| Issue #31, October 27, 2006 |
Fall Back
Time has a very powerful effect on our lives. We often apply meaning to time by expressing that we don’t have enough of it or that time is money. Well, October 29th marks the age-old tradition of Daylight Saving Time and you might be able to shatter both of those thoughts by gaining an hour and saving on energy costs. However, there is much more to know about Daylight Savings than just simply turning your clock back an hour; Daylight Saving Time is an historical concept practiced all around the world, and has provoked both controversy and debate.
The idea of daylight saving was first conceived by Benjamin Franklin during his sojourn as an American delegate in Paris in 1784, in an essay he wrote, “An Economical Project.” The main purpose of Daylight Saving Time (called “Summer Time” in many places), is to make better use of daylight. We change our clocks during the summer months in order to wake up earlier, thus gaining an hour of daylight in the morning.
Countries have different Daylight Saving Time dates. If you live near the equator, day and night are nearly the same length, yet elsewhere on Earth, like here on the East End, there is much more daylight in the summer than in the winter. The closer you live to the North or South Pole, the longer the period of daylight in the summer. Thus, Daylight Saving Time is usually not helpful in the tropics, and therefore countries near the equator generally do not change their clocks.
Daylight Saving Time was instituted in the United States during World War I in order to save energy for war production by taking advantage of the greater number of daylight hours between April and October. During World War II, the federal government again required the states to observe the time change. Between the wars, and after World War II, states and communities themselves chose whether or not to observe Daylight Saving Time. In 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act, which standardized the length of Daylight Saving Time. However, Arizona (except select Indian Reservations), Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa and some counties in Indiana, have chosen not to observe Daylight Saving Time.
As stated earlier, we all know that time is money. In today’s busy world it is important to keep up the pace by developing your time-management skills and making the most of the clock. This is where Daylight Saving Time can be used to your advantage – it saves energy. Studies done by the U.S. Department of Transportation show that Daylight Saving Time trims the entire country’s electricity usage by a small but significant amount – about one percent each day, since less electricity is used for lighting and appliances.
Energy use, and the demand for electricity for lighting homes, is directly related to the hour that people go to bed at night and rise in the morning. In the average home, 25 percent of electricity is used for lighting and small appliances, such as TVs, DVD players, and stereos. A good percentage of energy consumed by lighting and appliances is used in the evening when families are home.
People occasionally complain about Daylight Saving Time. Frequent complaints pertain to the inconvenience of changing many clocks and adjusting to a new sleep schedule. For most people, this is a mere nuisance, but some people with sleep disorders find this transition very difficult. Another complaint is sometimes put forth by people who wake at dawn, or whose schedules are otherwise tied to sunrise, such as farmers. Farmers often dislike the clocks changing mid-year.
Yet the benefits of turning the clock back is that it can be good for your health. For example, we all know that there is a deer problem here on the East End, and just last week it was reported that deers were the cause of nearly all of our motor vehicle accidents. Several studies in the U.S. have found that the DST shift reduces net traffic accidents and fatalities by close to one percent. An increase in accidents which occur on dark mornings is more than offset by the evening decrease in accidents.
This October 29th, be sure to turn back your clock and keep those extra dollars tucked away in your pocket. What have you got to lose? After all, who couldn’t use an extra hour of sleep these days?
–Victoria L. Cooper
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