If you’re looking to pay your yearly energy bill for charging your iPhone 5, we’ve got good news. You should be able to find enough change in your couch cushions to cover it.
Energy efficiency company Opower today released a study calculating the annual energy cost for charging the iPhone 5 at just $0.41. While any user’s actual cost would vary based on use and electricity rates in their areas, Opower’s estimate assumes a full charge once per day at a U.S. average of 11.8 cents per kWh.
While an solitary iPhone 5 uses a smidgen of energy, the popularity of Apple’s devices in total can put a heavy draw on the most robust power grid.
“Even if we consider just the 170 million iPhone 5’s that are projected to be sold globally in the next year, their aggregate electricity requirements are nothing to sneeze at. The collective annual electricity consumption of the iPhone 5’s sold within 12 months will be equivalent to the annual electricity usage of 54,000 US households (roughly equivalent to the size of Cedar Rapids – the second largest city in Iowa). That’s just for one smartphone model over one year.”
The study does note that smartphones use significantly less energy than other entertainment devices. The continuing shift from traditional entertainment sources to smartphones and similar devices could result in an overall reduction in energy consumption.
Consumer electronics now represent approximately 13% of U.S. household energy use. The growth is being fueled by a huge increase in the types and numbers of devices being used in homes, ranging from smartphones and tablets, to televisions, to gaming systems and computers.
