Ghost power in my apartment!!
Where does the uncounted power consumption come from?
Standby power consumed by an electronic appliances is known to be the "ghost" that secretly suck energy out of power outlet when the device is not in use. Generally, standby power is used by built-in clock for a device to display and/or keep track of the time. It is also used to power the IR receiver so that a device can turn itself on when we push that "power" button on the remote controller. The power used by a single device in standby mode may be quite unnoticeable compared to that consumed in operation mode; however, standby powers add up when there are ten or twenty devices constantly plugged in (yes, we all have that many electronic devices) and eventually contribute to a non-negligible part of our electricity bill. This infamous power consumption is thus also called ghost power.
Out of curiosity, I used a Kill a Watt to measure power consumptions of all the electronic devices that are constantly plugged in in my apartment to determine which ones actually consume standby power and which ones don't. I also measured the power consumption when the devices are in operation just for fun. Parameters measured by the Kill a Watt include RMS current, VA, Wattage and power factor. The table below shows the results, and devices with standby power are marked Yes in the last column.
Observations:
- Roughly half of the electronic devices measured consume power in standby mode.
- By looking at the power factor alone, many devices actually have very low power factor. While some of them are outdated equipment, most of them are relatively new products. I thought newer electronic devices have been advanced enough to have high power factor, but apparently not. It worth mentioning that my Apple iMac has very high power factor when in operation and consumes almost no power (at least not measurable by the Kill a Watt) even if it's just in sleeping mode. It's probably the most energy-efficient device in my apartment.
- Some of my old musical devices have a physical switch without a clock display or a remote controller, and it is surprising that they still consume power as long as they are plugged in even though they are literally switched off.
| Item | Make/Model | Current (A) | VA | Wattage (W) | Power Factor | Operation Mode | Ghost Power |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| VHF/UHF Amplifier | Philips | 0.02 | 2.80 | 1.80 | 0.66 | Always ON | Yes |
| Stereo Receiver | Technics SA-DX930 | 0.01 | 2.00 | 1.00 | 0.54 | Standby | Yes |
| 0.69 | 83.60 | 64.50 | 0.76 | ON but doing nothing | |||
| 0.71 | 85.40 | 66.70 | 0.76 | Play DVD | |||
| 0.76 | 72.00 | 70.60 | 0.76 | Play LP record | |||
| 0.70 | 85.20 | 65.40 | 0.76 | Play radio | |||
| Digital Set Top Box (STB) | Comcast RNG110 | 0.22 | 27.20 | 11.40 | 0.41 | Standby | Yes |
| 22.00 | 27.10 | 11.40 | 0.41 | ON | |||
| LCD TV | LG 42HL40 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 | Standby | No |
| 1.12 | 140.00 | 138.00 | 0.99 | ON | |||
| DVD Player | Yamaha DVD-S1800 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 | Standby | No |
| 0.18 | 22.30 | 12.20 | 0.54 | ON but not playing | |||
| 0.20 | 26.00 | 14.30 | 0.56 | Play |
One big fish story
Will broken compact fluorescent lamps create hazardous situation?
We all know by now that compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) are energy efficient compared to the old good incandescent light bulbs. Most families have been replacing incandescent bulbs with CFLs to save some money on their electricity bills. Utility companies in many states are also promoting CFLs with rebates. Like all other fluorescent lamps, CFLs contains small amount of mercury as part of the mechanism to produce light. Speculations about evaporated mercury from a broken CFL could create hazardous situation if inhaled have floating around. Should this be a major concern? Should we just stop using CFLs or even roll back to those inefficient incandescent bulbs?
The One Big Fish Story is an article written by three of my dear friends, Bob, Francis, and Jack, in the lighting group at the Lawrence Berkeley Nation Laboratory. The short conclusion of this study is that the evaporated mercury from a broken CFL won't do us more harm than the dose of mercury from a decent meal of tuna. What's more interesting in this article though is that they repeatedly cite (and basically attack) the guidelines from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) regarding cleaning up broken CFLs. It is obvious that the studies of the Maine DEP really overly exaggerate the danger of broken CFLs with inappropriate information and experiment setups. I was more curious about how the Maine DEP reacts to this article. I asked Bob about this, but he told me that he hasn't received any compliant from them. Well, maybe they just haven't seen this article...
Check here for the article: One Big Fish Story
Do my ski boots really fit?
