Dish Networks' ViP722: Leaving on a 60-watt bulb 24 hours a day uses just a tad more than the ludicrous power consumption of this set top box: 55W while active and 52W while in standby.

The average pay television subscriber is spending at least $4 a month in hidden electricity costs thanks to the small set top boxes found on top of many television sets across North America.  That’s more than you are paying to run a modern refrigerator.

That stunning revelation comes from a study by the Natural Resources Defense Council, financed by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Costs for residents in the northeastern United States, where electricity rates are often higher, can reach $10 per month for customers with a DVR in the living room and a traditional set top box in the bedroom.  That’s up to $120 a year in hidden charges.

The pay television industry, which has driven the set top box into millions of homes, has never paid much attention to energy consumption of their equipment, if only because they don’t pay the power bills of their customers.  The NRDC found that many boxes even attempt to fool consumers into believing they are running in a reduced-power mode, by programming them to slightly dim the front clock when the box’s “power button” is switched off.

In reality, most set top boxes use nearly as much power “shut off” as they use left on.

The cost of these little power demons to North America’s power grid exceeds 18 billion kilowatt hours. More than seven power plants could not sustain that level of power, even if running 24/7 every day of the year.  The combined electric use of Alberta and British Columbia in a year would still not match the power consumption of every set top box in North America.

These revelations have led the U.S. Department of Energy to lay the groundwork to regulate the power consumption of set top equipment.  Once again, the United States would be a follower.  Europe cracked down on excessive power consumption of electronic equipment years earlier.  In the United Kingdom, for example, satellite providers include a box that can achieve a standby status that only consumes a handful of watts.  The trade-off is that consumers have to wait up to 90 seconds for the box to re-boot every morning when the television is first switched on.  Consumers have the ability to choose different power states as a menu option on the devices.

Some cable operators program their DVR boxes to spin down internal hard drives overnight, assuming no recording is scheduled at those times.  But many of these initiatives were designed to spare the longevity of the hard drive, not reduce power consumption overall.

Popular Science dug through the data and uncovered the best reasonable options subscribers have for boxes that at least snort their way onto your monthly utility bill, as opposed to pigging out at the trough (your wallet):

If You Have Comcast

In terms of energy efficiency, Comcast comes out as the lesser of several evils, but not by much. Comcast’s most energy-efficient boxes tend to be slightly more efficient than their equivalents at Verizon, Time Warner, and the satellite companies, and they also offer more choices in terms of hardware. The NRDC’s data picks the Motorola DCH70 as the best standard-def box (sucking down 10W while active, and 10W while on standby), the Pace RNG110 as the best high-def box (13W active, 12W standby), and the Motorola DCX3400 as the best HD/DVR (29W active, 28W standby).

I spoke to a Comcast representative who told me that typically, the company installs whichever box they want, but that if you request a specific box that they have in stock, they’ll happily install that one for you. They won’t order you a box from elsewhere, and this kind of hardware rotates in and out of availability fairly quickly, but at least you might have the option to choose.

If You Have Verizon FiOS

Verizon’s most efficient boxes are just okay, while its least efficient are some of the worst of any surveyed. Even worse, Verizon gives the customer absolutely no option about which box they get–you can’t request a specific box at any point. That doesn’t matter too much for the non-DVR boxes, as the NRDC’s findings only turned up one standard-def and one high-def box, but there’s a big gap in efficiency between the company’s best and worst DVRs. The most efficient is Motorola’s QIP7216, at an unremarkably 29W active and 28W standby, but the older Motorola QIP6416 clocks in at a lousy 36W active and 35W standby.

If You Have Time Warner Cable

Time Warner has a smaller selection of set-top boxes than either Verizon or Comcast, with only one averagely (in)efficient DVR and one startlingly inefficient standard-def box. For a high-def, non-DVR box, the Cisco Explorer 4250HDC is the most efficient, at 19W active and 18W standby, but Time Warner told me that that’s an older box that might be tough to find. The Time Warner rep was (surprisingly, given the company’s lousy reputation here in New York) quite helpful, and offered to try to track down one of the 4250HDCs if that was what I wanted.

If You Have DirecTV

Here we get to the satellite folks. DirecTV’s offerings are only slightly less efficient than Comcast’s or Verizon’s, with the (currently only) standard-def box coming in at 12W active, 9W standby, the best HD box (the DirecTV H24) at 16W active, 15W standby, and the best HD/DVR (the DirecTV HR24) at 31W active, 31W standby. The DVR is pretty lousy, efficiency-wise, but that’s nothing compared to the Dish Network’s craziness.

