EU energy efficiency regulations

Dear Ricsimas,

Concerning common sense, you will understand that a large domestic electric fire draws up 2,500 Watts through a domestic plug and socket. This is is about as large a load as the capacity of our domestic systems allow through a single domestic mains power point, and may therefore be consider a large domestic electrical load. Larger loads tend to be hard wired without a plug and socket interface. Items such as a continuous flow electrically heated shower unit, an immersion water heater, and an electric cooker take more power than the domestic socket is designed to supply, and these items may be considered very large domestic loads.

An incandescent lamp will usually be rated at 40, 60, or 100 Watts, and these may be considered small to moderate loads. A modern LED lamp is typically rated at 6 or 9 Watts, and this may be considered a very small electrical load. Indeed LED cycle lamps can provide as much illumination as the 6 or 9 Watt domestic type LED lamps from small batteries that last many hours. Small low voltage batteries [more correctly cells] are not noted for having the capacity to drive anything more than small or very small loads. 

A powerful incandescent lamp of say 100 Watts rating is one twenty fifth of the largest normal rating for a domestic socket, and thus may be characterised a moderate to small load. A nine Watt LED lamps is less than a two hundred and fiftieth of the largest load ... Very small would be an adequate description. 

It may be seen with common sense that a pair ESLs drawing 2 Watts between them constitute a very very small load indeed,  ...

Really it is utilitarian common sense to see this.

I look forward to your alternative definition of what constitutes a large and small load on a domestic socket.

ATB from George

You said "utilitarianism" so I looked that up and find myself in tune with the concept.

Had you used the word "utility" then I would have looked that up, but you did not. I am not going to chase round looking up precise definitions just because you change your argument - if in a very subtle way!

All the best from George

Don't play dense, George. The reason the thing is called "utilitarianism" is because of the concept of utility. Just because you found the vaguest definition possible of the term and didn't even bother looking up why it's called what it is does not make mine a different argument.

Does it not? Well you had better be more precise in future if you want me to play word games with you!

And I would not call a quote from the Encyclopaedia  Brtanica vague! It is a definition of the word from a greater authority than you have quoted so far.

Please don't post the half dozen definitions of utility! You will only select which one you want to use after I have replied. You blew your chance by using the wrong word in the first place! 

ATB from George

You chose to compare it to all the larger devices you have at home that you can't easily choose not to use. I suggested an alternative which was comparing them to an equivalent device (headphones) that consumes less power. If you are using more power than you "need", you are producing waste. Simple as that, isn't it? Why does this not bother you?

You won't find a definition of large and small by me because I am not comfortable making arbitrary comments about how people use or not their resources - and it really is theirs, since they paid for the power, just like you do with your ESLs.

When you assure me that you are only use headphones, then your point would have some validity! If you are using conventional speakers [except the large horn variety] it is certain that your system is using a good deal more power from the socket than mine.

ATB from George

Not into word games, I'm afraid. I just assumed, clearly wrongly, that if a person comes across a word like "utilitarianism" that they would not stop at a vague definition, given that the word is clearly derived from another. Using Google wouldn't net a result as poor as what you used.

I'm actually surprised you managed to find something about Utilitarianism that doesn't talk about Utility, to be honest. It would be like an entry on Malthusianism that didn't contain the name Malthus.

My point is that your system is drawing more from the socket than the ones centered around headphones, and ultimately the only reason you don't consider that wasteful is because you are the one doing it.

What I use or not is irrelevant - I'm not trying to get everyone to be just like me.

Nor am I.

But it would be pretty thick if you comment on the very modest power requirements of my system if you are running an active 500 series system for example? I am sure that you can see the common sense in that, and the utility in my questioning the point!

ATB from George

1 - I did not quote anyone. Utility is actually pretty well established in the field of economics. Use any definition that's appeared in a discussion of utilitarianism and you'll be in the ballpark

2 - The Encyclopaedia Britannica (EB), as you may know, tries to condense a lot of knowledge into almost "bite-sized" fragments - part of the reason it has become largely irrelevant in this day and age

3 - Do you find an argument of authority really better than what your eyes tell you in this case? Given a word with a root like "Utilitarianism", don't you think perhaps it ought to have been addressed? Or can you not judge what's on the EB?

Graham, the simplest and quickest way is to just make a post alert and send a message that way. Otherwise, you can email Naim and they can forward it on to me.

