Individually switched is the key feature. The power strip, now gracing our bedroom, has a switch per socket on the extension. This means I can turn off the plugged in devices one at a time.
This is a simple benefit, I can leave the power strip plugged into the wall sockets and have the power strip beside my bed, I can turn off phone or computer power supplies easily and quickly. Also the light ( and power supply) is now controlled from this switch. Each country does these differently, in fact the cumbersome UK plugs are a benefit here, there size means that there is space for a switch.
A secondary motive is that I have a one year old son and I'd rather he didn't play with the unplugged power supplies. So there is a safety issue as well.
I agree whole heartedly, we have too many of these black blocks heating the air, a friend commented to me when I launched this site about the benefits of USB based charging, at least I can charge my iPod from my MacBook Pro.We're under attack. Our civilisation is being colonised by an alien species intent on destroying our planet and, in the meantime, our sanity.
Evidence of this invasion is almost certainly only a few feet away, at your nearest power socket. Odds-on it'll be occupied by a little black box, possibly feeding a trickle of current into some half-forgotten electronic gizmo, possibly doing nothing but gently heating the surrounding air.
So, if you unplug your phone from the charger and leave it plugged in, then it can be drawing 10W of power or more, based on this standby power study from 2002. Taking lower end of this as a baseline it is surprising how much power is wasted. I've estimated about 2000W per day could be being wasted, say ten power supplies, which are actually in use for 2-3 hours a day and left on the rest of the time.
There are many of these in the average home, they drive bedside lights, radios, phone and battery chargers, provide power for scanners, hard disks and small speakers to name a few I own. In the UK 1kWh is the standard billing unit for domestic metering of electricity, it costs about 10 pence per kWh, so over a year it is possible to save about 750kWh or about 75 pounds, say 150 dollars. This is more than enough to pay for the cost of replacing the power strips in the first year. I'm planning on looking at the environmental impact of replacement in a later posting.
How many power supplies are left on all the time in your flat or house ?
A quick trip to a local DIY shop produced this photo, showing the range of power strips available and how few of them have switches. See the image on flickr for notes. The photo was taken in the UK, hence the three square pin plugs.
Why did I do this? Well I'm as lazy as you and I know I should unplug each of the 20 or 30 devices in my house, but I don't always do the right thing. So I looked to see what was for sale and I was surprised, hence the focused micro-campaign.