Ski boot clinic at the California Cki Company
I attended the ski boot clinic at the California Ski Company last night. Greg Whitehouse, the store owner and the speaker, gave a very in-depth introduction on ski boots as well as how one's feet should fit in a pair of boots. There was a lot of information to take in, and I am sure I had already forgotten more than half of what he had talked about before walking out of the clinic. Anyways, I think the main take-home for me was that buying a pair of boots is more like finding and fitting the right pair of boots instead of looking for the looking and price. Being a hardcore deal hunter, I am confident that for the same product, I can always find the best deal online rather than in a specialty store. But yesterday's talk totally made me understand that my shopping strategy will never work on ski boots. Among hundreds of different ski boots by various manufactures, there may only be a few that really fit my feet, and they still need to be fine tuned to make perfect fit.
I also learned from the stance analysis, which is part of the clinic, that my feet pronates more than 3 degrees, and my current boots won't keep my feet and lags straight at all. I had a hard time keep my feet flat on the ground in my boots... As a result, I returned to the store today in hopes of getting my boots fitted to my feet. The boots turned out to be way too large for my feet even though I felt comfortable in them for the past ski season. So the result was a new pair of boots... John Oshima, my boot fitter, helped me choose the boots, and it seemed that out of those boots the store carries, only one would fit me. John then spent another two hours or so to make a custom sole and fit the new boot for me. I really felt the difference when I put the boots on, and my feet could stand flat on the ground steadily in the boots. It was really an unexpected payment just like the fortunate cookie I got at lunch said... Well, look at the bright side, now I am really looking forward to a even more pleasant ski season this year!
As a side note, being trained as an engineer, I believe there are lots of math and empirical recipes behind ski boot making. I did a quick Google search to see if there is any scholarly article discussing boot design or force distribution analysis. Didn't find many. I am wondering if anyone will be interested enough to write a research dissertation on this. Maybe it'll make a huge difference on boot design or make sense of all those empirical recipes.
Bass players going off the grid??!!
Phil Jones PJB Solar Bass Amp
Maybe because I work in the energy field, this kind of thing catches my eyes immediately. When everyone is thinking about going green, so are bass amps... This amp equips with a 100W amplifier, two 5" speakers, 5-band EQ, etc. Although it's considered a miniature bass amp, finding a way to power it with solar panels is still quite impressive! It's actually the rechargeable battery inside that powers the amp, and the solar panels won't be able to provide adequate power on the fly. The Bass Gear Magazine says that it's not a toy amp, but a serious small combo amp. Well, for the list price of $995, I believe it's an amp for serious players... This is definitely the Prius in the bass amp world.
That's indeed very creative! And for this, I would give my two thumbs up! However, how to effectively take advantage of the renewable energy is probably still questionable. Play your small gig under the bright daylight? Practice bass with it in your yard? Or maybe toss it under the sun for ten hours in exchange of one-hour indoor play time? Anyways, according to the Bass Gear Magazine, Phil is going to build 10 first, and we'll see how that plays out. See Phil Jones website and Bass Gear Magazine for more details.
Burma Superstar
Popular Burmese cuisine in San Francisco
I had dinner at Burma Superstar last Tuesday with two of my dearest friends, Kim and Rupam. Kim suggested this restaurant. I've never heard of Burma before, not to mention Burmese dish. After a quick online research, I realized that Burma is actually Myanmar, which I do know and have several friends from there. Almost half-an-hour waiting on a weekday night before getting a table proved that it is indeed very popular. According to Kim, it is ranked the 3rd place on Yelp among all San Francisco restaurants.
It seems to be an American-Burmese restaurant since not every item on the menu is Burmese cuisine. Some of the dishes are more Chinese-like. The waiters and waitresses were very friendly. They anticipated that people may not have Burmese cuisine before, and did a good job introduce and recommend the right dish to us. I ordered Chicken Tofu Kebat, which is specifically marked as a Burmese dish. And all of us ordered Coconut Rice, a Burmese style rice of course. The dish was actually pretty good, and tasted a lot like Thai cuisine. I am looking forward to trying other dishes next time.
My first one
Can I keep up?
Looks like everyone has a blog, so I guess I should have one as well when making this website. Well, if you know me, you'd know that I am a lazy reader, not to mention writing... I wonder how frequently I can keep this blog updated. We'll see...