If You Have Dish Network

I don’t know what is happening inside the Dish Network’s DVRs. Given the energy usage, they might well be powering nuclear reactors. The “best” DVR Dish offers, the ViP922, uses 43W while active, and 40W while in standby–but the worst one, the ViP722, uses a ridiculous 55W while active and 52W while in standby.

If You Use Internet Video Streaming

Many are ditching traditional cable services for online services like Netflix and Hulu, and luckily, there are a whole bunch of gadgets that can play that content (and more) on a TV. They are also invariably more efficient than a cable box, to a startling degree. The Apple TV (reviewed here), which streams Netflix and plays music, movies, and TV from Apple’s iTunes store, uses a mere 3W while active and 0.5W while in standby. Roku‘s XR-HD, which streams Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Instant Video, and a whole bunch more, uses only 7W while active and another 7W while in standby. The Boxee Box, a curiously shaped media streamer that uses the open-source, ultra-powerful Boxee software, can play Netflix, stream video from other computers on its network, play media from a hard drive or thumb drive plugged into one of its USB ports, and stream from lots of apps (with Hulu hopefully to come soon). It was tested by an Ars Technica commenter whose measurements probably differ from the NRDC’s, but roughly estimates that it uses 13W while active and 13W while in standby.

[flv width=”640″ height=”388″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CBC TV boxes guzzle power 6-27-11.flv[/flv]

CBC TV took a closer look at the pay television set top box: a real power guzzler.  (2 minutes)

Stop the Cap! reader Danielle spent last Monday night screaming at Comcast when she discovered the vast majority of cable channels she was paying for disappeared off the Dale City, Va. cable system after what she says was “no warning.”

“All I wanted to do was sit down and watch some television, and almost all of my channels were gone, replaced either with snowy nothing or a message telling me I had to upgrade to a set top box to receive the channel,” she writes.  “It was like Comcast conquered the world and took over almost every station.”

Danielle was left with just over a dozen channels, mostly local stations and channels dedicated to public access and her local government.

“Nobody told me they were doing this,” Danielle claims.  “The Comcast lady kept telling me it was on my bill but I don’t get a bill from them in the mail, so how should I know?”

The Comcast system in question, along with many others, has begun the progression to digital to conserve channel space, offer more services and networks, and increase broadband speed for customers.  But when Comcast converted so many channels to a digital platform all at once, it created the potential for chaos and confusion among subscribers.

The News & Messenger newspaper heard from their readers last Monday, and quickly noticed the dramatic change in Comcast’s lineup themselves in the newspaper break room.  Just 17 channels remained untouched after the digital conversion, but Comcast spokeswoman Alisha Martin made it clear customers shouldn’t get too comfortable watching them either.  Those 17 channels are scheduled to be switched to digital as well at a future undetermined date.

News & Messenger reader Stephanie Crenshaw, also in Dale City, was shocked to find her favorite stations gone, and she is an example of a subscriber that may be left in limbo by Comcast’s digital upgrade program.

Dale City, Va.

Comcast is offering impacted subscribers in Prince William, Manassas and Manassas Park digital converters and set top boxes at no additional charge, at least for now, to help customers adjust to the changes.

But Crenshaw isn’t a Comcast subscriber — her homeowner’s association is, providing Comcast Cable to every home in the development, included in the homeowner association fee.  So far, Crenshaw cannot obtain the free equipment because she technically isn’t a recognized customer, and the homeowner’s association has yet to provide access either.

Our reader Danielle was in better shape after Comcast calmed her down.  Her level of service allowed her to get one digital set-top box and two digital adapters for free.  She now uses the set top box in her living room and the two digital-to-analog adapters on her televisions in the bedroom and kitchen.  But she wonders how long “free” will remain “free.”

“There is no guarantee I can find that says they cannot turn around and charge us for these later on,” Danielle complains.  “It also messes up my VCR — an excuse for Comcast to try and upgrade me to a set top DVR box I don’t want to spend that much on.”

“What really irritates me is the only mailings I get from Comcast lately are about their new electronic guide they are launching today — a guide I couldn’t get until I got their box, and one I don’t think I am ever going to use,” she says. “That and those cards trying to get me to cut over my phone line to them.  If the phone company treated me like Comcast, they would have turned off dial phone service on me and told me I had to buy a new push-button phone.”

