minarchist wrote on Oct 8
th, 2018 at 2:26pm:
Sir Spot of Borg wrote on Oct 8
th, 2018 at 5:15am:
Now my light is gone in the morning. Stupid daylight savings. Theres no justification for it in this era.
Spot
With solar becoming more commonplace, it makes more sense now to implement or continue with Daylight Savings. By shifting the day forward by an hour, you're shifting the network load demand to be in parallel with the level of solar insolation received during the day. For example, if the time sunrise occurs is shifted from approx. 4.30 AM to 5.30 AM, it falls in line more with the time people wake up and create demand on the grid. Likewise, shifting sunset from approx 7.30 PM to 8.30 PM falls more in line with the time people switch off air conditioners and other appliances as they prepare to get ready for bed.
Even if this wasn't a factor, there are other economic benefits, such as a reduction in crime rates and an increase in spending in shops and restaurants. I've never bought the "well I wake up when the sun goes up" argument that farmers often push as a justification for not having Daylight Savings - if your work routine is not governed by what time it is it shouldn't be an issue. Nor should the argument "we've had x referendums on the issue and the majority voted no" be a justification, particularly if the referendums were held more than 10 years ago.
Ultimately, the issue would be best resolved if Daylight Savings was governed by the Federal Government and not individual states - either every state has it or no states have it at all to at least maintain unity between time zones.
I would go for walks during the winter. The sun starting to come up around 5am. It probably comes up around 4:30am now. The longest days, the sun starts to come up around 4am. "Sun starts to come up" meaning that the first daylight hours are upon us.
But that is not really the issue for me. I work in a restaurant. We have noted that the summer work hours get put back an hour to compensate for the sunsets going from near 6pm to 7pm. That means that our restaurant orders come in an hour later. With peak demand, we have to keep more staff back an hour to make sure that the late shift do not get burdened too much with clean up near closing. How it works is that we have to have staff on hand to deal with the 4 to 5pm orders. But there is not a great deal of work to do at the time. From 6 to 7pm, our orders are increased considerably, with peak period not ending until 8 to 9pm -- depending if there is an event on television that night.
Imagine running a restaurant business that gets most of their customers at night. You have to adjust according to the seasons. But with daylight savings, you not only have to deal with shifting sunsets, but the fact is that customers will come in an average of another hour later. And though we get the "it's too hot to cook dinner" customers coming in, the reality is that we have to be burdened with exacerbated peak demand of customers, rather than having to deal with the same amount of customers over another hour of opening hours.
And apart from that, Queensland is too hot and/or humid to have daylight savings. Imagine trying to get your children to bed at 8pm with the sun still out. Or the 2pm sun on the skins of children riding their bikes home from school at the 3pm time on the clock.
I can't see how farmers would be affected by daylight savings, either. Instead of getting up at 4am, they get up at 5am. Instead of finishing the day at 7pm, they finish at 8pm. Or however it is that farmers work.
As for power usage from solar panels, the load of electricity usage is not going to be impacted by moving the clocks forward. You are likely to use power to cook your meals when the sun goes down. I would likely use my air conditioner an hour before I usually would with daylight savings. Then I would switch off at dusk. Meaning, I would still use more electricity during the day -- not the I use the A/C power very often.