of will to stop thinking of greenhouse gases in that conceptual, global sort of way. So I try for a few minutes just sucking in the air and thinking about the friends I know with asthma or lung diseases and pondering to what degree I damage my own pulminary equipment as I bike through the core. It doesn’t take long before I’m ruminating on the repercussions of burning oil, coal and diesel.
This leads to some resolves. I should look into doing some pamphleteering for the Clean Air Alliance and the Clean Train Coalition. But there’s bigger stuff, too. Like cluing in to anti-tar-sands happenings, catching the action around the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference (see page 17) or becoming an active anti-nuker. Luckily, to catch a glimpse of the future, all I need is a trek to the Ex.
pault@nowtoronto.com
