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Dear Queen of Green:

Q: How does electricity work? What is a volt and a watt? I don’t want to put my name because this seems like a really dumb question.

A: No such thing as a dumb question, so sayeth the Queen. How would you know about electricity? Do they ever teach you about it in school? Not in my school they didn’t! Here’s how to think about it. This is very simplified, but is fairly accurate. Know this simple equation and you’ll get it.

Watts = Volts x Amps

Volts… OK, imagine your garden hose. You’re standing out trying to water your rose bushes. If you have good water pressure, the stream coming out of the hose is pretty strong and the bushes get a drink. Voltage is like water pressure. Strong water pressure equals a high voltage, and low water pressure is like low voltage.

Amps… (Also known as Amperes) Think of this as the amount of water flowing through the hose at whatever pressure is available. Instead of water, an ampere is electrons – or electrical current. How many electrons? Really a lot.

Watts… Think of this as money. 1 Watt = 1 Volt x 1 Amp. Or… 120 Watts = 120 Volts x 1 Amps.

The power company charges for every kilowatt hour – or 1000 watts used for an hour. Prices vary around the country, but the one consistent is that most of them have gone up. Of course, it may appear that things are still dirt cheap. For instance, my power company sends a bill saying that I paid only 5 cents per kwh. Uh huh (I was born at night, but not last night)… In fact, I’m paying about 12.5 cents. The extra is cleverly and subtly disguised as surcharges. Want to know what you’re paying? Take the total amount of the bill and divide it by the kwh used.

The mystery of the exploding hair dryer. I once went on a trip to a far off destination with a bunch of women skydivers. I certainly didn’t bother with a hair dryer, but one of the women in the group did. Her husband had warned her to use a converter but she couldn’t figure out which one to use, and so decided to plug the dryer in and see what happened. For a minute or so, she was delighted! The dryer worked like a champ, blowing so fast and hot. She’d have her hair dry in no time flat. I watched this with some fascination when suddenly – blammo! The hair dryer shot a flame out the back end and stopped running, leaving tendrils of smoke wafting dramatically through the air.

Why did the hairdryer blow up? Because there is no consistency of voltage around the world! How odd is that? Here in America, what you have coming out of your average wall socket is 120 volts (more or less), while in many other countries, the standard is 240 volts. The poor little hair dryer did its best, but the internal stuff was designed for half of what was being forced through and so it ended its days by bursting into flames.

Here’s something else to think about when contemplating the mysteries of electricity. We all think nothing of it… expecting it to come out of the walls when wanted. In fact, the entire system is incredibly complex! The electrical grid is one of the largest man made structures in the world. Also, here’s a disheartening thought. Much electricity comes from crummy dirty old coal fired

plants. Here are some truly disheartening numbers about these coal fired plants: the bugaboos of air pollution are sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide. And guess who puts lots and lots of this crap into the air? Coal fired plants! 65% of the total for sulfur dioxide, 23% for nitrogen oxide and 40% for CO2. These are some pretty startling and depressing numbers. And of course, the utilities insist that should they be forced to clean up their old plants, it would be the end of the world. Uh huh… Anyway, to add insult to injury, most of the power extracted from the coal is lost along the way somewhere… with only 35% making it to the system. Which means, every kilowatt hour counts. It all comes at a cost to the environment, and the process is not efficient.
xo - QoG
Q: If I install some sort of alternative energy system on my house and then move in a few years, I’ll never recoup my investment… will I?
A.K. – Florida
A: This is a common misconception. In fact, an alternative energy system can be a fabulous investment. Depending on where the house is located, the payback on an alternative energy system can be up to 137%, or it can be 90% or less. By comparison, a kitchen remodel will recoup about 75% of the investment. One good estimate says that for every $1000 of energy savings, the appraisal would go up $20,000. And here’s a relevant (and actual) item: Two sets of homes in the same area of the NE. The houses in one development are super efficient, loaded with “green” systems – and are selling – even in a slowing market. Homes in the other development are “standard” and not selling. Super efficient green homes have something that sets them apart, so they sell! All in all, green energy systems sound like a good bet!
xo - QoG
Q: Dear Queen of Green, what is the meaning of life?
S.V. – Rhode Island
A: That’s an easy one deary, so here goes. Always do your best, make progress, and remember that whatever you put out is what you’ll get back, so don’t be mean. Think about it. xo - QoG