We have a worldwide energy crisis and electricity rates are very high in Australia. Any energy saving will help with the current situation with added benefit of reducing global warming.
So just trying to understand why do many stores leave their lights on after they are closed? Is it for security only? At least sensor based lighting should be there.
Thoughts?
Which stores are you referring to? Are all the lights on?
Mostly shops in the malls or on shopping streets. Some restaurants too.
The same thing happens with office buildings and the Catholic University at the end of our street is lit up like a Christmas tree, even though they haven’t finished building it. Most of it is just wasted energy.
We have a worldwide energy crisis and electricity rates are very high in Australia
What crisis? I haven't seen any rolling blackouts. Sure prices are up, but so is everything else. Using this view, we have a fossils fuel crisis too, as petrol is double what it was 10 years ago, just like electricity.
Any energy saving will help with the current situation with added benefit of reducing global warming.
Not really, power plants are still running. Most base load plants are very slow to ramp up and down. It was the entire reason street lights had been invented, to mop up excess power in the evenings. Newer renewables like wind etc can be turned on and off as needed.
So just trying to understand why do many stores leave their lights on after they are closed? Is it for security only? At least sensor based lighting should be there.
Mostly security so people can see what is happening inside. Don't forget a lot of stores are cleaned/refilled at night, so the lights might be on because of workers too.
Is this fake news ?
Well it is on skynews…….
Eiffel Tower started shutting off the lights early and there are many such stories across the world. Blackouts are not happening yet, but hopefully situation won't deteriorate to that. Also, i would say we DO have fossil fuel crisis specially after Russia's invasion.
To be frank - I am not really clear about the excess power being wasted. They will still charge the households and stores though. It's not free for the consumer, even if it is excess.
Totally understand the security and workers angle but that shouldn't require whole store/ restaurant to be lit up. Sensors can do the job.
Eiffel Tower started shutting off the lights early and there are many such stories across the world
But why did they turn them off, saving money or power shortages or reducing light pollution?
To be frank - I am not really clear about the excess power being wasted. They will still charge the households and stores though. It's not free for the consumer, even if it is excess.
Wholesale power prices vary depending on demand/excess in the grid. Retailers average out the cost over the day to the consumer at fixed rates.
You do understand that 'excess' power that isn't used is wasted and too much excess power in the grid, causes high voltages and will result in other issues.
The EU is not Australia. Our shops having lights on doesn't affect their power grid.
It was the entire reason street lights had been invented, to mop up excess power in the evenings.
Not sure if you are being serious with that but…. does anyone actually believe this is the reason for their invention?
Where would you find that in any legitimate source?
By the way, you may find it hard to believe but, street lights have also not always been powered by electricity.
does anyone actually believe this is the reason for their invention?
By the way, you may find it hard to believe but, street lights have also not always been powered by electricity.
Sure, the very first street lights used to be fossil fuel powered to provide light to make people feel safe in very select areas.
Then along came electricity, and in the early days usage was very defined, businesses used it during the day and households used it mostly for lights at night, so when everyone went to sleep, there was a glut of power around. Hence 'off peak' elec hot water, and elec street lights rolled out in mass to help balance out the grid during the night.
Those old coal plants don't ramp up and down that well.
Where would you find that in any legitimate source?
I'm sure if you googled it, you would find a source for the history of street lights.
and elec street lights rolled out in mass to help balance out the grid during the night.
It was the entire reason street lights had been invented
You really believe the "entire reason' for the invention of electric street lights was to balance the grid?
Please do some real research before spouting this sort of rubbish.(while you're at it you may find it worthwhile to determine the difference between 'research' and 'Googling something'.)
You really believe the "entire reason' for the invention of electric street lights was to balance the grid?
I didn't say invention, I said roll out on a mass scale and yes in the early days it was to help suck up the excess power at night.
Please do some real research before spouting this sort of rubbish
Have you done any on the topic? Sounds like you haven't.
I didn't say invention, I said roll out on a mass scale
The line I already quoted from your post appears to quite literally contradict that statement of yours.
You seem to have made it quite clear in the first posted quoted that "It was the entire reason street lights had been invented, to mop up excess power in the evenings."
Just in case you missed it I will quote it again for you -
It was the entire reason street lights had been invented, to mop up excess power in the evenings.
