WASHINGTON, April 6 (Reuters) - A House committee voted on Wednesday to expand U.S. daylight-saving time by two months to help reduce energy consumption, but rejected a plan to shave total U.S. oil demand by 1 million barrels a day.
Both proposals were offered as amendments to be tacked on to a broad energy bill that was debated by the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
The panel agreed in a voice vote to move the start of daylight-saving time in the United States -- which occurs when clocks are turned forward by one hour -- one month earlier to the first Sunday in March. The end of daylight time would be moved back one month to the last Sunday in November.
Supporters of the amendment, sponsored by Michigan Republican Fred Upton, said it would save about 10,000 barrels of oil a day because offices and stores would be open while it was still light outside and therefore use less energy.
Now I have to ask all of you how many times have you been in a store or office during the day and they had the lights off?
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Katherine
Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 | 06:12 PM
I saw that, too...it kind of weirded me out. And you're right about the businesses leaving lights on. In my experience, city people have a tendency to keep the lights blazing at all hours of the day (and night!), while people way out in the country are far more likely to use natural sunlight during the day, and only turn on the lights near sunset. So maybe they'd save energy among random Iowans or something, but ehhhhh.
You should ask them that question.