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Whatever you call it, the humble AC adapter, external power supply, plug pack, plug-in adapter, domestic mains adapter, line power adapter, wall wart, or power brick is due for significant changes next month.
The U.S. Level VI energy-efficiency regulation, aimed at energy savings in external power supplies, goes into force on February 10, 2016, and will impact all OEMs selling into the U.S. market. The European Union (EU) also is expected to harmonize with the new efficiency standard.
This article includes a quote (& pun) from one power supply vendor,
"It's a two-pronged approach," said Johnson. "The regulation addresses active mode when the adapter is powered up and supplying power to the end product. Under the regulation, efficiency is increased by roughly five percent."
But the big change is at no load when the adapter is plugged into the wall – like a cell phone charger – and nothing is connected to it, Johnson added. "Power consumption at Level IV was .5 watt and at Level VI it's decreasing to .1 watt, which when you talk about the millions of adapters in the market it's significant in power savings."
Another article can be found at http://www.metlabs.com/blog/energy-star-2/external-power-supplies-must-meet-level-vi-energy-efficiency-requirements-for-u-s-doe-by-february-2016/
US Department of Energy has an information page with several linked documents
https://www1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/appliance_standards/rulemaking.aspx/ruleid/28
"Rulemaking for Battery Chargers and External Power Supplies Energy Conservation Standard"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 05 2016, @01:34PM
Yeah I've told people that keeping alleyways/warehouses/etc pitch dark is safer instead of lighting them up- most common criminals don't have night vision goggles nor are they skilled at echolocation or navigating in the dark. If there's light in the alleyway/warehouse/etc that's normally pitch dark there's a good chance someone is there... So have your security cameras on IR but also alert the guards if visible light is spotted. And if you want more security - install smoke machines to release smoke when the alarm goes off.
One normal fluorescent tube lamp is 36W and that's about seventy 0.5W wall warts. Then there's air-conditioning and heating... And as I've said elsewhere here ( https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=11445&cid=284122#commentwrap [soylentnews.org] ) even our desktop computers use more than most wall warts. The difference between running a 3D game with vsync on and vsync off can be 120 wall warts. Not noticing a CPU intensive tab can be 30 to 60 wall warts.