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Residents peeved as Comcast removes scores of channels 6-21-11.flv[/flv]

A reporter at the News & Messenger flips through channels on the television in the newspaper’s break room and discovers there is very little left to see.  (1 minute)

“If your house was destroyed, and you have looked around the neighborhood for our cable box and cannot find it, you owe us $212 and you need to either pay us or make an insurance claim on our behalf.”

Those were the exact words of a Charter Cable representative talking to a storm victim who lost her home, possessions, and yes, Charter Cable’s set top box.  Stop the Cap! reader Jake from Alabama shared the story of his friend Kelly — a single mother with three kids who lived in Jefferson County, until last month’s tornado flattened her home and scattered everything the family owned for miles around.  Kelly is now living with her parents in Georgia and trying to sort through insurance claims, school for her children, her future career, and the cable company.

“She told me everyone was wonderful, offering food, aid, temporary shelter, and even assistance with insurance claims,” Jake writes.  “Everyone but Charter Cable, who immediately demanded payment for equipment that could have blown into the next county.”

Kelly told Jake the other utilities were glad to help suspend service to her now non-existent home.  The phone company is even forwarding phone calls to her Alabama phone number, which now connects to her cell phone.  Nobody asked for a penny, and all expressed sorrow for the loss.  Charter Cable expressed an interest in Kelly’s credit card number to pay for her lost cable box.

“She told me the woman at Charter demanded to know if she was not prepared to pay today, when would she file her insurance claim so the company can get paid,” Jake says.  “Even worse, if she didn’t pay, they would assess late fees and turn her over to a collection agency.”

Cable companies demanding payment for lost or destroyed cable equipment is nothing new.  Stop the Cap! has documented instances where operators demand payment for cable boxes destroyed in fires, even when the customer lacks insurance.

“It’s become a hot topic in Birmingham and storm-damaged areas because relief workers are hearing horror stories from customers, some injured, who are told to start combing through adjacent yards to look for their lost cable equipment,” Jake says.

Bright House Networks, which also provides service in some storm-damaged areas, has been particularly nasty.

Jake notes one local talk show featured a caller who shared the story of a Bright House representative who told the customer she would wait on the phone while she searched the backyard for Bright House’s DVR box.

“It was disgusting, and Bright House told a Birmingham newspaper it was their policy to demand homeowners file insurance claims on the cable company’s behalf so they can get paid full value for their damaged, usually previously used, cable equipment,” Jake says.

In fact, that is Bright House Networks’ policy, notes the Birmingham News:

Bright House Networks, whose service area includes hard-hit Pratt City, also expects its customers to file claims under homeowners’ or renters’ insurance to pay for lost or destroyed cable boxes. “That’s how we normally handle it,” spokesman Robert L. Smith said.

If storm victims don’t have insurance, he said, decisions will have to be made on a case-by-case basis.

“For those who have lost everything, talking to a cable company is probably the last thing on their minds,” Smith said. “We’re not going to pressure someone for a set-top box.”

But in fact cable companies have pressured customers into paying for lost equipment and told they’ll get their money back from the final insurance settlement.

“The problem here isn’t so much that Charter and Bright House want to get paid for destroyed equipment, it’s how zealous they are about getting paid right now, even as people are still wrapping their hands around the cards dealt to them by the massive tornado damage,” Jake says.

The News notes not every cable company is out for customers’ credit card numbers:

Among other television services, AT&T’s U-verse customers who lost their leased equipment in the storm can have it replaced at no charge, company spokeswoman Sue Sperry said.

DirecTV waives replacement costs for equipment damaged in storms if customers continue services, spokeswoman Vanessa Dunham said. If service can’t be restored because of damage to the home, DirecTV offers to cancel the account and waive fees for not returning equipment, she said.

[Update 5/20: Charter Communications sent a statement saying, in part: Charter will not charge customers for missing, destroyed, or damaged equipment as a result of the recent tornadoes. We adjusted our policy shortly after the tornado in response to the large-scale and catastrophic nature of this storm.  We have now confirmed the company is now crediting customers for lost or damaged equipment.]

One of the biggest impediments to freeing up space on cable television systems is the amount of analog television programming viewers still watch over televisions not connected to set top boxes.  Time Warner Cable customers, already weary from paying $7 or more a month per television to rent digital boxes could eventually be in luck, if they own certain televisions made by Sony or Samsung.

The cable operator announced at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show it would begin testing delivering cable television directly to some television sets equipped to receive the Internet.

Time Warner Cable’s test of IPTV would deliver the cable lineup over its broadband network, which removes the need for an expensive and unsightly cable box.

