What can you unplug?

Electric utilities report that an increasingly significant amount of electricity is used by electronic devices and chargers that are not actively in use.  Not every electric appliance, light, or device uses energy even when turned off, but an increasing number of these items do use energy even when turned off.  If you want to know if an item is using electricity when it’s turned off, see if your local electric utility or library has a consumer power meter that you can borrow.  When you plug the power meter into an outlet and then plug a device into the power meter, it will tell you how much power the device is using.  Many devices and chargers are warm when they are using power, so feeling the device is an easy low-tech way to identify some of these items.  Another thing to consider is that these unused items that are warm are adding heat to your home, which adds to the air conditioning load in the summer. 

• Chargers use energy whenever they are plugged into an electric outlet even when a device (cell phone, electric toothbrush, electric razor) is fully charged or when there is no device attached for charging.  Unplug chargers for portable electronic devices when you are not actively charging a device. 
• Electronic devices (TVs, computer printers, computers) that plug directly into an electrical outlet in your home nearly always use a little energy even when turned off, so that the device is instantly ready for use when it’s turned on.   If you have a device such as a DVD player that you seldom use, keep it unplugged between uses.  For the devices you use frequently, consider plugging them into a power strip/surge protector that you can turn off when you will be away from your home so that the devices are not using energy while you are gone.
• Unplug devices such as a bedside clock in a guest room and look at other seldom-used areas for devices that can be unplugged until you are ready to use them again. 
• Before you travel, look around for devices that can be unplugged until you return.  Some items, such as the refrigerator, need to stay plugged in but many others can be unplugged until you return home.