Why Daylight Saving Time is pointless

[Jamaal510]

More: http://gizmodo.com/5892438/why-daylight-saving-time-is-pointless

Ugh. You're up an hour early, your body hates you for it, and even a gallon of coffee can't get your day on track. Daylight savings sucks. But you know the worst part? It doesn't have to be like this.
Daylight savings isn't as old as you think it is. First suggested by Benjamin Franklin, in 1784, it was at the time shot down by many very sensible people as being pointless. Then, in the First World War, it was introduced—first by the Germans—to save coal during war time.

Somehow in that age of austerity, the concept soon caught on and everyone started doing it. Sadly, nobody's really thought to change back. Except Arizona, and it hasn't fallen off the face of the planet as a result.

[Cooley Hurd]

1. 1 freaking hour ruins your day?

[virgogal]

2. Hawaii doesn't have it either.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

3. Moving it to early March and November was also very dumb.

Idea was to save energy, allegedly. Did anyone stop to think that up here in the northern US that means the heat has to go on one hour earlier, when it's colder outside? Who told them it would save energy to do it earlier in the year?
Dumb.

[virgogal]

4. You can thank Ed Markey for that.

[ashling]

15. See #6 below

[ashling]

5. We did change back for a good while

- except Colorado as I recall -

I was in college in the 70s when most of the country made the big shift back to daylight savings time.

I remember letters to the editor like:

"Don't mess with God's time!"

and

"An extra hour of sunlight will burn the crops." - pretty ironic considering global warming and all.

My wife used to work for the subcommittee in the House that had jurisdiction over time zones, etc:The Subcommittee on
Transportation, Tourism, and Hazardous Materials - I shit you not - and they always got calls about "when does daylight savings time start?"

the reason they had jurisdiction over time was the transportation part - the same reason that they had jurisdiction over railroads: the regulation of the time zones was created because of the railroads. . . got to keep the trains on time.

[ashling]

6. Extended Daylight Saving Time Saves Energy

Electricity use on the additional days dropped in 2008 as residents took advantage of extra evening daylight.
People throughout most of the United States set their clocks ahead by one hour on Sunday for the start of daylight saving time, marking the third year in a row that daylight saving time started three to four weeks early.

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 shifted the start of daylight saving time to the second Sunday in March rather than the first Sunday in April, and extended it through the first Sunday in November rather than the last Sunday in October. The shift started in 2007, and the intent was to save energy, allowing people to take advantage of additional daylight in the evening hours.

Although some people argued that the increased use of lighting in the morning could easily cancel out the gains in the evening, the data suggest otherwise. A report by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released last year found that U.S. electricity use was decreased by 0.5 percent for each day of the extended daylight saving time, resulting in a savings of 0.03 percent for the year as a whole. The savings are small in percentage terms, but in absolute terms, they added up to 1.3 billion kilowatt-hours, which is enough to power about 122,000 average U.S. homes for a year.

The DOE report did find small increases in electricity use in the early morning hours, but those increases were more than cancelled out by the energy savings in the evening. The shift was also found to have no effect on traffic volume and gasoline consumption.

Reprinted from EERE Network News, a free newsletter of the U.S. Department of Energy.

Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Nature-Community/Longer-Daylight-Saving-Time.aspx#ixzz2N6WcBRyg


Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Nature-Community/Longer-Daylight-Saving-Time.aspx#ixzz2N6WRtlHU


Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Nature-Community/Longer-Daylight-Saving-Time.aspx#ixzz2N6WHfW4v

Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Nature-Community/Longer-Daylight-Saving-Time.aspx#ixzz2N6W0gHhf

[ZombieHorde]

12. Damnit, I hate daylight savings time, but you make a good point. nt

[russspeakeasy]

7. Have you been to Arizona lately ?

[chillfactor]

11. no...and God forbid I should ever have to go there..

[immoderate]

8. I remember, as a kid, it meant going to school in the dark.

It was the only smart thing I saw in Arizona.

--imm

[RC]

9. Daylight saving time saves as much energy as daylight, maybe less

You can’t save daylight by moving around the hands on your clock, of course. So daylight saving time remains as absurdly named as it ever was.

The general pointlessness of DST was the subject of a Rachel Maddow interview Friday (video below) with the author of a whole book (!) on the subject.