Only if your point was on topic! I am not about to look up every conceivable word connected with significant words in your wooly posts in the middle of something much more important.

As an off topic point I consider it a red herring.

If you want an answer to this, then please open a new thread in the Padded Cell, and we can play utility word games if that is your bag, but don't be too surprised if I get bored and stop after a couple of exchanges!

ATB from George

No - it would be thick of you not to realize you are just another of the wasteful pigs running loudspeakers, just like me, instead of really being green and using some high-efficiency headphones.

.

You are absolutely right and I apologise for that. I won't ever again expect you to make a judgment on something you read.

Two points, because at least your post is back on topic?

Which do you think consumes more power at the socket? A headphone system or my modest loudspeaker system?

Chances are that it is my system, but by a very small margin indeed. The use is less than one mid-rated incandescent domestic lamp? We have already defined that as a small domestic load. It only becomes an issue, when used wastefully by leaving on when not in use!

If everyone in the country had as economical a home entertainment system as mine the national grid would be significantly less challenged!

On you second post, I think you may assume that I make a judgement on everything I read. Sometimes it is more polite not to post what my view is, in the sense that this is a family forum!

ATB from George

"Very small" - it's somewhere between thousands and hundreds times of more, in the tens if you're talking about very powerful headphone amps. How is that small other than because you say so?

As for "we", "we" did not establish anything - you posted your arbitrary definition of low consumption. Don't assume your opinion is absolute truth, George.

By a very small margin, I mean no more than the amount of electricity consumed by a single mid-rated incandescent lamp. And if you think otherwise, please be so kind as to explain your reasoning, or not if you care not to.

ATB from George

Well, I don't have a single incandescent lamp left in my house because of the waste it generates. The fact that you don't care about the environment like I do doesn't make it "small".

I think the fact that you do not use incandescent lamps is admirable. This puts you in the same camp as me, however uncomfortable that may be for you. I found utility in the change to LEDs in many senses of the word!

ATB from Georghe

I agree!

Oh, I'm totally comfortable with that, George - I hope you did that because of the utility you got from it indeed, and not because of regulation. I don't like seeing things like these being forced upon others.

However, as you yourself posted before on this thread, that does not offset the waste generated by your loudspeakers - or does it now?

Wow, that's a very good point! George could easily choose to conserve energy every time he listens to music but he chooses to make the world a worse place for future generations by running the ESLs.

This is before we consider the total energy lifecycle for that redundant NAP 100 - embarrassing, really.

Earlier in the thread Debs made the point that the inefficiency from electronics leads to heat that enters the room. Now whilst I do not hold with the notional that it makes sense to heat an empty unused room - a hateful act if ever - I do not believe that between my replay and any heating I might use while awake amounts to waste so long as the room temperature is in moderation. I keep a thermometer in my room and only keep the room at 15 to 16 degrees. I do not think that is wasteful at all. It is certainly true that the heat my system might generate will in use is about the same as a forty Watt incandescent lamp. I can live with my conscience at that level of consumption while the system is in use.

If I were maintaining higher temperatures I would question it! On the other hand, I doubt that we shall see temperatures for living rooms be legislated about in my lifetime. Some people heat empty rooms, and I find that something I could not do. I have never understood why central heating has become so fashionable. I am content to sit in a warm pull-over rather than just a shirt. If it is very cold I find a hat and slippers very useful as well!

Best wishes from George.

PS: Pertaining to your comment above. I care passionately about waste and and excessive consumption in environmental terms, as you seem to suggest that I had given the impression that I do not!

George, I also believe that to be sensible. It also seems to me you arrived at that on your own. I try to minimize what I see as waste, but the keyword here is "see", which I chose instead of "know".

I draw the line at defining for others what is waste when we are talking about things they pay for (such as electricity) and as such constitute their resources at that point. This is because I am positive that "waste" as we are discussing is not an absolute, and I prefer to let people make their own choices re: that.

I suppose the nub of this issue is the fact that most owners of specialist high fidelity equipment are financially 'comfortable', and thus, do not have to concern themselves with the equivalent cost of running two or three incandescent light bulbs 24/7.

We only react when it hurts us in the pocket. If all detections of excess speed on the roads lead to an unlimited amount of written admonishments, I think we can all guess how successful the 'Safety Camera' mobile vehicles would be in changing our driving habits.

John.