Should you unplug chargers when you're not using them - tested

The_Traveler · Oct 21, 2015

Tested: Should You Unplug Chargers When You’re Not Using Them?

JacaRanda · Oct 21, 2015

Very very useful and informative.

SoulfulRecover · Oct 21, 2015

I leave my phone charger plugged in next to the bed. aside from that, everything else gets unplugged or turned off when we aren't home. Typical electric bill is 120 during the summer/winter and 80 during spring/fall.

waday · Oct 21, 2015

Get ready, I'm going to poo-poo this story. Sorry for being a Debbie Downer.

I understand from one person's perspective, it doesn't seem like all that much. It's only $0.34 per person per year. Not bad, right?

Assuming the author's numbers are accurate... now take that 2.628 kilowatt hours (kWh) and multiply it by approximately 275,000,000 adults (over the age 18) in the US (source: Kids Count Data Center). (Although, I should probably include kids, because they have so many electronics nowadays.) I'm assuming all adults would have similar vampire power demand as the author.

So, now we have 722,700,000 kWh being used by chargers that are not in use. Multiply that by the author's $0.1298 per kWh, and we have a cool $94 million dollars being wasted a year. Ouch.

Not only is that money wasted, power is wasted. Power has quite the negative effect on the environment. We waste a heck of a lot more than just $0.34 a year per person. Billions of gallons of water are withdrawn EVERY DAY here in PA for power plants. Now include the rest of the US. Oof.

Not only that, other natural resources such as coal, oil, natural gas, and plutonium have to be mined and transported to the facilities. Where does all the waste go? Back into the earth as waste. Water withdrawn can impinge/entrain aquatic communities in the intake systesm. Heated wastewater has negative impacts on the aquatic community downstream of the facility.

I read a similar article from someone in California a few months ago that essentially said it was ok to leave the water running while brushing/etc, because 'so little water' is used. Yes, by one single faucet, not a lot is used. For the population as a whole, it's another story. A bad story.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't always unplug when I should, but I think articles such as this give a false impression of our impact on the environment. They pull a very tiny piece of the entire process and say its ok. We need to look from cradle to grave.. look at the process holistically.

These articles try to justify our laziness. IMO, that's not right.

End rant.

tirediron · Oct 21, 2015

^^Agree^^ In addition, I'd be curious to know just how accurate their $24.00, Amazon purchased consumption meter is. With consumption rates that low (at the individual level), it would not surprise me at all to learn that it was 25, 50, or even 100% inaccurate (and most probably on the low side).

waday · Oct 21, 2015

tirediron said:
^^Agree^^ In addition, I'd be curious to know just how accurate their $24.00, Amazon purchased consumption meter is. With consumption rates that low (at the individual level), it would not surprise me at all to learn that it was 25, 50, or even 100% inaccurate (and most probably on the low side).

Totally agree. The error range on this is likely very high, probably in the 50-100% range.

That's not to say it isn't a good device to get an overall generalization of how much energy is being used by different devices. It's absolutely good for that purpose. But, if we're going to start calculating costs and energy usage for the explicit purpose of trying to dissuade people from trying to be environmentally and financially conscious, I want to be more accurate than using that meter.

runnah · Oct 21, 2015

I always do regardless of power use. Force of habit.

The_Traveler · Oct 21, 2015

perhaps we should stay off the Internet?

480sparky · Oct 21, 2015

Istead of worrying about 34¢ of electricity being used by a plugged-in phone charger, why not offset that by installing just ONE single CFL or LED lamp in your house or office?

Designer · Oct 21, 2015

I'm working on getting them all replaced. Got quite a lot replaced already.

tirediron · Oct 21, 2015

480sparky said:
Istead of worrying about 34¢ of electricity being used by a plugged-in phone charger, why not offset that by installing just ONE single CFL or LED lamp in your house or office?

Why offset, why not save? Is it really that difficult to unplug a wall-wart when you're done with it? LEDs? Perhaps, but I don't see any benefit to CFLs when you considered all the energy needed to deal with the HAZMAT aspect.

480sparky · Oct 21, 2015

tirediron said:
....... Is it really that difficult to unplug a wall-wart when you're done with it? ..........

No, not really. If you only do it once. But I plug in my phone to three different chargers scattered throughout the house. So I'd be unplugging three times a day, and plugging in three times a day. Six times a day, times 365........

Yeah, that would be a freekin' big hassle.

tirediron said:
..............Perhaps, but I don't see any benefit to CFLs when you considered all the energy needed to deal with the HAZMAT aspect.

What about the HAZMAT aspect of that computer you're using? No, not the electricity it's sucking out of the wall..... the hazardous materials that went into it? :icon_scratch:

Scatterbrained · Oct 21, 2015

tirediron said:
480sparky said:

Istead of worrying about 34¢ of electricity being used by a plugged-in phone charger, why not offset that by installing just ONE single CFL or LED lamp in your house or office?

Click to expand...

Why offset, why not save? Is it really that difficult to unplug a wall-wart when you're done with it? LEDs? Perhaps, but I don't see any benefit to CFLs when you considered all the energy needed to deal with the HAZMAT aspect.

In my home it's a pain in the but. Beyond that, I can charge most of my portable electronics from one of the 6 USB ports on my tower so. . . . . .
Beyond that, we more than offset by replacing every light in the home with an LED, we have a roof that is covered in solar panels, and we use fans, swamp coolers, and well timed opening and closing of windows to avoid running the A/C. Granted, were I live electricity costs $.31kwh so it's not a "save the planet thing", "it's a save the wallet thing".

KmH · Oct 21, 2015

I wanna know how much it costs to charge the devices that plug into the chargers 1 time each.

Buckster · Oct 22, 2015

I worked extensively in power plants and their associated sub-stations throughout Iowa and Minnesota while working on their communications systems.

One thing I learned from the folks that run those places is that it's a bit of a myth out here in power-consumption land that power is generated in a power plant at the level needed to meet demand. So, folks think that the more power that's needed out here in "vampire plug-ins" land, the more the power plant makes, and to do so it uses more raw materials, be it coal or whatever, to convert into that energy.

In reality, power plants consume raw materials and put out more than enough energy than is needed at all times, or they'd get caught short when demand suddenly goes up. The energy that's not used doesn't get stored for later use either. It's just gone, along with the raw materials it used to generate that lost power.

So, even if 300 million vampire plug-ins were unplugged, it wouldn't affect the amount of raw materials consumed by power plants, nor the amount of power they'd generate.

Just F.Y.I.