4 ms·

IIRC the flip side is we waste a lot of energy by allocating the hour of sunlight to the morning where many people are still asleep vs. the afternoon when almos

IIRC the flip side is we waste a lot of energy by allocating the hour of sunlight to the morning where many people are still asleep vs. the afternoon when almost everyone is awake and thus needs to turn on lights and heat.

pkulak 7y ago
Maybe a long time ago when lights actually used a lot of energy. For me, it's all about the heat. And if my family gets up in the dark, when it's coldest, and the heat pump turns on, that's probably my biggest energy draw of the day. If I can wait just an hour for the sun to come up and the air to become even a few degrees warmer, my heat pump just became a lot more efficient.
- jimmaswell 7y ago
  The heating system is on all day, is it not? Why does the clock make a difference? I guess if you have no pets you might turn it down while you're not home but it still has to stay on some to keep the pipes from freezing.
  - MereInterest 7y ago
    During the night, most people are under blankets, and so the temperature doesn't need to be as high. If people wake up earlier in the morning, it is colder when they get out of bed. They then turn up the thermostat in the morning, and never turn it back down as the day goes on. When Indiana implemented DST in 2006, power consumption increased by ~1%. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-daylight-saving-times-save-energy/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-daylight-sav...
  - taeric 7y ago
    I think the point is few places need heat as much during the day as they do at night. Do they? Just look at the daily high/low. The low is at night. This would be a neat graphic. What does this do to the average temperature morning and evening.
    - leetcrew 7y ago
      > This would be a neat graphic. my utility company actually provides a graph of low/avg/high temperature and power consumption for each day of the billing period. it's a great way to see how your heating/cooling schedule affects your bill. I think most people sleep better when the ambient temperature is a few degrees cooler than they want their house during the day. so an extra hour in bed during the coldest part of the day could save some energy, probably marginal though.
    - hunter2_ 7y ago
      Weather Underground (wunderground.com) shows a line graph of temperature (and many other options as well) and the low is almost always around sunrise. Lack of sun means decline, sun shining means increase.
    - ants_a 7y ago
      Common architectural pattern in northern Europe is externally insulated masonry buildings that have significant amount of mass inside the thermal envelope. In such buildings there is enough time-delay in temperature changes that the time of heating does not matter much. And while heat-pumps have a higher coefficient of performance when temperature difference is smaller, this is overwhelmed by pricing difference of peak vs off-peak energy.
  - TheCoelacanth 7y ago
    Programmable thermostat set to a lower temperature at night. It saves a ton of energy.

pkulak 7y ago

Maybe a long time ago when lights actually used a lot of energy. For me, it's all about the heat. And if my family gets up in the dark, when it's coldest, and the heat pump turns on, that's probably my biggest energy draw of the day. If I can wait just an hour for the sun to come up and the air to become even a few degrees warmer, my heat pump just became a lot more efficient.

jimmaswell 7y ago
The heating system is on all day, is it not? Why does the clock make a difference? I guess if you have no pets you might turn it down while you're not home but it still has to stay on some to keep the pipes from freezing.
- MereInterest 7y ago
  During the night, most people are under blankets, and so the temperature doesn't need to be as high. If people wake up earlier in the morning, it is colder when they get out of bed. They then turn up the thermostat in the morning, and never turn it back down as the day goes on. When Indiana implemented DST in 2006, power consumption increased by ~1%. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-daylight-saving-times-save-energy/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-daylight-sav...
- taeric 7y ago
  I think the point is few places need heat as much during the day as they do at night. Do they? Just look at the daily high/low. The low is at night. This would be a neat graphic. What does this do to the average temperature morning and evening.
  - leetcrew 7y ago
    > This would be a neat graphic. my utility company actually provides a graph of low/avg/high temperature and power consumption for each day of the billing period. it's a great way to see how your heating/cooling schedule affects your bill. I think most people sleep better when the ambient temperature is a few degrees cooler than they want their house during the day. so an extra hour in bed during the coldest part of the day could save some energy, probably marginal though.
  - hunter2_ 7y ago
    Weather Underground (wunderground.com) shows a line graph of temperature (and many other options as well) and the low is almost always around sunrise. Lack of sun means decline, sun shining means increase.
  - ants_a 7y ago
    Common architectural pattern in northern Europe is externally insulated masonry buildings that have significant amount of mass inside the thermal envelope. In such buildings there is enough time-delay in temperature changes that the time of heating does not matter much. And while heat-pumps have a higher coefficient of performance when temperature difference is smaller, this is overwhelmed by pricing difference of peak vs off-peak energy.
- TheCoelacanth 7y ago
  Programmable thermostat set to a lower temperature at night. It saves a ton of energy.