【TED】能帮你节省生活成本的“怪癖行为”

Now, how about your household energy use? Anybody check that today? This week? Last week? A few energy geeks spread out across the room. It's good to see you guys. But the rest of us -- this is a room filled with people who are passionate about the future of this planet, and even we aren't paying attention to the energy use that's driving climate change.

那么家庭能源使用情况呢？有人今天查看那个了吗？这个礼拜？上个礼拜呢？这个房间中有一些能源极客。很高兴见到你们。但是剩下的我们，这是一个全是人的房间，这些人对这个星球的未来充满热情，但是我们都不关心导致气候变暖的能源消耗。

The woman in the photo with me is Harriet. We met her on our first family vacation. Harriet's paying attention to her energy use, and she is decidedly not an energy geek. This is the story of how Harriet came to pay attention.

这张照片中和我在一起的女性是Harriet。在我们第一次家庭度假的时候，我们见到了她。Harriet正在关注她的能源使用情况，毫无疑问，她并不是能源极客。这是Harriet为什么会关注能源的故事。

This is coal, the most common source of electricity on the planet, and there's enough energy in this coal to light this bulb for more than a year. But unfortunately, between here and here, most of that energy is lost to things like transmission leakage and heat. In fact, only 10 percent ends up as light. So this coal will last a little bit more than a month. If you wanted to light this bulb for a year, you'd need this much coal.

这是煤炭，这个星球上最常见的电力能源，这些煤炭中有足够多的能量，可以让这个灯泡亮了一年还多。不幸的是，在从这里到这里过程中，这种能量大部分都因为，传导流失和放热而丢失了。事实上，只有10%的能量最后以光能的形式释放。所以这块煤炭最多只能够维持一个月多一点。如果你想要让这个灯泡照明一年，你需要这么多煤炭。

The bad news here is that, for every unit of energy we use, we waste nine. That means there's good news, because for every unit of energy we save, we save the other nine. So the question is, how can we get the people in this room and across the globe to start paying attention to the energy we're using, and start wasting less of it?

坏消息是，我们每用一成的能量，我们就会浪费九成。这也意味着有好消息，就是我们每节约一成的能量，我们就节约了剩下的九成。问题是，我们如何让在这个房间里的人们以及全世界的人们开始关注我们所使用的能量，并且开始减少浪费？

The answer comes from a behavioral science experiment that was run one hot summer, 10 years ago, and only 90 miles from here, in San Marcos, California. Graduate students put signs on every door in a neighborhood, asking people to turn off their air conditioning and turn on their fans. One quarter of the homes received a message that said, did you know you could save 54 dollars a month this summer?

答案来自于一个行为科学实验，是十年前一个炎热的夏天进行的，离这儿只有90英里地方，在California的San Marcos。研究生们在某个街区的每一扇门上做了留言条，告诉人们关掉空调打开电扇。四分之一的家庭收到了一条留言说，你知道吗？这个夏天你可以每月节约54美元？

Turn off your air conditioning, turn on your fans. Another group got an environmental message. And still a third group got a message about being good citizens, preventing blackouts. Most people guessed that money-saving message would work best of all. In fact, none of these messages worked. They had zero impact on energy consumption. It was as if the grad students hadn't shown up at all.

只要关掉空调，使用电扇。另一组收到的是环境方面的留言。第三组得到的留言是做一个文明公民，防止停电。大部分人认为节约开支的留言将会最有效应。事实上，没有一条留言起到作用。他们并不在意这些能源消耗问题。就好像研究生们并没有贴过这些留言条一样。

But there was a fourth message, and this message simply said, "When surveyed, 77 percent of your neighbors said that they turned off their air conditioning and turned on their fans. Please join them. Turn off your air conditioning and turn on your fans." And wouldn't you know it, they did. The people who received this message showed a marked decrease in energy consumption simply by being told what their neighbors were doing.

