Up until two years ago, only 15 of Indiana’s 92 counties set their clocks an hour ahead in the spring and an hour back in the fall. The rest stayed on standard time all year, in part because farmers resisted the prospect of having to work an extra hour in the morning dark. But many residents came to hate falling in and out of sync with businesses and residents in neighboring states and prevailed upon the Indiana Legislature to put the entire state on daylight-saving time beginning in the spring of 2006…
Their finding: Having the entire state switch to daylight-saving time each year, rather than stay on standard time, costs Indiana households an additional $8.6 million in electricity bills. They conclude that the reduced cost of lighting in afternoons during daylight-saving time is more than offset by the higher air-conditioning costs on hot afternoons and increased heating costs on cool mornings…
The energy-savings numbers often cited by lawmakers and others come from research conducted in the 1970s. Yet a key difference between now and the ’70s — or, for that matter, Ben Franklin’s time — is the prevalence of air conditioning.
People as simple-minded as Congress will want to study the question for another couple of decades before giving up a magic bullet solution like Daylight Savings Time.
Thanks, Helen
I personally hate daylight savings time. It might have been a good idea decades ago, but now it serves no purpose except to fuck up the internal clocks of millions of people.
Humans don’t f*ck with time; time f*cks with humans.
I always thought that if the children waited for the rural school bus later in the morning during daylight hours it was safer. School buses run early in big farm counties. Who wants to wait for the school bus in the dark?
I don’t buy the logic in this article. Nearly everyone uses a simple thermostat to control heating and cooling. This depends only on temperature, not on the time-of-day.
Now, I do agree that summertime DST does reduce the electricity we use to light homes. The real question is whether the new changes in DST really reduce energy use. I seriously doubt it – any savings we get in spring and fall evenings is offset by greater energy use in the mornings to light homes.
Personally, I’d like to see DST run from equinox to equinox. DST in November is absurd.
The whole concept of DST is silly to me. How does it save electricity when we keep the lights on in our homes and run the AC no matter if the sun is out or not? I’d rather not screw with the clocks twice a year and sleep a little sounder.
As for kids waiting for buses in the dark… ask the school board to start school later if it’s really a problem.
I like DST, just because I like having more light after work. I can’t change my work hours, so this is great for me. I don’t care if it saves energy. I just want more daylight hours after work.
There is no “s” at the end of the saving, in Daylight Saving Time
#7 – I’m with you. Switch to DST then stay there permanently.
I moved to Indiana for grad school a couple of years ago, and I have to say daylight savings is the least of our problems with time here. In the 1990s they moved Indiana from Central time to Eastern, making Indiana the farthest west state on EST. Consequently even with DST there it isn’t light until *at least* 8:30am in the Winter. When DST ends in a few weeks it will be even worse. With the days (light) being so short in the winter, you can’t find savings in lighting later in the day when it just causes you to uses lights earlier in the morning.
About the HVAC stuff, it is a lot colder when their is no light outside, so turning on the furnace earlier in the morning *may* actually end up using more energy. But again, the days are very short anyway.
DST is bad science and Bush recently stretched it out even longer. What a dipschitt.
PS- the sun goes up, the sun goes down, when it wants. You can’t gain or save daylight by messing with the clock. Now, if someone comes up with a way to slow the rotation of the earth… then lets talk.
#8–You’re right, but since we don’t actually save time, but merely shift it, I suggest we call it “Daylight Shifting Time”. Best of all, you can still abbreviate it as DST.
Wrong, the US congress extended DST, Bush simply signed it into law. If you blame this on Bush, then you have to blame Clinton for the DMCA.
Blaming Bush for DST is quality tin foil hat stuff. The argument for extending DST was so that it would extend to Halloween and thereby be safer for children. Why we don’t just continue extending it for remaining months I don’t know.
Someone should make a watch with a built-in GPS – then it could give you your precise “time” based on your current location on earth and the relative position of the earth to the sun.
Time is not real, it is a creation of the human condition. Let’s keep this in mind when discussing DST and time zones and related.
#13 – It happened on Bush’s watch. Just because congress is full of pushovers does not make it OK for our president to sign bad legislation into law.
#14 – “Blaming Bush for DST is quality tin foil hat stuff”
I’m not blaming Bush for DST, just its expansion. Also, if it was just for Halloween as you suggest, why did they start DST earlier and not just extend it to Halloween?
Make your own hat.
#17 Ok, its settled then. Clinton is responsible for the single, worst piece of legislation ever conceived, the DMCA.
I hate daylight savings time and I hate time zones. Let’s do away with both. Everyone convert to zulu time.
The people in Indiana who are still fighting this are idiots. The problem was that until 2006 Indiana effectively switched time zones twice each year. They may have called it EST, but here in Michigan we knew they were on Chicago time half the year, which was CDT, and our time half the year, which was EDT. Heh, they even got their own time zone in Windows, isn’t that special?
Seriously, this was such a big problem that the border airports, such as South Bend, installed THREE clocks. One for Michigan, one for Illinois, and one for Indiana. West Wing did a story on this once, where Josh was left behind and ran the maze of time changes in Indiana trying to catch up with the prez. It was funny, but far too true.
Today, the only place in the western hemisphere that doesn’t do DST is Arizona, but nobody lives there so who cares.
#17
The primary reason of course was perceived energy savings. Regardless of the justification for the expansion, laying blame onto Bush for your dislike of the bill is still misplaced. Most environmentalist applauded the bill. Enjoy your hat.
#20
Yes, AZ is the only State that does not have its collective head up its tokhes.
#21 “The primary reason of course was perceived energy savings.”
Your operative word being “perceived”.
#18 “Ok, its settled then. Clinton is responsible for the single, worst piece of legislation ever conceived, the DMCA.”
Fine, fine… whatever.
21, AZ may now be the only place in the hemisphere that doesn’t do DST. OK, Hawaii, but who would know if they were off by one or two hours? 🙂
I want to know how this raises the electric bill. “It’s 6pm turn on the lights” “but Pa it’s still light out” “Damnit Jed I said turn on them dar lights. Oh Beautiful…. For Spacious Skies…” Don’t people turn on the lights when it’s dark? And shouldn’t street lights do the same? What else do you use when it’s dark and not light?
I say let EVERYONE ON THE PLANET use Swatch’s Beat system. Everyone is on the same time frame. Problem solved.
I love DST and hate Standard Time. Who cares if it is dark at 6 in the morning. I’m too grumpy at that hour to notice.
Far better to have those life giving (cancer causing) sun rays in the afternoon when they are useful! Benjamin Franklin was nobody’s fool, you know!
And Arizona, like all states does indeed have its head up its a**.
I really hate DST. I hate having to get up an hour earlier, eating an hour earlier, and getting to work an hour earlier. I want to sleep in! Also, at night, I want it to be dark so I feel like sleeping! DST drags the day to long into the night, so you don’t feel like sleeping until 10:30 or 11 PM. DST can drag the light up to past 9 PM! That’s just crazy. Hate having so much light at night because it unnatural, and hate waking up in the dark in the morning when it should be bright. DST is just messed up! No more DST!