@Grunntt: I love that this person thinks this, when if you wanted to waste power you could do it much more efficiently in a central location.
I want you to consider how much power your fridge and freezer draw during a day. 5kWh, perhaps? 100 watts each might be expected.
Now, multiply that by 100x to get the capacity of your local Woolies. These cooling devices also get really high traffic so there is a lot of efficiency lost from customers opening the doors constantly - but we'll ignore this since it's hard to evaluate without concrete figures.
That comes to 500kWh. Per day. Half a megawatt-hour just to keep your milk and nuggets fresh… the 3kW of constant LED lighting that @mokr calculated is a rounding error in the total power expenditure of each store.
Its more like 2kw/h unless you have a one star walk in.
10% of commercial power use is lighting:
https://www.energyrating.gov.au/products/lighting
That's not nothing.
Myer leave their lights on during the day and to top it off there's not even anyone in the store.
I don’t think we have an energy crisis. Australia is quite likely the most energy rich country on the planet.
True, except for the fact that investment in new tech has been woeful under the last 10+ years of cough competent government cough, and we sell all our natural resources for cheaper than our own industry can utilise them.
We have a brains crisis
Now that we have actual competent government that's changing pretty quickly:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/09/austr…
Thankfully!
I can't comment on every type of store, but:
1) most supermarkets have their deliveries, or shelves getting stocked a couple hours after the shop is closed, so night staff are often working til 11pm, or til 2am.
2) then there's the morning crew, the bakers, cleaners, inv management, tickets, etc. At least a few of these are going from 2-3am.
In reality, for these stores, there's maybe a hour or 2 of downtime with no staff inside working.
most supermarkets have their deliveries, or shelves getting stocked a couple hours after the shop is closed, so night staff are often working til 11pm, or til 2am
I find Coles and Woolies annoying nowadays with kids stocking most aisles just after school hours . They don't want to pay more for the latter shifts .
They fill late at night as well. Bulk loads on pallets go up at night and smaller cage restocking during the day.
Because most business owners & managers are conservative voters & conservatives are relatively selfish people. They justify their selfishness by denying science & attending church to 'resolve' cognitive dissonance.
Sounds like a load of lefty freeloading bunk to me.
How was sky fairy service last weekend?
Ayyy time for the culture wars. Grab your team pennants and popcorn.
Says the boogerman!
Years ago back in the 80s I lived in inner city melb and there was an office tower a few hundred meters away. All the lights in the building used to be turned off at night except for this one room that had a weird eerie red glow emanating from it. The room was on an upper floor so couldn’t quite see directly into it from our 1st floor unit.
It used to freak me and my mates out wondering what could be so important that it was red and never ever turned off. Disclaimer…. We used to smoke a lot of dope back then.
Anyway one night one of my mates had the bright idea of walking up a couple of levels in the apartment block for a better viewing angle. (It could be seen from the stairwell). We took binoculars for good measure.
Turned out it was a coke machine.
Have an upvote sir. Best post of the day!
Damn that was mad anti-climatic, good story!
Decades ago with the poor efficiency of lights back then some people use to claim it costs more turning the lights on with fluorescent globes than actually running them.
I mean you wouldn't want to turn the tubes on and off every few minutes. But surely turning them off for 16 hours at night would be better? And surely the tubes are LEDs these days anyway so maybe leaving them on is worth it if it helps avoid a single injury or deters a single crime in a warehouse or office.
why do 7 elevens have locks on their doors?
they lock during midnight-dawn, orders and payment made at cashier window, at least around my area
So you can identify theves who break in.
Night vision is good - but having the lights on allows you to pick up a better image.
Cost of running lights is peanuts next to power costs for other things. Fridges running constantly, air conditioning, other commercial electrical equipment would all use vastly more power.
Also consider the security aspect. Businesses likely have large excesses attached to insurance premiums. I know ours have a $20000 excess, i.e. insurance only covers worst case. Leaving the lights on for security cameras/general deterrent is cheaper than reducing excess on that insurance premium I bet.
And another thing is quite a lot of businesses have already put on solar power. Large roof areas with lots of panels pumping loads of electricity back into the grid. The site I work at has 60kW of panels on the roof.
Because they’re paying the bill.
There isn't really a 'worldwide energy crisis'.
Prices are going up due to record industry profits. They want it seem like a scarce commodity so they can charge well for it.
maybe you should be more concerned about the fridges that stay on all day and night.
