The Oil Drum | DrumBeat: November 10, 2007

164 comments on DrumBeat: November 10, 2007

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WNC Observer on November 10, 2007 - 10:54am

THE HOLIDAY ENERGY-SAVING THREAD

OK, it is the weekend, Thanksgiving - the peak travel period of the year - is less than 2 weeks away, and Christmas/etc. - the peak gift giving season of the year - is about six weeks away. Good time to discuss energy saving strategies.

Travel:

We have to make our annual trip to visit my wife's mother, over 400 miles away. Amtrak won't work out for us given out-of-the-way routes and the limited time we've got. Thus, I plan to rent the most fuel-efficient car available for the trip. I've also posted a ride offer on erideshare.com, seeking riders to cover part of the cost and increase our fuel efficiency per passenger mile. I'll be surprised if I get any takers this year, the time just doesn't seem quite right yet. But I might as well get in the habit of doing this, this is the wave of the future.

Fortunately, for Christmas we stay home.

Gifts:

The shopping mall and big box stores are about 20 miles away. I've decided to skip them this year. Whatever I can't procure locally I'll buy over the internet and have shipped via ground. I've already gotten an early start to assure that the items I'm looking for are in stock, and to allow plenty of time for ground shipment. I figure that especially this time of year, the delivery vans are going to be driving through my neighborhood anyway, so the marginal impact of delivering my stuff as well is going to be pretty minimal compared to the one or two gallons of gas I'd burn shopping.

We're setting some reasonable spending limits this year (we've never been very extravagant in any case), and most of our focus will be on necessities. Warm clothing is a good choice, as I've bumped down our programable thermostat another couple of degrees.

We always do a little holiday baking for smaller gifts for neighbors, co-workers, etc. Producing these in big batches is actually more energy efficient than is producing small batches.

We always try to save & reuse our wrapping paper. Most sheets will end up getting used at least two or three times, most gift boxes will get used dozen of times.

Holiday decor:

I was watching the NBC Today show a short while ago, and they had a segment on "green" holiday decor. There are now LED light strands available that are much more energy efficient than the old ones. Looks like something worth considering if you are in the market for lights. I'm not so sure about the idea of just throwing away lights that are still working to buy these new ones, though - that seems pretty wasteful.

There is always the big debate about real vs. artificial trees. The guy on NBC said that a locally-procured live tree (i.e., rootball in tub), planted outside afterwards is best. Well, maybe. Unfortunately, I need every square inch of space I've got left in my lawn dedicated to food production, conifers won't help. Thus, we've got a very sturdy artificial tree. We've had it for years, take good care of it, and it will last us for many more years. We do live fairly close to Christmas tree farms, so a case could be made for getting a real tree each year, and then running most of it through our chipper/shredder to make mulch. If I didn't have the artificial tree, that's probably what I'd do.

Interested to hear about other thoughts and ideas.

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vaporlock on November 10, 2007 - 11:19am

Check out the colleges in your area kid might need a ride they might not normally get and you can spread the word on peak oil on the ride.

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AlanfromBigEasy on November 10, 2007 - 1:19pm

LED Christmas bulbs

http://www.superbrightleds.com/edison.html

Towards the bottom of the page are C7 & C9 bulbs, often used in Christmas Tree strings. Already made up LED strings are also available (and quite possibly cheaper).

Also useful during a blackout if you have a computer UPS.

Best Hopes for Energy Efficient Holidays,

Alan

PS: They also have a good line of replacement LED "marker" bulbs for cars.

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Richard on November 10, 2007 - 1:40pm

Why would you want to save gas now?

The only thing that happens is that the guy in the Hummer can keep driving his car longer.

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WNC Observer on November 10, 2007 - 5:52pm

Why now? Habbits are not all that easy to establish, especially as one gets older. We are going to have to change a lot of habbits in the future. Might as well get a head start on some of them.

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Noizette on November 11, 2007 - 9:06am

Maybe superficial for TOD;

Still I can’t resist as the mound of presents at Xmas (up to 4 cubic meters in one US family I know) literally make me feel ill, because the waste and mindless consumerism is so blatant and heart wrenching. So I’m perpetually vociferatin' on this topic..

Put a price limit on presents, making them ‘favors’ or kindly jokes. Make a rule they have be home-made / recycled only / not bought but given from what one has already / found. Do a ‘treasure hunt’ scenario where small presents can be picked up. Limit presents to -for children only. Each person gives one present and receives one, decided by drawing names out of hat. Make the presents immaterial - a note, a letter, a short story, a photo with comments, a song (or other live music), a sketch, a souvenir...this can become quite emotional but I have seen it work. For a stable family, pick one or x recipients each year, giving something thought out and of value to them. Make up a Xmas project (eg. garden, refurbishing whatever, etc.) and have each person contribute to that, including doing some of the work. Make each person write a wish, vote on it, picking one or more, and devote the next year to doing whatever possible.

I have left out the ‘give to charity instead’ schemes because while pious they don’t maintain today’s Xmas spirit (what would Jesus think if he saw what we have done with his birthday?) which is about gift giving and family reunion etc.

on edit: spelling

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WNC Observer on November 11, 2007 - 9:35am

Noizette:

Spot on! We sort of started to see some movement along these lines in the 1970s, but it pretty much became invisible (though did not entirely go away) during the Reagan years. We're due for a comeback to this way of thinking and doing.

For our household, we focus on gifts of NEEDED clothing and other useful stuff that we would have otherwise had to buy anyway. Thus, we're not spending any more than we would have anyway, just wrapping it up and making a little bit of a celebration out of it. We also set a spending limit which isn't very extravagant by US standards.

Speaking for myself, I would be just as happy to dispense with the gifts entirely. I think it has distorted the entire holiday into something grotesque. Christmas has morphed into "Gift-showering day" and Thanksgiving has morphed into "Turkey day". In the one case, the focus is on the promotion of sales of massive amounts of stuff that people don't need and can't afford, and in the other case the focus is on the promotion of sales of massive amounts of food that people don't need and can't afford. Hypercapitalism run rampant and transformed into something truly grotesque.

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Dragonfly41 on November 11, 2007 - 10:07am

Noizzette...on top of the unnecessary items given (mostly to kids), there is indeed a health-factor risk this year (i.e., Aquadots, lead paint in toys). There have been many articles in newspapers here in the States recently reminiscing about the days when you made Xmas present or buying books, music, etc. in lieu of Chinese made junk.

I have a 5-year old that received Aquadots for his last birthday from his grandparents. He had been playing with them for about 2 months now when the bad news broke. My wife and I said perhaps we just need to make corn-husk and wood toys for the boys this year (half-joking).

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