Andrew Rosenthal, 15 April 2021, "Have you ever turned off your heating or air conditioning in order to save money on utility bills? (Q.33 Wi2020)", contributed by Andrew Rosenthal and Alison Kenner, The Energy Rights Project, Platform for Experimental Collaborative Ethnography, last modified 30 June 2021, accessed 24 April 2024. https://energyrights.info/content/have-you-ever-turned-your-heating-or-air-conditioning-order-save-money-utility-bills-q33-0
Critical Commentary
This chart reflects responses to Question #33 from the Winter 2020 survey, “Have you ever turned off your heating or air conditioning in order to save money on utility bills?” The options available were,
Yes, in the past;
Yes, due to COVID-19;
No;
No, but this is something I am considering because of COVID-19;
I do not control the temperature in my house.
All eighty-three respondents answered this question. Respondents could choose multiple answers, so many indicated they had turned off their heating and cooling both in the past and during COVID-19.
Fifty-four respondents (65.1%) said they had turned off their heating or cooling in order to save money on their bills in the past.
Thirty respondents (36.1%) said yes because of COVID-19. (Twenty responded that they turned off their heating and cooling to save money on COVID-19 both before COVID-19 and during.)
Twenty-one (25.3%) respondents said no.
Two respondents (2.4%) answered “other”, saying they turned down their heating and cooling but never turned off.
The data was produced by the Shifting Energy Demands in COVID-19 Survey - Overview, which was administered to 83 people over a fourteen week period between December 2020 and March 2021. Visit the Winter 2020 Shifting Energy Demands in COVID-19 - Survey Results page to view more data from our survey. The project is approved by Drexel’s IRB.