Go on google maps and look for the tankers and rail lines leading from the sea to the refineries and factories. You don't have a clue how much energy society uses, where it is used, and why switching off a few lights means nothing in the scheme of things.
Yep. People will recycle their rubbish into the yellow bin (which is its own scam) and then go on a freaking CRUISE SHIP and be ignorant to the impact.
Advertising and security.
Very small or negligible usage.
It's to prevent theives. Sounds cliche but they love to work under the cover of darkness.
Same reason street and footpath lights are on 24/7. It creates a haven for the crook mentality unfortunately.
Hey own a retail store here. The reason we leave lights on is so that people and cars going past can see the store. It's essentially advertising at night. We pay cents to grab attention of the 1000s of cars and pedestrians that go by. It's definitely worth it. Why do you think billboards have lights on them?
How many cars drive past at 3AM ?
I'm on a main arterial road so probably about 60 at a minimum. I've been working at my store at 2am before and there are cars still driving through.
How many have come in and said they said your signs the other night at 3am and thats what piqued their interest to come in ?
Its wasteful of them, but them turning it off wont really do anything for the same reason earth hour doesn't do anything.
It's not about the comparison of the amount being saved compared to the amount being used, its the way powerplants work and their inability to scale power supply up or down quickly.
I imagine when things go to stored electricity it will likely change.
Also, if I had a shop I would want it easy for people to see in if I was getting robbed.
There's no energy crisis, there's an energy profits crisis.
I think the reality is that the couple of lights in the store costs so little in electricty (compared to what the bill comes in at) that it's financially more beneficial having lighting on for theft prevention purposes than it is to switch everything off overnight.
Best thing you and everyone else could do is educate friends / family / yourself on the importance of running only essential devices rather than running everything at every moment of every day.
What I did was grab a 5 pack of those smart plugs with energy monitoring functionality and first used them to work out parasitic draw on all devices.. you'd be surprised the savings that can be made here alone. Then I used them and various smart deviced to work out ways to shift electricity usage to daylight hours when the solar is cranking, some of my best savings come from:
Loading up the dishwasher at the end of the day and putting on a timer to start at 9am (solar is doing 3-4kw at this point). That way they're done by midday and we use solar energy only.
Restricting laundry to daytime use only and using the washing line as opposed to the dryer for those really slow to dry items like towels
Turning off (via smart plugs) freezers between the hours of midnight and 8am. Sure the compressor works overtime to catch up, but with a full freezer the temperature change is minimal (doesn't thaw anything) and it shifts that to solar energy again
Running the towel rail (i know, pretentious) at a set time each night and having it switch off via IFTTT when connecting the phone to charge at bedtime. Similarly I run it from 8am to midday to dry the towels used for morning showers fully
I estimate I'm saving at least ~$50 per bill (every 2 months) doing this alone. Towel rail is 150w or so per hour (24hrs down to <1), Fridges are ~150w per hour (24 hrs down to 16hrs), Dishwasher uses ~50c per cycle and washing / drying is the biggest win as despite being a heat pump dryer.. the 5+ hours to dry a batch of towels @ 700w is significant!
As someone who sold fridges for over 15 years, i would strongly recommend you stop turning off your freezers constantly. The damage you are doing to the compressor far outways the electrical savings you think you are making.
The compressors use so little power when not cycling that is not worth the absolute stress load you are putting on it EVERY DAY, versus the 5 times over 15 years it was designed to be turned off.
The massive spike in power you are using when you turn on the compressor every morning will also be using way more than you could ever save turning it off, solar or not, it will cost more and cause much much faster wear and damage to the compressor which will also cause more power to be used faster due to the damage.
Just food for thought.
Just to pre-empt anybody else getting the wrong idea, this guy is shifting electricity usage to the day speciifcally because he has solar panels. This is the opposite of what people using energy from the grid would typically do, as electricity is cheaper overnight.
Haha don't play with fridge or freezer power.
In SA we need more waste. The government wants to charge people when they export solar to the grid.
There's too much solar coming into the grid. My landlord doesn't have a smart meter or any smart stuff because he's worried about not being able to feed into to grid when the grid is overcapacity and they do rolling feed-in cutoffs for certain suburbs.
