Electricity consumers can now see where their energy comes from and the emissions intensity of their appliances
A mobile and web app has been developed for US consumers and businesses eager to reduce their carbon footprint from electricity use.
Built by Boston-based Emission Information, the app tells users whether their electricity is being produced by solar, nuclear or coal power.
A spokesman told RTCC they hope the device will help increase public awareness of the types of energy used to create electricity.
“We believe that making carbon emissions from electricity use available to consumers and businesses on a real-time basis is a paradigm shift in thinking which can modify behaviour and dramatically increase awareness of how individual behaviour impacts our environment,” they said.
It will allow households to increase their energy use when the cleanest forms of electricity generation are online, buy, for example, setting washing machines to start their cycle at a particular time.
EI claims its localised, hourly greenhouse gas emission information apps are more precise than the existing methods of estimating carbon footprint from electricity use.
Its predictions are based on the types of electricity generation scheduled for distribution in a certain geography, at a certain time.
The app will be available to consumers in November 2013.