Are Vampires Lurking In Your Office and in your home………………

County Energy Manager,Jeff Sheckels

Surprise -- your TV uses even when turned off. Same goes for your stereo, coffee maker, garage-door opener, microwave oven, clock radio and other electronics. Yes, even chargers for cell phones and MP3 players siphon energy when plugged in - even if they're not charging a thing!

A "phantom load" is any appliance or electronic gizmo that uses energy even when turned off. Some people call them "vampire appliances" or "energy vampires."

If your home is typical, you live with 20 vampires. They add about $200 to your annual energy bill, according to the Department of Energy. That’s because the "off" button doesn’t really mean "off" these days; instead, it means "standby." In fact, your TV with remote control likely uses more energy during the 20 hours a day that it’s turned off and in a "standby power" state than it does during the hours you watch the tube.

The upshot, according to DOE, is we’re using the equivalent of seven electrical generating plants within the daily, just to supply vampires that are turned "off."

Here are some clues to identify your energy vampires: They're appliances with remote controls, such as TVs, VCRs and audio equipment. They feature a continuous digital display -- like those glowing clocks on stoves. They feature rechargeable batteries, such as cordless phones (which use energy even after the battery is charged). And they're appliances with external power supplies, such as inkjet printers and iPod chargers.

How can you combat vampires?

•Eliminate vampires by using a sold at hardware stores, home-supply superstores, discount stores and the like.

Step 1: Plug all components of a or home entertainment system into a power strip.

Step 2: Turn off the power strip with a single switch. Anything plugged into the strip now is truly turned off.

•Unplug "vampires." Unplug rarely used appliances. Ditto for chargers that aren't in use. Unplug the TV, toaster oven and other well-used appliances before you leave on vacation (or more frequently). If it’s not plugged in, it can’t suck energy.

How Vampire Power Works

There's a vampire on the loose. Whether you're at work, at home or out on the town, this vampire is taking a bite out of your wallet and harming the environment. But, there's no need to barricade the house and stock up on garlic just yet. This vampire works entirely though your electrical outlets and stopping this process can be as easy as pulling a few plugs. The culprit in question is vampire power, also known as standby power and phantom load. You can also find it referred to as vampire energy, leaking energy, wall warts, standby loss, idle current, phantom power, ghost load and vampire load. The terms refer to the electricity many gadgets and appliances waste just by being plugged in (even if they're switched off). After all, what do you think your cell-phone charger does all day while it's plugged into the wall? If it's warm when you get home from work, then it's been using electricity -- even if it had nothing to charge. Individually, your rechargeable electric toothbrush may not put that much strain on the local power plant, but the big picture is far more troubling. In the United States alone, vampire power costs consumers more than $3 billion a year. Over time, many microwaves and actually consume more electricity during the hours they're not in use than the times you're actually using them to heat up dinner and watch your favorite show. How do you fight off the ravages of vampire power? In this article, you'll learn why this energy loss happens and how to eliminate it once and for all.

Fight Vampire Power Ready to take a crack at saving electricity and fight vampire power? Lucky for you, the battle against this energy waster comes down to two extremely affordable tactics.

Getting your money's worth out of that new, gigantic plasma TV? Forget the thousands of dollars you paid for it at the store. According to Good Magazine, you'll spend about $159 a year on its standby power.

If you're not using an electronic device, unplug it -- that's the blanket approach to fighting vampire power. You can make this step even easier with a (1) surge protector or (2) power strip. Plug multiple items in the strip and simply turn it off when you're not using the devices. If the strip is off, you don't have to worry about leaking electricity. A certain amount of standby power is unavoidable, especially with major appliances or other devices that are impractical to turn off. But this doesn't mean vampire power can't be kept to a minimum. Many electronic devices waste power in standby mode due to poor design. Purchase energy-efficient products and you'll waste less electricity on standby functions. The governments of the United States, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Taiwan and the European Union all regulate energy-saving products and label them as -certified products. These products are guaranteed to meet certain low-energy consumption criteria.

Vampire Loads Consume 25-35% percent of a home’s overall annual electrical usages.

Electronic devices may cause vampire power, but there are also a number of gadgets on the market designed to help cut down on unnecessary power loss. The digital wattage reader from P3 International allows you to check how much power your electronic devices are consuming. Other products take the energy-saving potential of surge protectors to the next level. Watt Stopper plug load controller basically combines a typical surge protector with a motion detector. The surge protector consists of six occupancy-controlled outlets that power off when there's no motion in the room for a set amount of time (programmable between 30 seconds and 30 minutes). Two uncontrolled outlets still remain on. All you have to do is plug vampire electronics or lights into the occupancy-controlled outlets and plug items you don't want randomly shutting off into the uncontrolled outlets. Other power strips (such as the Smart Strip Power Strip or the Power-Saving Essential Surge Arrest 7) feature a master-slave arrangement, similar to the set up of many electronic devices. If you aren't using your computer, why have power traveling to your speakers, printer and other accessories? The smart strip lets you designate one device as the "master" and several secondary devices as "slaves". If the master device is off or drawing only standby power, then the slave outlets doesn’t get any power either. All these defensive tactics may seem useless against the billions of dollars worth of vampire power that flows through power lines each year. But if enough people become aware of the problem and take steps to prevent it, a vast amount of power and natural resources can be better used. Vampire Power Causes In the average U.S. home, 25 percent of electricity use by home electronics occurs while the products are off. Is this power used for anything?

Computers are huge vampire power offenders. Standby mode may use less power, but it can still waste electricity -- and what about all those accessories? Vampire power causes usually include one of the following: 1. The gadget, such as a cell-phone AC adapter, constantly supplies a charge, even if the batteries are fully charged or if nothing is plugged into it. Many AC adapters, nicknamed wall warts by some critics, waste as much as 50 percent of the power they use. 2. The gadget uses electricity to power a display screen, an external time display or an internal clock. In some cases, this power usage is justified. For instance, your refrigerator needs to monitor temperature levels in order to power up at appropriate times. When it comes to your radio however, it's not as easy to justify a constant power drain to keep the digital clock lit. 3. The gadget never fully shuts down so that it's ready to use at a moment's notice. Many printers spend hours in standby mode, waiting to receive signals from connected . Before you even pick up your remote control, the TV is already using electricity to power the sensor that will receive the signal.

Vampire Grandpa Munster wasn't the only vampire living it up during the golden age of television. Vampire power and TV have a relationship that dates back to the late '60s, when producers first applied "instant-on" technology to sets. Developers aimed this measure at eliminating the few minutes of warm-up required in earlier models. Their solution was to keep certain parts of the TV on all the time.

Vampire power has been on the rise during the past decade, thanks to the proliferation of rechargeable gadgets, computer networks and devices with standby power functions. The United States consumes 26 percent of the world's energy. Of that energy, approximately 5 percent is vampire power. To put that in perspective, that's between 200 and 400 terawatt hours -- roughly as much electricity as the entire country of Italy consumes in a year.

Note: All this energy use enacts quite a hefty toll on the environment. Coal-burning power plants produce carbon dioxide, a leading cause of global climate change. Therefore, less vampire power translates to lower carbon emissions. Even plants that run on nuclear or hydroelectric power produce emissions that can lead to smog and .