This week’s challenge is to conserve energy by turning lights off around the house. Although I think I have already starting becoming more conscientious about this since I started Guygoesgreen, it certainly is a behavior that I need to improve. Hopefully, you can join me this week on this eco challenge and both give me tips on what you do to conserve energy and possibly also learn along with me.
I have been told ever since I was a little guy that I should turn lights off when I am not in a room because it is wasteful. I, being somewhat stubborn and forgetful, may not have been the best at this and hope to learn about this type of wastefulness and take effort to change this behavior. I learned last week that I might have a tough time re-training my brain, but I think part of my journey is not only learning how to be green, but also how to rewire my brain for some things.
Some of my previous tasks require multiple steps and thought to follow through with. Those challenges seemed to be a bit easier for me. It is easy to say “I can only shower once a day” and for me it is easy to turn off the faucet when I brush, but it seems that there are some very small actions (or inactions) that I perform nearly every day that are difficult. For example, last week my challenge was to not use plastic bags and it seemed like I only realized that I took a plastic bag once I was in my car. I did it without thought. I think that possibly this might be another one of these tasks.
So, now that I know going into this green challenge that I will need to retrain my brain, do you guys/gals have any suggestions right off the bat? Are there any tricks, tools or suggestions you have for me to make sure the lights are off or how to conserve energy in relation to the lights?
A ‘real time’ monitor (not sure what you would call it) can really help with this. You can see all the time how much electricity you are using by having a portable monitor next to you. You’ll get an idea of what a ‘tick over’ is in your home and when it goes up, you realise something is on. This has been fantastic for us and we’ve slashed our electricity bills. we hardly ever leave the lights on any more.
Although we’re lucky; most of them are now LED and run off solar. When it’s a grey day and the power is limited, you soon get used to turning the lights off otherwise you’re sitting in the dark at 7:30pm!
Electricity gives us power too easily; we don’t have to think about it or conserving it, but with any self generated power your thinking changes.
Good luck with this challenge; How about taking daily meter readings if you don’t have a monitor to see how you are progressing?
I think it would be great to invest in some sort of monitor reader. I like the idea of knowing exactly what you are using, and reducing that amount each month. I see even certain models of cars have this too.