Once again, Daylight Savings Time is upon us, and this year it's arrived earlier than ever. Undoubtedly, you'll hear someone mention the supposed energy savings due to the earlier switch-over, but I'll counter that with an item from The Chimp Refuge's closet of past goodies: Don't Bank on This Savings.
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I don't understand what you're complaining about. In your old column you say: "during the extension period,...we would ... reduce our annual energy use..."
I obviously left a few words out where you say that the reduction is minimal, but, so what - there is a savings. So, what's the downside?
Are you implying that the total amount of energy expended by everyone having to go around and reset all their clocks causes them to be more hungry, eat more food, require more food production which requires more fertilizer, which requires more petroleum to make the fertilizer?
No. I'm implying that calling the DST shift a method to reduce energy usage is akin to ordering a pitcher of light beer with your double stuffed-crust pizza and calling it a method to reduce your weight.
I suspect the driver behind DST is commerce. By making people do everything an hour early for the darker half of the year, there will be more daylight in the evening for people to do what? Go out, drive the car, and spend money. After dinner, people don't want to go out into the night, when it's dark, but they'll go out in the evening, when there's still light.
Ben Franklin proposed the idea as a joke. Most people didn't get it, and some people took advantage of the stupidity of the masses, which in this country, about anything scientific, is woefully stupid.
I personally don't observe Daylight Saving Time. Instead I switch from Pacific Standard Time to Mountain Standard Time and I do everything an hour early. So far I've fooled everybody.