Wait a couple weeks

When I saw someone wearing a black dress who I know favors daylight-saving time yesterday, I mentioned they were wearing an appropriately colored dress on this "Black Sunday." I call the day we are coerced to change our clocks "Black Sunday."

When I told her I will miss the beautiful luminous mornings, she curtly said, "Wait a couple of weeks." I looked it up. On Saturday, March 8th, the sun rose at 6:50 am on standard time. I told her we wouldn't have a 6 am sunrise until May. In two weeks, on March 23rd, the sun will be up at 7:25 am, thirty-five minutes behind the standard time sunrise prior to the switch.

It won't be until April 13th when the sun will rise at 6:51 am on daylight-saving time. This DST proponent should wait a couple weeks on standard time when the sun will set at 6:43 pm on March 23rd as opposed to 6:27 pm on March 8th.

If Utah abandons DST, the sun will still set two minutes later on standard time on June 21st than it would in San Diego on DST. On that day the sun sets in San Diego at 8:00 pm Pacific Daylight Time; it would set in Salt Lake City at 8:02 pm Mountain Standard Time. That puts some things in perspective.

Daylight-saving gas price increase

Higher gas prices usually accompany the change to daylight-saving time. Now we get the increases four weeks earlier than usual this year. If we were still doing it the pre-2007 way, we wouldn't be changing the time for another four weeks.

It makes sense that people will be driving more in the evening daylight. The increased demand will cause a price hike. If we stayed on standard time, I'm sure the price increases would occur even later in the spring.

DST wastes energy by higher A/C use

A 27 February 2008 Wall Street Journal article cites a study comparing Indiana's energy consumption off and on daylight saving time. The study concludes that increased evening air conditioning use more than offset the reduced cost of lighting. Here's the link to the article:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120406767043794825-UOLcfJA8x9Gw9ozbCz77MiLmtaE_20080327.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top

daylight saving time wastes energy

It is so ironic that Congress extended daylight saving time to save energy. My first thought was "How do you save energy when you'll have to burn the lights in the morning instead of in the evening?"

Well, we now have some evidence to substantiate that this idiotic practice actually causes the consumption of more energy. In an April 5, 2007 article in USA Today, it says the nation used 3% more gasoline than the previous two years during the same three-week period in March when we used to observe the superior standard time. The figures were obtained from the Energy Department. So much for saving energy.

It makes sense because if it's light another hour in the evening, more people will be out driving their cars. This is a great cause for concern because gasoline for our cars is a non-renewable resource. I also read reports that power companies said there was no change in electricity consumption.

My question is this: If daylight saving time causes higher energy consumption in March, does it also cause us to use more energy other months of the year? If this is the case, shouldn't we abandon daylight-saving time altogether? That would make sense if the objective is "saving energy."