I find this quite surprising. When I’m working from home during the winter, I’m heating a lot of the house that would normally be unheated.
I would have assumed that bringing multiple people together into a single heated space would have been more energy efficient
This is based in the US. I imagine a lot of that also comes from air con, very long commutes and other wasted office energy use.
From the article > The main causes of remote workers’ reduced emissions were less office energy use, as well as fewer emissions from a daily commute.
Again - I’m really surprised that net energy use is less for distributed workers (setting aside commmute energy use).
I believe, distributed power is cheaper. Smaller transformers, less drain on the power grid, etc. etc. In other words, I think it’s less efficient, especially in the summer when body heat becomes a negative rather than a positive factor.
And offices aren’t often great at adjusting thermostats when people are out of the office. So that larger space is often being heated/cooled 24/7
Yes, of course. But I’m calling out the one factor that they specifically talk about
What’s more efficient? Heating a small home that id well insulated and geared towards economical energy use or heating massive empty spaces of a practically non-insulated office building with massive heaters while at the same times the homes are being heated? (Albeit to a lower temperature)