但是有第四条留言，这条留言简单地写着，“调查发现，你们77%的邻居们说他们关掉了空调，开始使用电扇。请加入他们。关掉空调，打开电扇。”你们信不信？他们做到了！收到这条留言的人们显著地减少了能源消耗。只是因为告知了他们，邻居在做什么。

So what does this tell us? Well, if something is inconvenient, even if we believe in it, moral suasion, financial incentives, don't do much to move us -- but social pressure, that's powerful stuff. And harnessed correctly, it can be a powerful force for good. In fact, it already is.

这告诉我们什么呢？好吧，如果某些事情有些不便，即使我们相信它，道德劝说，经济鼓励，并不会让我们行动起来，但是社会压力，是强悍的。正确地利用的话，它可以成为强大的正能量。事实上，它已经是了。

Inspired by this insight, my friend Dan Yates and I started a company called Opower. We built software and partnered with utility companies who wanted to help their customers save energy. We deliver personalized home energy reports that show people how their consumption compares to their neighbors in similar-sized homes.

受此启发，我和我的朋友Dan Yates开始筹划一个公司，叫”Opower“。我们开发软件并且与公共事业公司合作，这些公司也想要帮助他们的客户节约能源。我们发表个性化的家庭能源报导，向人们展示他们的消耗量与住房大小相似的邻居比较。

Just like those effective door hangers, we have people comparing themselves to their neighbors, and then we give everyone targeted recommendations to help them save. We started with paper, we moved to a mobile application, web, and now even a controllable thermostat, and for the last five years we've been running the largest behavioral science experiment in the world.

就像那些有效的挂在门上的留言条一样，我们让人们把他们自己与邻居相比，然后给出目标性的建议。帮助他们节约。我们从纸张开始，然后是手机应用，网络，现在甚至是可控恒温器，在过去的五年中，我们已经开始启动世界上最大的行为科学实验。

And it's working. Ordinary homeowners and renters have saved more than 250 million dollars on their energy bills, and we're just getting started. This year alone, in partnership with more than 80 utilities in six countries, we're going to generate another two terawatt hours of electricity savings.

它起效了。普通的房主和租房者已经在他们的能源账单上节约了超过250美金，那时我们才刚刚开始。就今年，与超过80个公共机构的合作，分布于六个国家，我们正在努力再省下两个太瓦小时(1亿度）的电量。

Now, the energy geeks in the room know two terawatt hours, but for the rest of us, two terawatt hours is more than enough energy to power every home in St. Louis and Salt Lake City combined for more than a year. Two terawatt hours, it's roughly half what the U.S. solar industry produced last year.

现在，屋子里的能源极客们知道两个太瓦小时，但是剩下的对于我们而言，两个太瓦小时可以足足让St. Louis和Salt Lake City中的每户人家用上一年还多。两个太瓦小时，大约是去年美国太阳能工厂年产量的一半。

And two terawatt hours? In terms of coal, we'd need to burn 34 of these wheelbarrows every minute around the clock every day for an entire year to get two terawatt hours of electricity. And we're not burning anything. We're just motivating people to pay attention and change their behavior.

只是两个太瓦小时？换成煤炭的话，我们需要每分钟燃烧34辆这种独轮手推车的煤炭，一整年每天24小时不停歇，才能得到两个太瓦小时的能量。然而我们并不燃烧任何东西，我们只是激发人们关注并且改变他们的行为。

But we're just one company, and this is just scratching the surface. Twenty percent of the electricity in homes is wasted, and when I say wasted, I don't mean that people have inefficient lightbulbs. They may. I mean we leave the lights on in empty rooms, and we leave the air conditioning on when nobody's home.

但我们只是一家公司，这些都还只是杯水车薪。一户人家中有20%的能量是被浪费掉的，当我说浪费的时候，我并不是指人们装了一些没用的灯泡。他们可以有。我是指我们让没人的屋子里亮着灯，我们仍然在家里没人的时候开着空调。

That's 40 billion dollars a year wasted on electricity that does not contribute to our well-being but does contribute to climate change. That's 40 billion -- with a B -- every year in the U.S. alone. That's half our coal usage right there.

