Before you google the next thing you want to learn about, check out earthle. http://www.earthle.com/ is basically a low-energy version of google. You get google results, but consume less energy. Big deal? Well, according to the site...
"Take at look at Google, who gets about 200 million queries a day. Let's assume each query is displayed for about 10 seconds; that means Google is running for about 550,000 hours every day on some desktop. Assuming that users run Google in full screen mode, the shift to a black background will save a total of 15 (74-59) watts. That turns into a global savings of 8.3 Megawatt-hours per day, or about 3000 Megawatt-hours a year."
Small changes add up!
I've heard about this website before, but I never knew how much energy was used from search engines. This is a really good idea, since you'll get the same exact results you would if you googled, but using much less energy. It would be a minor change, but if enough people change Earthle (which the link shows the directions to do this) to their homepage, all the saved energy would really add up! This is a great idea, and I hope it catches on with many people around the world. I think it would be interesting to see how Earthle is advertising its website, and if they aren't, then they should start and spread their name and energy-saving message.
ReplyDeleteThere is no wayy!! That is so crazy! I had no idea that even the backgrounds of our computer contributed so much energy. There is no doubt that if everyone started using this search engine that we could save A LOT of money. I am definitely going to earthle.com instead of google.com because I sure do go to google.com quite often. This is all really new to me and I have never heard of this before. I'm sure others have not either. More people definitely need to know about this. This is not a hard thing to do either. People just need to change some color codes and make their home page open up to Earthle.com instead of Google.com. Earthle.com is exactly the same as google, what ever comes up on Google.com, the same thing will come up on Earthle.com. It just uses less energy and it saves thousands of dollars. I am about to change mine now!
ReplyDeleteI think that this is a fantastic idea! It's a great way to start saving energy without doing something completely out of your way or something that would be too difficult to do. It's super easy and convenient. I'm a little surprised that this hasn't been thought of sooner... I don't know of anyone who doesn't use Google. I happily admit that I'm a "Google Girl" and that I'll probably start using Earthle. I think people will really start embracing this new search engine. I am a little surprised that this is the first time that I have heard of Earthle though. You would have thought that the word about a an "earth friendly Google" would have spread faster. This was the first time I've heard of Earthle.
ReplyDeleteI thought the facts and statistics regarding Google's energy intake was pretty mind boggling. They most definitely helped to support the article better. I was unaware of the amount of energy it took to power and operate Google searches. It was a wonderful article and hopefully more creative and innovative ideas will be born to help conserve our energy.
I think this is a good idea. But how much hard would it be to get everyone to switch over to this earthle search engine? Is the earthle results exactly the same and as reliable as the google results? Or could they be better? It says its just a version so it could be like ask jeeves or one of those type searches which in my opinion is not as good as google. Actually I believe ask jeeves is gone now, or its just called ask I'm not sure. That’s just something else to consider. If this happened where to everyone was hooked on this earthle then google would lose out. So the smartest plan would be for google to do some remodeling to the site and make the backgrounds black and whatever else is necessary for the conservation of energy.
ReplyDeleteWhat stinks about Earthle is that I can't set it as my default search engine. I guess it's not that widely known yet. But if they changed Google so that it would do what Earthle does, even more energy would be saved because it's used a lot more than Earthle. Someone finally had the brains to make a site that saves energy, instead of wasting it. If the smarties that helped create Earthle want to help save more energy, but would only do it if they could profit from it, why not sell the mechanics behind Earthle to other search engines? They would be making money and saving energy.
ReplyDeleteWhy someone did not think of the Earthle idea before, I can only guess.
Personally I feel that this website could make a huge change in our web as we know it. I have earthle.com set as my homepage already. A website that can save that much energy is phenomenal and shows that with a little change a big difference can be made. If earthle.com can pull up the same queries as Google.com within the same amount of time, it would be silly not use this website. It's truly amazing that just a background color could make such a difference in energy. Imagine if other websites joined the bandwagon, it could be a domino effect for the good! Also if a change in a background color can make a difference there has to be more changes that can be made to improve the amount of energy we consume. The world is continuing to become more advanced in technology everyday and the internet is used more than any other tool most people have. This could have a big impact on the development of other technology in the future. I hope to see it.
ReplyDeleteThis is really thinking outside the box!
ReplyDeleteI am a bit skeptical of the savings of 74-59 watts per computer that switches to a black background, as my entire laptop running at an average load pulls only 96 watts. A desktop draws more enrgy then a laptop, but the computers in the US are split about 60% desktops to 40% laptops. On the conservative end of this if a black screen on my laptop conserved 59 watts then that would leave 37 watts for my processor, fans, hard drive, USB buss, wireless, and I/O devices to operate. This is not even considering the amount of energy the screen still requires to run black. I am sure that a black background saves energy and the estimates that are provided may be true of 20" monitors on the typical desktops.
I am also rather sure that the expirement did not take into account the number of queries performed on alternative devices like cell phones and pdas, or queries by servers and automated systems with no screen. 59 watts would power four or five cell phones completely irrelevant of screen color. Servers and data systems can query google thousands of times per second to do what is called data-mining, these systems have no screen so really no energy is saved with them.
This is an excellent idea and no doubt saves a great deal of energy, but further tests should be used to determine the actual energy savings. The average US household consumes 10,656 kilowatt hours annually. If the numbers that are provided are assumed valid, then enough power has been conserved globally to power 281 average US homes.
I really did not know that thats what earthle was! I thought it was just a website that told a lot of information about the environment and stuff. But whoever thought of it is a genius! I never thought you could make a "green" website! I know for a fact not many people know about this website though, so we should try to tell our friends and family about it so we can save some energy. This might sound cheesy but I so think they should make a greenspace and greenbook instead of myspace and face book because those two websites are used a lot these days. So somebody should talk to (Tom) about that. Maybe they can go to the extreme of making the whole internet like this or maybe even a whole computer! Some smart guy will probably do that soon. But from now on I'm use earthle.
ReplyDeleteI believe this is a great new and innovative idea. I would have never have thought to just change the background color of a website in order to save energy. Is it possible to put in as a toolbar like google? If it isn't I probably won't use it much because the toolbar is very convenient and that is where I type in all my searches. I guess that is the problem with people today though is that they just do what is convenient, not what has the least consequences. Well, anyways, I promise that I'll at least try to remember when I actually plan on going to the Google website that I'll go to earthle.com instead.
ReplyDeleteWow, I didnt hear about Earthle until like the 2nd day of school. I knew it was a search engine but I didnt know it was an ecofriendly search engine. If everyone started using Earthle instead of google I bet that would make a huge difference. I never knew that changing background colors on websites save energy. I guess you learn something new everyday. Im going to save Earthle as a favorite and advise other students and friends to use Earthle as well.
ReplyDelete-Sierra-
I have never heard of earthle until just a few weeks ago. I had no clue making a background black instead of white could make such a huge difference. I think earthle is a fantastic idea. Saving energy is very important to me. And the way it sounds is if everyone used earthle instead of google or other websites we could all help the enviorment without doing much at all. And we could save alot of money! The only thing I'm a little skeptical about is whether the results will be as reliable as google or not. Google in my opinion has the most plentiful and accurate results. If earthle had those same results I do not see why people would not want to switch to it. This could be a great impact in newer technology as well. I am definately going to start using earthle.com for all my needs. And I will promote it to others as well.
ReplyDelete~Courtney