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David Nebenzahl David Nebenzahl is offline
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Default Appliances with mechanical controls not electronics?

On 11/12/2010 8:13 AM Smitty Two spake thus:

In article , "Worn Out Retread"
wrote:

"hr(bob) " wrote in message
...

On Nov 11, 8:37 am, "Bill" wrote:

"Bill who putters" wrote in message

Seems lately my appliance failures are due to electronic
failures. Dish washer now gone bad twice (Maytag quietseries
300.) Anyone know of appliances with mechanical control? Gas
stove with all the heat is just waiting to fail. Upside
washing dishes by hand not so bad not quick but not too bad.
May be cleaner and use less water too.

Also electronic controls *always* are on and always use
electricity to power them. When I can't find something with an
old fashioned on/off switch (uses NO electricity when off), I
add a switch.

Then some things can't be taken apart without destroying them
lately. They make the plastic parts so they permanently lock
when snapped together. (They want to make darn sure you always
use a little electricity!) In those cases, I plug it into an
external switch so I can totally turn it off when not in use.

Some of the companies which make these products also make
electric company power generation equipment. I would imagine
that if millions of people fill their homes with gadgets which
always use electricity, then the electric companies would need
to add on more power generating capacity/equipment? $$

Boy, are you cynicalG.


But is he wrong??


The amount of quiescent power consumed by electronic appliances is
negligible.


Wrong.

According to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, "vampire power"
(technically known as "standby power") accounts for 5-10% of usage in
the U.S.:

How much power is used for standby in the US?...Worldwide?

Nobody knows for sure, but it's typically 5-10% of residential
electricity use in most developed countries and a rising fraction in the
developing countries (especially in the cities). Standby power in
commercial buildings is smaller but still significant. Altogether,
standby power use is roughly responsible for 1% of global CO2 emissions.

(
http://standby.lbl.gov/faq.html)

Regarding the previous poster's assertions regarding utility company
conspiracy, he was right about standby power being a significant
fraction of usage, but his claims of collusion between utilities and
makers of electric products seems a bit outlandish.

Even the greedy lying *******s at PG&E have been airing a series of TV
commercials urging utility customers to unplug their "vampire power"
devices to reduce their bills. It's easy to see why they're doing this:
one of the biggest problems we have here in California with our utility
companies, PG&E in particular, is that they're so bottom-line obsessed
that they're allowed their infrastructure to rot to pieces. In addition
to the recent catastrophic San Bruno gas line explosion, there are
numerous incidents of transformer vaults exploding under streets in
downtown San Francisco, as well as lots of other equipment and line
failures. The last thing they want to do is invest in expensive new
capital equipment; they just want to gouge us with their old
falling-apart stuff and keep patching it. And even if demand for
electricity were somehow to flag, which is unlikely, they could always
do what they always do, which is to get their compliant lapdog, the
Public Utilities Commission, to grant them a rate increase.


--
The fashion in killing has an insouciant, flirty style this spring,
with the flaunting of well-defined muscle, wrapped in flags.

- Comment from an article on Antiwar.com (http://antiwar.com)