Also if you can see the lights on at night, then that's free advertising. The store has been on your mind, you're talking about it with dozens of strangers, so it sounds like a good idea to leave them on!
Lots of stores run lights to a certain time and then they turn off. Lots of stores run 10 to 50% of their daytime lighting due to nightfill or security, after that the lights shut off completely.
Some keep minimal lighting all night for security.
As alot have said the energy cost and usage is incredibly minimal, even though it may not look like it from the outside.
NO.
The real answer is WHY have stores at all. Many stores are unnecessary…
For example.
Phone shops, theres no need for phone shops, ordering direct online should be enough.
At least half the stores in any shopping center are completely unnecessary. Close down shopping centers, saves a lot of electricity on shop lights etc, cars driving around etc, waste and a lot more.
Yeah…. wipe out half the jobs available on the planet… who needs them.
50 years ago we didnt have shopping centers everywhere and we didnt have people commuting 2+ and far more people had owned homes and nobody was hungry.
Not all jobs are good, because guess what happens…
House prices went up 10x in the past 20 years, did families win when mum went full time ?
No families, mum and dad everyone lost.
You fail to understand the system is fundamentally broken, the more jobs you have the more prices of things go up….Nobody wins in this stpid race.
And half the population dies if theres no jobs because they then can't buy food or have housing.
Absolutely the system is broken. But is shutting the stores, making everyone broke, hungry and homeless going to fix it?
No.
Brick and mortal shops are still preferred by many people. Some people also want to browse, trying before buying.
How many phone shops does a shopping center need ?
Life isnt over if you dont get to try the latest iphone, in the end the displays are fake plastic shells anyway.
You keep telling yourself you are special because you saw that xbox box in the window, etc…
On top of that tell yourself its an experience…
What are you on about? Me and the other person are talking about brick and mortar shops? Even for a phone shop, elderly people want to buy the phone instore and get the employee to show how to use a certain feature or get their help to install apps they like using. Your narrow viewpoints (that are not even relevant to OP's original post) must be fun to live with.
@lookingforTV: If you have a bit of a read of their comment history you'll learn some (sad, disappointing) things about how that person views the world and an inability to follow a simple discussion / train of thought.
Every.
Single.
Time.
@Crow K: @Crow:
No if you look at my answers you will see that Im actually offering answers that solve problems.
How about for fun you actually try and use your vast so - called claim intelligence and challenge my ideas.
Show some honour and be fair, try and actually address instead of taking the cowards way out and calling people names.
The problem is you cant grasp that my ideas have many benefits.
Waiting…
@lookingforTV: looking: Me and the other person are talking about brick and mortar shops
cow: So was i - shops in this topic is about brick and mortar shops, i fail to see how you could be confused.
~
looking: Even for a phone shop, elderly people want to buy the phone instore and get the employee to show how to use a certain feature or get their help to install apps they like using.
cow:
Please take the time to actually read ACCURATELY what i said.
I never said to close down ALL phone shops, i simply said that MANY could be closed. There is a difference, im sure you can tell the difference between 0% and 50% and 100%.
Next time you visit a shopping center, go around and visit a few phone shops and tell me how many old people are actually in each of them. You will find the number of shops greatly exceeds the number of elderly customers.
If half the shops disappeared in your local shopping center it would not affect the ability of the elderly to visit or get help from a phone shop.
LEARN TO READ…PROPERLY.
Thieves don't show up well in the dark
In the scheme of things, the difference of fuel cost of running a power plant at max load vs at min load is miniscule.
The cost difference of not running a power plant vs running one at minimum load is huge in comparison.
As long as the extra electricity usage do not trigger the need to bring additional power plant online, the additional fuel consumption and hence global warming effect is miniscule (again in the scheme of things)
For global warming, managing maximum load is a more the ultimate goal i.e to reduce the number of power plant active at one time.
Lighting cost is fixed cost that can be calculated/measured easily by each shop/business, I'd imagine this can be used in risk/benefit calculation for insurance/cost of break in.
Not having enough lights in the store turns CCTV cameras to change to infrared mode, only capturing things in black and white. I leave lights on for that reason for my store when I shut it down.
Basically nobody robs shopping centers these days overnight. Not sure why you pretend this is a problem.
Do you sell cameras ?
