KPLU Local News
(2009-12-14)
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RICHLAND, WA
(N3) -
Everywhere you turn in the Northwest lighted deer, blinking lights and massive blow-up snow globes festoon neighborhood yards. With climate change so much in the news these days, you might wonder how much electricity those lights consume. Not much as KPLU's Anna King found out.
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Energy efficient holiday lights - EnergyStar
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Katie Pruder-Scruggs is the spokeswoman for the Bonneville Power Administration. In general she encourages people to use the newest, most energy efficient Christmas lights they can lay your mittens on. But in the grand scheme of things, Pruder-Scruggs says holiday lights don't account for much of the BPA's overall winter load. Northwest residents do use more power in the winter, but holiday decorations account for only one-half of one percent of the total power BPA customers use. Even so she says energy consumption is growing in the Northwest.
Katie Pruder-Scruggs: "And that's do to population but it's also due to the different types of electronics that we have like plasma TVs and things like that. So energy consumption is growing, which is why energy efficiency is such a critical thing for folks to be thinking about."
Pruder-Scruggs says holiday lights use the same amount of power as 30-thousand households for BPA customers. But the spike in winter power comes primarily from heating homes.
I'm Anna King in Richland. © Copyright 2012, N3
