Consumers Spend $3 Billion/Year on Nothing!

Vampire energy, aka phantom loads, is estimated to cost U.S. consumers about $3 billion per year.  I know, it’s not really that much … I mean, if you break it down to the individual level, that’s only $10 per person ($3 billion / 300 million).  But the point is, it’s money that goes in the pocketbook of energy companies and their shareholders — it’s not going in yours.  The chart above is courtesy of GOOD, the magazine that always brings a full-page spread to otherwise obfuscatory information.

I wrote a post for Building Green TV a little bit back with some stats from the Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook:

• If one million households halved their phantom power load, we’d eliminate 150,000 tons of CO2 per year;
• It’s estimated that only 5% of the power drawn by cell phone chargers is actually used to charge phones, so the other 95% is waste when left plugged in;
• Buy Energy Star appliances when you can and you’ll cut up to 50% of the phantom energy load;
• TV and VCRs alone waste $1 billion in lost electricity in the U.S. annually. ##

Via Re-Nest.