The €19 power strip that cut our lab's bill in half
Switchable sockets are unglamorous. In a room full of always-on equipment, they are the cheapest fix available.
3 September 2026 · 4 min read
Half is a big claim, and it comes with an obvious caveat: our test room was unusually bad to begin with. Everything stayed on, all the time, because nobody had a reason to switch it off.
Grouping equipment by when it is actually used, then putting each group behind a switch, removed the decision entirely. One flick at the end of the day.
What it does not fix
Anything that needs to stay powered — network hardware, anything with a scheduled update, a fridge — should not go behind the switch. The saving comes from the equipment that genuinely idles.
Daan Hofman
Technology reporter
Daan writes about gadgets, energy use and the quiet ways devices cost you money.
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