Instant bills will cut energy use

Press, 11 July 1979, Page 19

Instant bills will cut energy use

By

DENISE WINN

of the “Observer”

Over the next few months an unusual device will be fixed to the walls of 100 houses in each of six American and Canadian cities in an attempt to raise energy-consciousness.

Looking somewhat like a super-digital clock, the device will have a top row of numbers showing the time and a bottom row of numbers steadily totting up the cost, in dollars ana cents, of all the electricity and gas the household has used since the previous midnight. These new energy meters will be the first extended test of psychologists’ recent findings in an energy conservation study based" on 3000 homes in the suburban town of Twin Rivers in New Jersey.

They discovered that people reduce their gas and electricity usage by 10 to 15 per cent if they receive immediate feedback on energy costs. Eyery day the psychologists worked out an

expected energy consumption rate for each house, taking into account factors such as the weather. Then they' worked out the actual amount used and computed the percentage that was saved. Several times a week, plastic numerals were attached to the doors

of the houses, indicating their percentage scores. Other ingenious devices for immediate feedback included a blue light connected to the air conditioner and to a thermostat on an outside wall. The light would start blinking if the air conditioner was on and the outside temperature was under 68 degrees. It would stop only if the air conditioner was turned off. Meters in the follow-up experiment will be more

sophisticated. Users can press a switch marked “next hour” and see the estimated cost of the energy that will be used if they don’t turn anything "off. Then, if they unplug an appliance, the projected difference will register instantly.

They can also press a “yesterday” switch to see how much they spent the previous day. Or, if they can bear it, they can use the “this month” switch to get a forecast of their next bill. Psychologists became involved in energy conservation tests when scientists and engineers, tracing actual energy usage in Twin Rivers, discovered that the differences in consumption varied enormously from house to house

in the same street. By running a survey of attitudes to energy, the psychologists found that most people are high consumers of some forms of energy and low consumers of others, depending upon particular idiosyncrasies. Some people are so nervous of catching colds or getting flu that they keep their homes like hothouses in winter; others perhaps have two baths or showers every day. The feedback method seems to be the best way of relating energy savings to individual usage. Several American firms are now competing to get the contract from the United States Department of Energy to produce a model meter, and the successful manufacturer will be required to massproduce a meter that can be sold and installed for $5O to $lOO. People who install them will become eligible for a tax credit. —O.F.N.S., Copyright.