Question about interior lighting.

[BlasterBob]

Years ago, MANY MANY years ago, as kids we were taught that when leaving one of the rooms in our house that had the light on, we were to always to turn off those lights. Now days, kids never seem to pay any attention to if the lights are left on or not. Back in the 40’s and 50’s it was a common belief that when a fluorescent light was used, it would be better to allow it to remain on for hours if we intended to come back in the room. Was told that it took more power to relight that type bulb than letting it burn for a few hours. If this was true, will this now also apply to our modern fluorescent bulbs, such as the long bulbs over a work bench. I hope this question will NOT wake up any trolls. TIA.

[ray1970]

Not sure I fully understand the question. I was also raised to turn off the lights if you weren’t using them. I think too many on/off cycles will shorten the life of an incandescent bulb. Not sure it will used more energy coming on or off though. I’m sure Ohm’s law applies somehow.

Lights being left on is a pet peeve of mine since I’m the one paying the electricity bill.

[BladesNBarrels]

"When not in use, turn off the juice" was drummed in as a kid.
I also learned that fluorescent light starters used more electricity starting the bulbs.
As I recall when installing the daylight fluorescent fixtures in my shop, the labeling said that it was more efficient than incandescent bulbs and the daylight bulbs have lasted well -
I am going on 10 years on the first set - lights are on about 8 hours daily.

[DenverGP]

the energy an older fluorescent tube light fixture uses at startup is equivalent to about 5 seconds of run time. And many modern fluorescent fixtures use more energy efficient ballasts, so their startup takes even less energy. Turn em off.

[Irving]

Myth busters tested this, I bet you can find the clip with the results on YouTube.

[Gman]

Modern rapid-start fluorescent fixtures don't require as much energy to start them. Turn them on when you need them and off when you don't.

In the age of LED bulbs, it still saves a bit to turn them off, but it's not as big a difference as it used to be.

[henpecked]

At work it was explained to us that they charge a "peak usage" surcharge. If we come in and turn on all the machines at once we get a huge electric bill. We now have timers on all our equipment that turns 1 machine on every 15 minutes. Cuts our bill in half.

[Gman]

At work it was explained to us that they charge a "peak usage" surcharge. If we come in and turn on all the machines at once we get a huge electric bill. We now have timers on all our equipment that turns 1 machine on every 15 minutes. Cuts our bill in half.

Worked in a high-rise building in Las Colinas, TX that got around "peak usage" for AC by cooling a huge water reservoir under the building at night (off-peak). They then used that chilled water to cool the building during the day. Someone creates these schemes and others figure out ways to get around them.

[fitterjohn]

That's popular here too. Even the city of Denver has a chilled water loop for buildings. All the schools in Loveland are like that too.

[Not_A_Llama]

Worked in a high-rise building in Las Colinas, TX that got around "peak usage" for AC by cooling a huge water reservoir under the building at night (off-peak). They then used that chilled water to cool the building during the day. Someone creates these schemes and others figure out ways to get around them.

Not really a scheme, but a reflection of the costs and expenses for the electrical company. The type of peak use you were dealing with was the daily cycle of high energy use around noon. The electrical company has low-cost base generation that runs through the day (traditionally cheap coal). At high use periods, especially around noon when industry is working and air conditioning is on, the electrical company has to bring in additional expensive generation (traditionally natural gas). You’ll see this peak/offpeak residential pricing in Texas, and here (implicitly) in the Xcel air conditioning “saver switches”

The other type of peak is how much is being used at once. It’s partly about maximum usage, and by proxy, how much can come online at once. Most residential electric tariffs don’t concern themselves with peak rampup, because a single house won’t be able to generate enough surge to make a difference. A large piece of moving machinery or an induction furnace kicking on, though, can slow down turbines enough to drop voltage and and frequency. The electric company then needs to compensate elsewhere on the system, either with spinning reserves or other correction services (battery, in some cases!).

You weren’t gaming the system, so much as you were helping to optimize the system and getting rewarded for it.

In your case, the water chilling was essentially an energy storage mechanism; a physical battery. It cost money to build, and the electric company paid you to use it.