Little Things Make A Big Difference

Energy Speedometer

Energy Usage Blocks

Available Energy

It's the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.
John Wooden 
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/little_things.html#1C4VrzlV7Mq7XAOP.99 


I attend a church in Carmichael called Self Realization Fellowship. For me it is a social and spiritual network that has made a rather isolated life in Sacramento, wonderful. I don't go as often as I would like, but that is because of choices I make about time and money. 

I do participate in the Social Committee, which is about cooking and making sure the members of the church enjoy the pot lucks we have occasionally, and I assist with putting out juice after services once a month. And I contribute when we need something artistic done. In this case, it was not a big fancy something but some charts that help explain why we need to watch our energy usage so carefully.  

Churches get hit with a rather unfair and huge penalty when they go over a certain minimum with energy. It is aligned with peak usage rates for businesses.  With us the magic number is 21 kilo watts. If we go over that mark once the penalty is somewhere around $2000 for the year. Now for most churches, which are mostly non-profit, this is a big deal. So two members of our church have been working to bring the numbers down and to figure out a way to keep us below 21 kW. With summer coming we need to talk to the general membership about why the A/C will not be going full blast in every room and what is controlling it. So my simple diagrams and charts will help do that.

I did these in Adobe Illustrator. The Speedometer  will be mounted on foam core and will have a movable arrow to illustrate the increases in energy usage. The blue chart with the red at the top will be mounted on a magnetic white board, and we will use the smaller blocks to show why we can't have all the rooms running A/C at the same time - they won't all fit. The one I chose is our Base usage block which will sit at the bottom of the Blue Chart to indicate where we start. 

Little things can make a big difference.