那每年浪费的400亿美金并没有为全面建设小康社会作出贡献，但是会导致气候改变。那是400亿美金，单单在美国。我们一半的煤炭被用在那儿了。

Now thankfully, some of the world's best material scientists are looking to replace coal with sustainable resources like these, and this is both fantastic and essential. But the most overlooked resource to get us to a sustainable energy future, it isn't on this slide. It's in this room. It's you, and it's me. And we can harness this resource with no new material science simply by applying behavioral science. We can do it today, we know it works, and it will save us money right away.

现在，十分的庆幸，一些世界上最好的材料科学家们正在寻找代替煤炭的可持续能源。像这些，这是令人惊奇的也是必须的。但是大部分的被忽视的资源带领我们来到可持续能源的未来，能做到这点的人并不在这个银幕上。而是在这个房间里，是你们，也是我。不必使用最新的材料科学技术，我们也可以利用这种资源。我们今天就可以做到，我们知道这是可行的，而且它会马上帮我们省钱。

So what are we waiting for? Well, in most places, utility regulation hasn't changed much since Thomas Edison. Utilities are still rewarded when their customers waste energy. They ought to be rewarded for helping their customers save it.

那我们还在等什么？好吧，在大多数地方，调节利用能源自从爱迪生时代起就没有改变太多。公共事业机构一直因为客户浪费能源而受到奖励。可他们更应该因帮助客户们节约能源而被奖励的。

But this story is much more than about household energy use. Take a look at the Prius. It's efficient not only because Toyota invested in material science but because they invested in behavioral science. The dashboard that shows drivers how much energy they're saving in real time makes former speed demons drive more like cautious grandmothers.

但这个故事远不止是关于家庭的能源使用。看看这辆丰田普锐斯。它十分地高效，不单单是因为丰田投资了材料科学，而是因为他们投资了行为科学。仪表盘告诉驾驶员们他们实时节约了多少能量。使之前的速度魔鬼变得更像谨慎的祖母。

Which brings us back to Harriet. We met her on our first family vacation. She came over to meet my young daughter, and she was tickled to learn that my daughter's name is also Harriet. She asked me what I did for a living, and I told her, I work with utilities to help people save energy. It was then that her eyes lit up.

这把我们带回到Harriet的故事中。我们在第一次家庭度假的时候遇见了她。她走过来看看我的小女儿，她很高兴地了解到我女儿的名字也是Harriet。她问我是什么工作的，我告诉她，我与公共事业单位一起工作来帮助人们节约能源。就在那时她的眼睛发亮了。

She looked at me, and she said, "You're exactly the person I need to talk to. You see, two weeks ago, my husband and I got a letter in the mail from our utility. It told us we were using twice as much energy as our neighbors."

她看着我说，“你正是我想要与之交流的人，你看，两个礼拜前，我丈夫和我收到了一封信，从我们的公共事业机构那儿。告诉我们使用的能源是我们邻居的2倍多。”

"And for the last two weeks, all we can think about, talk about, and even argue about, is what we should be doing to save energy. We did everything that letter told us to do, and still I know there must be more. Now I'm here with a genuine expert. Tell me. What should I do to save energy?"

“在过去的两个礼拜中，所有我们思考的，讨论的，甚至争论的，都是我们应该做什么来节约能源。我们做了信件告诉我们的每一件事，我知道一定还有更多。现在我和一个真正的专家站在这儿。告诉我。我该做什么才能节约能源？”

There are many experts who can help answer Harriet's question. My goal is to make sure we are all asking it.

有很多专家可以回答Harriet的问题。我的目标是确保人人都会这么问。

Thank you.

谢谢。

来源：TED演讲

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