Since the cable company would only deliver the channels customers were authorized to receive, boxes with complicated digital tuners and encryption schemes would be unnecessary.  For the first time in years, consumers could once again get the full cable lineup just by plugging a single cable into the back of their television.  No boxes, no TV set remotes rendered useless, no cableCARDs, and no more tangled cables behind the set.

The company could also eventually dump their DVR boxes, which require regular service to maintain and replace worn out hard drives.  The future of DVR’s is “cloud storage,” — your recordings would be stored at the cable company on their equipment, ready for on-demand access.

Could the days of the set top box be numbered?

The new IPTV service can also deliver advanced graphics and provide better on-screen programming guides, and even open up the potential to integrate Internet applications with the television experience.

IPTV already exists today with AT&T’s U-verse, which delivers all of its video programming over the same bandwidth their phone and broadband services rely on.  But U-verse still has a box attached to each television in the home.

Consumers could end up saving plenty if they got rid of expensive rented cable equipment.

But there are some downsides — the biggest being the currently limited number of televisions equipped to handle Time Warner’s proposed implementation of IPTV.

IPTV has often also opened the door to concerns from content producers about stream security — could a consumer capture perfect digital copies of movies over the cable company’s IPTV network?  And what happens politically if the cable company tries to deliver unlimited cable TV over the same broadband network it tried to limit in the past.

Cable providers and phone companies are trying to keep video subscribers happy in hopes they won’t drop service.  Comcast and Time Warner Cable both announced last week they are trying to build virtual cable systems that would deliver their channel lineups live to tablet computers, starting over home Wi-Fi networks.  Verizon and AT&T are also working on similar features.

Wood

Roku CEO Anthony Wood told a cable trade publication he is not worried that providers will kill the market for his online video set-top box with Internet Overcharging schemes.

Wood told Multichannel News the broadband industry faces enough competition to prevent one or both traditional providers from implementing usage caps and metered pricing for broadband service.

“What we see from a practical point of view in the marketplace is that there’s enough competition from cable, telcos and wireless so that in every market there’s an unlimited option — and the price is competitive,” he said.  “Unlimited sells — it’s just a good marketing strategy.”

Wood may want to inform broadband providers of that, because several American phone and cable companies are experimenting with slapping usage limits on their customers, making his web-streaming set top box an expensive proposition.  For customers of Frontier Communications in Elk Grove, Calif., using too much Roku could mean broadband bills as high as $300 a month.

With some HD movies consuming 2-4 gigabytes per title, some companies experimenting with usage limits as low as 5GB per month would make online video the primary culprit for consumers blowing through their monthly usage allowance.  After one bill with overlimit fees arrives, the Roku box will be the first thing to go.

Netflix, a major investor in the Roku box, could see its plans to shift to online distribution of its massive DVD rental business stymied by large phone and cable providers, many of whom see Netflix and other online video services as competitors who use their broadband service to send movies to consumers.  Some cable and phone companies contend Roku, Netflix, and other online video streamers are freeloaders — using their networks “for free” and demanding additional compensation to keep carrying their content.

Wood discloses another reason why cable and phone companies could potentially adopt a hostile position towards his 100-employee operation — “cord cutting.”

Wood told Multichannel News about 12% of Roku customers say they have canceled cable or satellite TV after buying the set-top while another 12% said they reduced their service level.

The cable industry is trying to retain customers by putting an increasing amount of cable content online for subscribers who maintain their cable-TV package.  Roku gives subscribers one more reason to downgrade or cancel service, a problem that could be stopped with an Internet Overcharging scheme that makes using the product an expensive proposition.

Some Roku watchers believe Wood is making a mistake underestimating the telecom industry’s willingness to protect its turf.

Two years ago Roku VP Tim Twerdahl said the company was not worried about Comcast’s 250GB download cap.  But since then, other providers have proposed far lower caps.

Roku is best known for letting Netflix subscribers stream the video rental firm’s online titles direct to television sets.  But Roku also delivers access to Hulu, Amazon video, and a growing number of new “channels” delivering classic movies, music/music videos, news, and user-created programming.

The company offers three set-top models: HD ($60), which delivers up to 720p video; XD ($80), which adds support for up to 1080p and 802.11n Wi-Fi; and the XDS ($99), which offers dual-band 802.11n and component video and optical audio outputs.  The top model occasionally sells for as little as $79.99 when on sale from Amazon.com or direct from the manufacturer.

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Introducing Roku.mp4[/flv]

A brief video introduction to Roku.  (1 minute)