Testing the reality of turning off the lights, getting others to 

 

BY MOLLY SMITH FOR GREENING OF OIL

Even though they have been a symbol of brilliant thoughts since 1879, the incandescent light bulb may not be such a bright idea after all.  With the average bulb using about 60 watts of energy, or .06kW(kilowatts) per hour and operating 8 hours a day, it comes out to use about 175.2 kW of energy a year. Multiply that by the 45 light bulbs an average American family has in their house hold to get a staggering 7884kW of energy spent on light bulbs alone.

For the same amount of energy it takes to run a 60 watt light bulb, someone could play a Nintendo Wii for three times the amount of time the light bulb was on and still not use all the power the light bulb does. So, are incandescent light bulbs really such a bright idea?

Most arguments concerning light bulbs are about persuading people to switch from the energy hogging incandescent to a more energy-efficient and cheaper compact florescent lamps, or CFL. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for that. Florescent lights are a great way to save energy. In fact, if everyone in the United States switched each of their bulbs from an incandescent to a CFL we could retire 90 average-size power plants.

But in reality, not everyone is going to change from using an incandescent to a florescent bulb. There are always going to be people who claim the light of a florescent isn’t as pleasing as an incandescent or they can’t find any that fit their light fixtures or they just like the pleasant, round, inverted pear shape of the old-fashioned incandescent lights.

Instead of persuading everyone that incandescent lights are evil and must be destroyed and replaced with their angelically good and environmentally friendly cohorts, the florescent or LED lights, why not just preach about moderation?

When I live at home, it’s second nature to turn off the light when I leave a room. Ingrained at an early age, the impulse the switch off the light upon exiting a room is now an automatic reflex. However, this is often not the case when I am at school. When I leave a classroom, I can’t guarantee the professor will turn off the lights when he or she leaves.

If I walk home late at night, I see hundreds of rooms , empty and unused, with the lights still blazing. This is frustrating for me. Not only are the majority of the light bulbs incandescent and using a lot of precious, expensive energy (and we wonder why our tuition is so high) but the light pollution emanating from the windows gives the illusion one is walking down the middle of main street, not a humble college campus.

Why is it necessary to have the lights on all the time? Why do people not turn them off when the leave a room? I have come to the conclusion that it is a social contagion; people don’t turn off lights when they are the last to leave a room because they are simply not aware that they should.

My goal for the week is to turn off every light I see that’s not being used. It is my hope that by having others witness my behavior, I will increase the chances of someone else copying it and continue to have an exponential effect on others. Every flick of a light switch isn’t the burning out of a good idea; it’s the advent of a new one.

To be honest, I thought this challenge wasn’t going to be much of one at all. How hard is it to flick a switch? Then again, if it wasn’t that hard, why don’t more people do it? It didn’t take long for the full challenge of the task to materialize.

First off, how do you really know when a room isn’t being used anymore? During the week, I tried my best to stay after the rest of the class had left, but was greeted with more students filtering in for the next class and would just need the light on anyway. When I managed to duck into unused classrooms and turn off the lights, I was rewarded with mystified, quizzical and occasionally judgmental stares from students passing by. I thought, maybe I’d have more luck in my own dorm suite. There, I kept switching off the hallway light in the morning, only to return in the evening to find it cheerfully blazing away. Still, every time I found it on, I flicked it off. I even had moderate success with others in my hallway. Every time I passed this one particular suite on my floor, I would see the lamp blazing away in the common room and no one home. This waste of energy regularly made me wince. One day during the week of the challenge, I was passing the suite and saw one of the residents inside. Here was my chance. I nervously stepped in and explained my light bulb crusade mission to the resident. Quite apart from being incensed, the resident welcomed my suggestion, and even gave me permission to enter the suite anytime I saw the light on and turn it off. Win!

The most embarrassing part of my week happened early one morning. I was groggily leaving the bathroom, still half asleep, and automatically flicked the light switch off only to be greeting by a shriek of surprise and anger. Turns out my suitemate was still in the shower and not at all pleased about her sudden plunge into darkness. Whoops.

At the end of the week, I came to the conclusion that the most effective way to reduce light bulb usage is to simply be conscious of my own personal habits. I left my dorm blinds open all the time to catch sunlight and refrained from using my lamp. When on campus, I made conscious efforts to turn off any lights in unused rooms, including bathrooms and labs. While slightly more difficult, I also tried to reach out to peers, encouraging them to turn off the lights in their own rooms when unoccupied. It was difficult not to come off as some radical light bulb cop, but if it saved a few kWs of power, it was all worth it.

If you come away with one thing from this article, let it be to turn off your own lights when you leave a room and be seen while doing to encourage others to follow your lead. Do the world a favor and flick a switch off. Now that’s a bright idea.

About Molly Smith

Molly Smith hails from a small rare-breeds farm in Woolrich, Pennsylvania. Growing up she was an active participant in 4-H, Project Grass, Envirothon and Dairy Promotion. After her graduation from the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School in 2007, Smith moved to New York to begin undergraduate work at Cornell University. As a Natural Resources major in Cornell’s College of Agriculture and Life Science, Smith has found ample opportunities to develop her interests in sustainable agriculture, conservation ecology and wildlife biology. On campus, she is an active participant in Forword Women’s Literary Magazine, Society for Natural Resources and Conservation and the Developmental Fencing Club. When not working, Molly enjoys rock climbing, yoga, playing scrabble and discovering new music.

Contact Molly Smith at mls379@cornell.edu.