How the Xbox’s default “instant on” feature could harm the environment

NRDC: Default Series S/X option responsible for 3 million tons of CO2 by 2025.

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[nivedita]

To put that 78 kWH into perspective, the average US household consumes a little over 10 MWH per year.

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=97&t=3

 

[nivedita]

What in the world is the device doing with all that power?

To put this in perspective, my entire 2015 MacBook Pro uses around 12-13W while I'm using it do to light workloads. That means the screen is on and it's actually computing stuff with some regularity.

So what are these XBoxes doing, other than the occasional software update?

This is a good question. I tried rooting around for some consumption figures when in S3 suspend-to-RAM, and came across this:
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Pow ... _295260754

This indicates that even a 2013-era dual-socket Xeon server used less power in S3 than this Xbox. You'd think instant-on should be similar to suspend-to-RAM, but 10-13W feels more like the system is actually fully running, just the CPU/GPU are down-clocked.

 

[nivedita]

To put that 78 kWH into perspective, the average US household consumes a little over 10 MWH per year.

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=97&t=3

To put that 10MWH inperspective, except for a few countries in Europe the average EU household consumes around 4MWH per year.
https://www.odyssee-mure.eu/publication ... lling.html

It’s kind of hard to compare on just gross numbers. Nowhere in the U.S. is as poor as Romania or Poland, for instance. Climate makes a huge difference (Californians aren’t particularly low energy users in other ways, but the climate requires relatively little heating/cooling compared to many others). Also depends on whether electric is used for heating (as opposed to natgas or fuel oil).

Even rich people in Britain only use 4-5 MW a year.

Britain's climate is largely much milder compared to large portions of the US. Your houses are probably much smaller as well (on average). We have large portions of our population living in areas where AC/Heating is actually a requirement not to die.

In the long run, it's a lifestyle choice to live like that. There's no particular reason why it would be impossible for Americans to live in reasonably-sized homes in temperate climates, rather than McMansions in deserts and snowfields.

 

[nivedita]

In the long run, it's a lifestyle choice to live like that. There's no particular reason why it would be impossible for Americans to live in reasonably-sized homes in temperate climates, rather than McMansions in deserts and snowfields.

yes, there's no reason why people shouldn't go to live where the government tells them and take whatever job they're given. there's a name for that system

What does the government have to do with anything? I'm making the point that it _is_ a choice, I'm not saying the government should force you to make a different one.

 

[nivedita]

In the long run, it's a lifestyle choice to live like that. There's no particular reason why it would be impossible for Americans to live in reasonably-sized homes in temperate climates, rather than McMansions in deserts and snowfields.

yes, there's no reason why people shouldn't go to live where the government tells them and take whatever job they're given. there's a name for that system

What does the government have to do with anything? I'm making the point that it _is_ a choice, I'm not saying the government should force you to make a different one.

ok fine then. but there's a reason why people live where they do. i'd surmise that you live on a different continent

And you'd be wrong.