This just in: Pushing daylight savings time up a few weeks might have not only not saved us any energy, we might have actually used more.
According to a study released this week by a Canadian energy analyst, while overall energy use saw little change, gasoline consumption rose, perhaps as folks took advantage of evening sunlight for leisurely drives. Or some other plausible cause. Gasoline use was increasing at a rate of 1.9 per cent prior to the early introduction of daylight saving time, but jumped to 2.9 per cent during those first three weeks, the report found.
“The major assumption was that the hour [of daylight] that you take away in the morning, people were sleeping,” Canadian economist Peter Tertzakian told the Globe and Mail. “But that’s not necessarily true — they get up and have to turn the lights on to make breakfast; you haven’t gained anything.”
