It’s that time of year again. Time to “fall back” by resetting our clocks back one hour to mark this year’s conclusion of Daylight Saving Time.
For 20 years, that’s what we - and our technology - have done with our clocks on the first Sunday in April and the last Sunday in October. But no longer. When few people were paying attention, Congress lengthened daylight saving time by four weeks in the name of energy efficiency.
The Energy Policy Act of 2005 changed the time change dates for Daylight Saving Time in the U.S. Beginning this year, DST begins on the second Sunday in March and ends the first Sunday in November. The change is supposed to save us untold barrels of oil by extending daylight hours.
But as you’ve probably read or experienced, the change hasn’t been without some glitches. Unless altered by one method or another, many systems such as Palm devices remain programmed to read the calendar and end daylight saving time on its old date in October, not its new one in November. The digital clock in Dawn’s car, for example, automatically reset the time back one hour last week. As IBM noted on its Web site: “Any time-sensitive functions could be impacted by this change… It is important for users to assess their environments and develop appropriate plans for applying the necessary changes.” Some of our systems still require patches.
So this Saturday night before you go to bed, remember to set your clocks back one hour. Happily, you’ll be gaining an hour of blissful sleep. And you can pat yourselves on the back in the knowledge that you may have helped reduce energy consumption… by an estimated 0.2%.
One final note: It’s a good time to change the batteries in your smoke detectors. Doing so twice a year will assure they continue to do their job.