If your family tends to “forget” to turn out the lights when they leave a room, take this tip from hotels and bathroom heat lamps to make sure that the lights aren’t left on when the room isn’t occupied.
To reduce your energy use, install mechanical timer switches on lights that tend to get left on. These timer switches can be found in most home improvement stores and are easy to install yourself. The timers come in a wide range of settings and options. You can find timers that time the switch for 15 minutes to those that time it for several hours.
When someone wants to turn on a light, they set the timer, which is usually a dial. The timer starts counting down. When the time expires, the lights are automatically shut off.
I love this idea, as you must know from reading about all of my family adventures and my struggle with having my family shut off lights, appliances and more. Some of my top picks for mechanical timer switches in my home include the bathroom, the basement and the upstairs hallway light. These have all been known to remain on for hours, even though someone only actually occupied one of those spaces for mere minutes.
The only reservation I have about purchasing and installing these timer switches is that I wonder if they will make my family lazy or teach the children that they don’t have to bother shutting off lights when they leave a room. But, I also wonder if trying to teach everyone would be a losing battle anyway. Reminding, pleading and begging doesn’t seem to be getting me very far. And my husband as the president of the leave the lights on club, so I doubt he will change his ways anytime soon.
What do you think?
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, technology in the Computing Blog, and creating a home in the Home Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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