Weekly Rant

I've ranted about the utilization of wind energy on campus, but now it's time for a new topic: laundry. When the typical college student talks about laundry, it's more of a question of how to do laundry, or why all their socks turned out pink. This laundry talk will be more focused on the price of laundry.

The cost of a washer machine for a typical load of clothes is $1.50. The entire price must be paid in quarters which spells inconvenience. In small dorms such as Wicomico, only 3 washers and 3 dryers are used. The washers are energy efficient Speed Queens (or at least that is what the labels say). A quick google search gave me results on the energy usage of different energy star rated washing machines. After inspecting the energy factor and using an equation they used to find the energy factor, I've deduced that a washer machine uses 515 kWh of energy per year (accuracy depending on their numbers).

Now lets hype some information I spat out in my last rant. College Park average wind speed is about 8 mph. Looking at the yearly kWh graph we come to find that the windspire wind turbine that costs about $4000 dollars would suffice to support one laundry machine. An average student probably does his laundry about 6 times per semester. Assuming there are only 60 students in the dorm, $540 dollars are spent on laundry per semester; $360 dollars are spent every year (not included summer or winter) on laundry per machine. If the power source was distributed (assuming the machines could be modified to run off of direct current, or that the direct current is rectified to alternating current)to run off power provided by a rooftop wind turbine, then in 12 years the electricity savings would pay for themselves. If the university would be so kind as to front the $12,000 for free laundry, I would very much appreciate it. (Dryers would be nice as well.)