Saving electricity

It appears that load-shedding has now become our daily companion. From cities to rural areas, there is hardly any area that is not affected by hours-long power outages. According to experts, this worsening situation has been created by an ongoing energy crisis and it is not going to improve soon. In a recent press briefing, state minister for power, energy and mineral resources said there is no hope of improvement in the ongoing load-shedding situation before November. In this situation, we, ourselves, should take an array of austerity measures so that electricity is not wasted and everyone is benefited from it.

To save electricity, the government has already taken various initiatives. But most of them are not being followed properly. There should be a body to oversee whether the measures are executed in public offices or not. Apart from them, common people should also come forward to resolve this problem. In daily life we should be careful about using household appliances like fan, lamp, television, refrigerator, washing machine, etc. It should be checked and rechecked to see whether the appliances are not left running unnecessarily. We can avoid using washing machines until the situation improves. The use of electric heaters, irons, rice cookers, and microwave ovens should be reduced as much as possible. The educational institutions that are often indifferent about wastage of electricity should be monitored and fined. Keeping lights and fans on unnecessarily should be considered an offence.

Decorative lighting arranged at various places should be curbed. Using energy saving bulbs helps save up to 75 per cent electricity. They last six times longer than the normal bulbs. So try to use energy saving bulbs at home and at other places. If the power connection is faulty, the power wastage can be high. So the connection should be checked regularly.

It should be remembered that it is not possible for the government alone to resolve the current problem of load-shedding. So if we can prevent the wastage of electricity individually and institutionally, we can make the country free from load-shedding one day.

Dewan Rahman,

Student of Public Administration,

University of Chittagong, Chattogram,

arahmandewan19@gmail.com