Gamers waste $1 billion of energy? Probably not

On Wednesday, NRDC released a study claiming that video game consoles are wasting $1 billion per year. There's a lot of interesting research in the study, including the differences in power consumption between different games and how the PS3 is incredibly inefficient as a Blu-ray player compared to standalone models.

The headline-grabbing "$1 billion wasted" claim, however, seems hyped in our opinion. Digging into the report, we found that the one of the assumptions used in deriving this figure is that 50% of gamers leave their consoles on all the time--24 hours a day, 365 days a year. That seemed unbelievable, so we dug a little deeper to see how the NRDC came up with this number. Here's what we found:

While we are unaware of any user data revealing the percentage of users who turn off their consoles after use, we have found anecdotally that many users leave their consoles on all the time. Some turn off their televisions at the end of a session [...], while others keep their consoles on in order not to lose progress in a game.

I certainly used to leave my NES on to save my progress on Bubble Bobble, but with modern game consoles, saving is much easier, and I don't know anyone that leaves their console on to save their progress anymore. The study addresses the assumption again later on:

The lack of concrete information on usage cycles for video game consoles, and particularly consoles that can also function as DVD players, led us to develop usage scenarios in which 50 percent of users turn off their consoles when they are done playing a game or watching a movie, and 50 percent of users leave the device on continuously. Since we know the power use of the consoles by mode, we are able to estimate the annual energy use and operational costs to consumers for each of the major consoles on the market today.

In other words, the 50% claim is a guess, and we're betting it's far from the truth. Confusingly, NRDC points to more concrete usage data later in the study.

Using the best and most current usage cycle information available, the Nielsen Group found that, on average, users who account for close to 75 percent of all playing time have their consoles on for an average of 5 hours and 45 minutes per day.

But instead of using that data, which intuitively seems more accurate to us, the NRDC decides to stick with the idea that many gamers are leaving their consoles on all the time.

Nielsen's statistics can be difficult to interpret because the time in Active mode reflects an average across only the days when the console was turned on, rather than a true daily average reflecting use across the entire time metered. It is likely, however, that many heavy users often have the console on every day. For all of these reasons, we built upon the information available and the following assumptions to complete the energy analysis.

It's probably fair to assume that some gamers do actually leave their consoles on all the time (especially PS3 users taking advantage of Folding@home), but we can't help but feel that the 50% assumption was selected to create the headline-grabbing $1 billion figure. Assuming at the average console is on about 6 hours a day is probably closer to the truth, particularly since we do know people that leave their console on while multitasking (switching to watch a football game, surfing their laptop, etc.)

It's worth noting that CNET uses assumptions to calculate costs in our Juice Box scores in our TV reviews and the TV Power Consumption Guide. We assume that the average household TV is left on for 8 hours a day, based on research by Nielsen.

What do you think? Do you leave your console on all the time, sucking up energy and draining your bank account? Or is the NRDC completely off base with its assumption about gaming habits?

[mrcavity]

Does that account for electric heat savings in winter?

[stigmattaman]

Would be interesting to know how much juice these things take when off but plugged in.

[pillowsrsoft]

i highly doubt it, whenever im not using my ps3 i turn it off and unplug it, im sure most at least leave it off

Do you know how much heat a PS3 puts off when on? After watching one movie my room is 5 degrees warmer. I highly doubt many people keep there console on for much longer then they have to otherwise their room would turn into a sauna.

[celticbrewer]

Far far less heat than my DVR, TV, or PC that's for sure! In fact, I'd say that my PS3 runs pretty cool. You must be in a very small room as I've never noticed any difference in ambient temperature and my room is fairly small with low ceilings.

As for the article- I always turn off my consoles when I'm done with them. And I surely don't use them every day- I do have other interests, afterall.

[Ryan_R]

I can't believe they used the word "wasting" :)

I don't suppose gaming PCs use a lot more - since there is more chance that they are left on for longer periods of time, but I never leave mine on 24/7 (too noisy and lights the room up)

[slacker15]

What about treadmills? Healthy runners waste $1 bn a year running to nowhere!

[jcnieves]

The room gets warmer with my Xbox 360 for sure, but I think a PC generates more heat, but both are noisy, starting with the fans and it's hard to sleep with that, in my case when I leave the xbox on to download a game I can barely sleep.

[Rik56]

Here we go again, somebody has nothing to do, and thinks that we will all follow his assumtions blindly into oblivion. I think there are greater energy wasters out there that waste far more energy than game consoles and pc's. The sad thing about this article will be that several "green" advocates will use it to our (pc and console gamers's) detriment.