What’s germane here is that DST saves about as much energy as light, according to most studies. In fact, a 2008 study found DST “may actually waste energy“: http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120406767043794825.html


http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2010/03/13/205642/daylight-saving-time-energy-dst/?mobile=nc

[Benton D Struckcheon]

14. Good read and exactly what I was thinking re this subject.

Makes no sense to think it would save energy overall, especially if you make it start when winter is still on.

Ed Markey's from Massachussetts, right? You'd think he'd notice something important: in the winter, the sun rises at a later time than it does six months later when the Sun is at an equivalent declination.
Huh? What does that mean?
It's like this: mean solar time varies from apparent time - clock time - by different intervals during the year. Checking my Old Farmer's Almanac, which conveniently for this controversy, has the sun rise and sun set times for Boston (you can correct it using their tables, but it makes looking it up for this post nice and easy) you see that on March 10, tomorrow, the sun will rise at 7:04 AM. The angle of the sun tomorrow according to the OFA is 3 degrees 50 minutes.
Flip a few pages and you find that the next time the sun will be at this angle is in early October, on the second, when the sun will be at 3 degrees 49 minutes. The sun rises on that day at 6:42 AM in Boston.
The difference is due to the small variations in actual solar time that take place during the year. The sun rises later and sets later in the winter months than it does when the sun is at the same angle six months later. So by moving back the start of daylight savings to early March, he put the start at a time when heating systems in Boston will have to crank up in the hour before dawn, when the air outside is at its coldest, rather than just after dawn, when the air will begin to be warmed by the sun and therefore give some assistance to those heating systems as they turn on to warm people up as they have breakfast and head out to work and school.

How, exactly, is that supposed to save energy?

Explanation of solar time: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_time

[fasttense]

18. The study in Indiana contradicts what Mother earth news is saying.

From your link:

"Indiana's change of heart gave University of California-Santa Barbara economics professor Matthew Kotchen and Ph.D. student Laura Grant a unique way to see how the time shift affects energy use. Using more than seven million monthly meter readings from Duke Energy Corp., covering nearly all the households in southern Indiana for three years, they were able to compare energy consumption before and after counties began observing daylight-saving time. Readings from counties that had already adopted daylight-saving time provided a control group that helped them to adjust for changes in weather from one year to the next.

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.

"I've never had a paper with such a clear and unambiguous finding as this," says Mr. Kotchen, who presented the paper at a National Bureau of Economic Research conference this month."

And then there is the annoyance factor that DST provides for everyone.

Actually after reading both Mother Earth News (whom I love) and Wall Street Urinal (whom I hate) I must agree with WSJ. It provides a more thorough analysis of DST and includes electrical costs for running air conditioners. That is what the original study in the 70s failed to account for - air conditioner use.

[Igel]

21. It's not clear that they contradict each other.

One sampled southern Indiana.

The other looked at the entire US.

[chillfactor]

10. I LOVE daylight savings time

it give me extra time to work in the yard after work......I enjoy eating my dinner in my cabana...extra time to enjoy the beauty of the outdoors and the singing of the birds

One hour ahead has never "ravished" my body...I drink the same amount of coffee in the morning ... your health must be very bad for you to "suffer" so.....

[starroute]

13. I do too

I'm not a morning person. For me, late afternoon is the best time of the day -- and the more of it the better. Suddenly having an extra hour of afternoon in March is like spring coming six weeks early. Everything seems brighter, more alive, and more hopeful.

Especially for people putting in a standard workday, daylight savings generally means having more sunlit hours when they can relax and enjoy them. I've known a few people in my life who can get up at 6 am and go out jogging before breakfast, but they're few and far between. For most of us, having that time after the day's demands are over is best.

[TM99]

16. Arizona would be insane to ever use Daylight Savings Time.

It is hot, and I mean damned hot, here in the summer. By 4:00 in the afternoon it is over 100º. During heat waves, the heat rises and even after dark never drops below 90º. I have spent weeks where the temperature at midnight in central Phoenix was still 100º.

There is no way in hell that Arizona could handle an extra hour of daylight.

Thankfully it is one of the few things Arizona does do right.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

17. *

[PADemD]

19. DST in March?

Oh Joy! That gives me an extra hour of daylight to go outside when it's 30 degrees.

I hate DST!

[GeorgeGist]

20. Arizona proves ...

You're wrong.

[raccoon]

22. I wish my state wouldn't do DST. nt