4 ms·

I wonder if Google has managed to circumvent the Heisenberg uncertainty principle or will the act of measuring energy usage actually increase it? :)

• jacquesm 18y ago
  I know your comment is in jest, but where to start with how little sense it makes even when you interpret it as humor.
  • donaq 18y ago
    Well, I know that Heisenberg does not apply, except insofar as - no wait, you're right, it does not apply at all. Anyway, my point in a nutshell was that making energy analytics available to all might not help that much. After all, having information about how much energy we're using is not the same as being arsed enough to change our usage patterns, but the effort of gathering the additional information will definitely consume more energy. It may be a negligible amount for one person or even a household, but multiply that by all the people on the energy grid and I bet you'll have a significant number, no matter how sophisticated the technology. I guess the question of whether such a project is ultimately worth the trouble comes down to the amount of energy that will be saved by the people (which my cynical nature inclines me to think will be a small minority of the total population) who care enough to actually alter their usage patterns for it versus the amount of total energy consumed by the project. Then again, the people who care, like yourself, are probably already careful about the amount of energy they consume, so my guess, though I hope I'm wrong, is that the nett effect of the project will be to increase overall power consumption.
• ars 18y ago
  It does actually. Electric meters consume some electricity - about 1.5 watts I think (it should say on the nameplate).