My shop is not part of the shopping centre? We are located in the basement level of the building which is accessible from the street level and someone can easily brick the door and enter and steal equipment and stock. And, when that happens, I rather have clear footage. Having black and white footage is definitely a problem. So shove your accusation tone in your arse.
looking: So shove your accusation tone in your arse.
cow: Clearly i was referring to shopping centers shops, there are lots of them, i was only talking about them.
I clearly did not refer to NON shopping center shops, it should be quite obvious then my comment was not about your shop.
Given your pathetic language, it hardly a shock you cant actually read a basic sentence that a 5 year old would not be confused by.
@CowFrogHorse: So lookingforTV makes a comment about why they leave the lights on at their shop, and you reply to them directly with some irrelevant stuff about other people's shops in shopping centres and the plot twist is THEY are the one with basic sentence confusion?
You're a very bad communicator. Your ideas are bad and you express them poorly. You need to stop talking to people without thinking things through.
@Crow K: crow: So lookingforTV makes a comment about why they leave the lights on at their shop, and you reply to them directly with some irrelevant stuff about other people's shops in shopping centres and the plot twist is THEY are the one with basic sentence confusion?
cow: No let be honest here…
Someone else made a general comment, i simply stated that shopping centers overnight basically never get robbed… then livingTv told his story about his OUTSIDE A SHOPPING CENTER store.
MY comment came before livingtv, the problem is he/she cant read.
Feel free to QUOTE what i actually said and show the true timeline of the thread…
@Crow K: @Crow
You are a bad communicator because you make shite up about people, and NEVER understand what that the proper way is to provide evidence.
WHERE is your evidence for what LookingForTv said ?
Evidence means sharing a link and QUOTING what each person said.
Grow up and learn to read and write.
@CowFrogHorse: Given this is all part of a response chain we can clearly who said what (and when) by scrolling up. They made a comment at 1:17pm on 9/3. You replied on the same date at 6pm.
Those were the two comments I was referring directly to, by responding in the same discussion (being the one we are having now).
I don't know who you're trying to trick by saying "they never said that" and "I said stuff first" or whatever but take it for granted you're a long way from outwitting someone here.
Screen time's over. PJ's on, teeth brushed and into bed, mister.
Depends on the circumstances, though the people running some businesses are just morons.
Many years ago I worked in a corporate office where they had sent out a memo on ways to help the business save money, I suggested that all desktop computers have an auto turn off set to a time at night as everyone left them always running (These were Pentium 4 machines so they were consuming a substantial amount of power) and they had close to 500 staff over several floors. I even did the math and showed how much they could save. Did the same for those ZIP water taps which did not have their automatic timers set so they were constantly heating the hot water all day and night.
Was quite literally laughed at the next company meeting when the suggestion was read out. All good though the company folded a couple of years after I left.
Energy Crisis - Why Do The Stores Leave Their Lights on All Night?
If you think there is an energy crisis post a video of yourself living without electricity and electronics and modern conveniences. Without stuff thats mass produced, stuff that uses a tonne of energy to produce, like batteries. Show us the way by your devoted example.
Get solar 6.6 to 13kw, leds, heat pump.
Use washer, dryer and dishwasher during the day.
Saving the world is becoming a new religion.
Security cameras record garbage footage in low light. The stores I have worked at turned some lighting off but left key areas on so the camera footage would be usable.
What crisis? My bills have been the same or less for at least 6 years
for small stores there's is obviously the question of security so passersby could see any late night intruders - best detected today by smart CCTV movement sensors triggering alarms to distant owner's smartphone - movement sensor lights are also helpful
but in my experiences in high-rise office blocks, the cleaners typically come after 6pm and may spend some hours there, so the lights being left on are for them - that's the old school
new 6-star sustainable buildings probably have occupant sensor lighting which will dim or turn off lights after hours and turn on when movement is detected
my standard calculation for electricity usage for a standard 120cm long fluorescent tube batten ceiling light using 40W (including ballast) is about $50 per year per light (say $1 per week) - you can count such lights to estimate electricity costs.
modern retrofits with movement sensor LED battens that dim to 10% can bring usage way down - our 24x7 garage lighting LED retrofits probably average about 4W compared to 40W before, so simply changing fluoro to LED might save 90% of that kind of lighting electricity cost.
so short answer - lighting electricity cost is probably such a small part of most business expenses that they won't worry about it. Making a profit is more important.
Advertising, you can't see the brand/store if it's dark.