When joined CDPN, I saw something about the carbon footprint from running the project was small compared to the benefit. So, I planned on leaving my computer on mostly 24/7. (I would shut it down during thunder-storms or hot weather.) However, my electric bill was very small, and running my computer 24/7 has doubled it.

That statement is still true. But, yes, running these huge supercomputer programs on a desktop computer does use up a fair bit of electricity.
The comparison is between lots of desktops, and one or more dedicated supercomputers.
It's up to each individual to decide about the research.

CPDN, as with all distributed computer projects, will increase electricity consumption. Some things you can do:

-Use a laptop.*

-Don't run CPDN or any CPU-based BOINC project on a machine with a dedicated graphics card.

-Run BOINC only certain times of the day and then suspend or hibernate.

-Undervolt and/or underclock.

* Ed: I'd recommend an extra one you don't need to carry around a lot--CPDN tasks are prone to crashing with a lot of shutdown cycles.

* Ed: I'd recommend an extra one you don't need to carry around a lot--CPDN tasks are prone to crashing with a lot of shutdown cycles.

Will it reduce the number of CDPN crashes if I use the BOINC manager to select all projects and suspend them before I shut down my computer?

quote]* Ed: I'd recommend an extra one you don't need to carry around a lot--CPDN tasks are prone to crashing with a lot of shutdown cycles.[/quote]

Will it reduce the number of CDPN crashes if I use the BOINC manager to select all projects and suspend them before I shut down my computer?

[/quote]

Suspending the tasks and then exiting the Boinc manager before shutting down the computer are definitely recommended. It will minimize crashes.

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In my experience it's best to shutdown BOINC before machine shutdown.

Ed: it might be okay to suspend BOINC without the "leave applications in memory while suspended" setting checked, but to the tasks it's essentially the same as shutting down BOINC--me thinks. This setting is probably what you want to save energy and keep the tasks loaded through S3 suspend or hibernation. Check that your suspend/hibernation is good and stable though.

Thanks for the replies.

I started using the BOINC manager to suspend projects (Seti@home and World Community Grid) prior to shutting down my computer about the time I joined CPDN, but before I received my first CDPN work unit. This was the result of some sort of bug in my operating system: When I booted my computer, it would start showing UTC time, instead of Chicago time. It would claim either the UTC time was "Local" time or Chicago time. I noticed that changing the time would confuse some of the software, including the BOINC projects, so I had to reboot after changing the time, hoping the time would be correct on the next boot. I would try to protect BOINC projects from this by suspending projects, and not resuming them until I verified I did not have to change the time.