Business Wire (Bellevue, WA): Bellevue Family Wins $7,500 Gift Card to Culminate PSE’s Rock the Bulb™ Energy Saving Campaign

Winner Dropped Their Energy Use by a Whopping 94 Percent to Beat out 7,600 Contestants in the PSE “Be An Energy Rock Star Contest”

It’s official: Puget Sound Energy’s 16-week Rock the Bulb Tour has come to an end – and the final numbers are in. In just four months, PSE distributed 511,543 free compact fluorescent light (CFL) bulbs to 25,000 households, exceeding the campaign goal by more than 25 percent, and the Hall family of Bellevue, Wash. was named the first prize winner of the campaign’s culminating “Be An Energy Rock Star Contest” and received a $7,500 Lowe’s gift card for their efforts.

The Hall family earned the maximum number of points for the “Be an Energy Rock Star” contest by exchanging their bulbs and participating in one of the Rock the Bulb Tour events, volunteering to distribute CFL bulbs in their community with Project Porchlight, taking EPA’s ENERGY STAR® Pledge to save energy, and above all, reducing their energy use by a whopping 94 percent in October 2009 (as compared to October 2008).

“The Halls were in it to win it,” said Cal Shirley, PSE vice president for Energy Efficiency Services. “The Halls--and all our winners--proved that with ingenuity and determination, it’s possible to achieve impressive home energy savings.”

The Halls started by using a device that measures how much electricity their refrigerator, microwave, televisions and other electronics use to see which they could shut off to make the biggest impact. A twenty-year-old freezer was one of the highest and is now gone from the home. They kept lights off, the heat low, did very little laundry and spent more time at the library and the mall. And the kids learned how many things in their home use electricity that they took for granted before.

While the Halls know some of the steps they took to win the contest might not practical for the long run, the family says they are still saving 30 to 50 percent on their energy use now that the contest is over and that much of what they did will now be part of everyday life.

“Energy efficiency is a habit, and once you start thinking about using energy wisely you see new opportunities to make better choices,” noted Shirley.

More than 7,600 PSE residential electric households in Western Washington also signed up to accumulate the most points toward part of the total $45,000 in prizes from campaign sponsors. Average energy use reduction by the top 1,000 participants was more than 30 percent, and nearly 70 households earned a prize for their participation.

From Bellingham to Olympia and Bellevue to Bremerton, PSE’s Rock the Bulb Tour took the message of energy efficiency to customers by distributing CFL bulbs at retail events, door-to-door outreach and at community events. ENERGY STAR qualified CFL bulbs use 75 percent less electricity than old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs and last up to 10 times longer, saving $40 or more for each bulb in electricity costs over its lifetime.

The total bulbs distributed through the Rock the Bulb campaign takes the utility’s total of CFL bulbs distributed since 2002 to 11 million, representing a total savings of more than $440 million region-wide over the lifetime of the bulbs. When installed, the CFL bulbs given away through PSE’s Rock the Bulb Tour will help PSE residential electric customers reduce their energy bills by more than $22 million and result in 130 million pounds of greenhouse gas emissions avoided – equal to taking about 10,800 cars off the road each year over the lifetime of the CFL bulbs.

Although the Rock the Bulb campaign and “Be An Energy Rock Star Contest” have now ended, PSE customers can still take advantage of new and improved rebates from the utility. CFL bulbs purchased by PSE electric customers through participating retailers will automatically be discounted at the register, and rebates totaling as much as $7,000 for energy efficient products, appliances and upgrades are also available, many of which qualify for up to an additional $1,500 in federal tax credits.

To learn more about PSE’s residential energy efficiency programs, visit PSE.com or call a PSE Energy Advisor at 1-800-562-1482, Monday through Friday, between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.

Photos of the Hall family and home available on request.

Washington state’s oldest local energy utility, Puget Sound Energy serves more than 1 million electric customers and nearly 750,000 natural gas customers in 11 counties. A subsidiary of Puget Energy, PSE meets the energy needs of its growing customer base through incremental, cost-effective energy conservation, procurement of sustainable energy resources, and far-sighted investment in the energy-delivery infrastructure. PSE employees are dedicated to providing great customer service and delivering energy that is safe, reliable, reasonably priced, and environmentally responsible. For more information, visit www.PSE.com.

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• source: Business Wire