Black Friday warning: video games waste energy and contribute to global warming

The Natural Resources Defense Council, a New York-based environmental organization,in a new report says that video games are huge energy wasters, mostly because people tend to leave them on even when they're not using them. The study, conducted with Portland, Ore., environmental research and consulting firm Eco consume an estimated 16 billion Kilowatt hours per year, roughly equal to the annual electricity use of the city of San Diego. Sony PlayStation 3 which uses 150 Watts of energy and Xbox 360 which uses 119 Watts are the biggest wasters, while the Nintendo Wii draws less than 20 Watts, according to the NRDC report. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 each if left on all the time, consume more than 1,000 kilowatt-hours each year which is equal to the annual energy use of two new refrigerators. But the report is calling for power-saving features on the consoles that could save approximately 11 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, cut the nation's electricity bill by more than $1 billion per year, and avoid emissions of more than 7 million tons of carbon dioxide each year. Which equals an amount equal to the global warming pollution from all the cars on the road in San Jose, California.

This reports shows that EVERYONE no matter your age has an effect on the global warming problem. Everyone's hands are dirty in this problem and everyone needs to make some essential sacrifices so that we can effectively counter this problem. Leaving things on such as console as well as leaving chargers plugged in are drainers on energy much more than people think and is an easily solvable problem. Many of the problems that we face on a global level can't really be fought on a local level, but simply unplugging unused things and turning things off is an easy way people can have an effective role in fighting global warming.


http://www.sciam.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=black-friday-warning-video-games-wa-2008-11-28