Things better than Earth Hour

Some initiatives I don't get. Like Earth Hour. It's always seemed to me that lights use relatively little power compared to other appliances, so what's the point of turning them off for only an hour? Instead of being negative, this year I calculated what else you can do and how much more energy it saves.

Assuming you have 1000 W of lights - that's a huge amount. The only way you can use this much in your home is if you use incandescent bulbs - turning them off for 1 hour saves 1 kWh (3.6 MJ). But switching to energy-saving fluorescent bulbs, which only use 25% of the energy, would save you 0.75 kWh every hour. That's 6 kWh every day - assuming you use your lights for 8 hours a day.

Ok maybe you're more environmentally conscious and already use fluorescent bulbs. Maybe you're only using 250 W on lighting - then you only save 0.25 kWh.

• Turning off your computer will save 3 kWh overnight, and 15 kWh over the weekend. That's 12 times as much saved, every day.
• Reducing your shower by only 1 minute, assuming your water is only heated by 10C, saves 0.1 kWh - and 10 litres of water. A hot shower is 40C and water coming in may be as low as 10C, so 10C of heating is really low.
• Your car uses about 1.3 kWh per km, and you can save even more energy by adjusting your thermostat.