[MacTUG] Different energy consumptions depending on how 'sleep' is initiated

[Don Duff-McCracken]

Hi Guys

I am hoping that Steve H. is still reading these postings as an Apple  
Engineer could likely help me out.

As part of our green computing initiatives, I am looking at ensuring  
our macs are sleeping when not in use. We have bought some great  
little devices that provide realtime energy use ("kill-a-watt power  
monitor" only $30 each! http://store.greengadgets.ca/products/P4400.html) 
  and one thing I have noticed is that how the mac is put to sleep  
radically alters its energy use.

For example

  ~80 watts -- Regular consumption of a 20" newer imac
~40 watts -- computer goes to sleep on its own via settings in energy  
saver control panel (set up to have the display, and the cpu go to  
sleep and the hard drive to stop whenever possible)
~02 watts -- (yes 2 watts!) put the computer to sleep manually from  
the apple menu or the "Are you sure you want to shut down..." dialog box
~02 watts -- put the computer to sleep remotely using Remote Desktop

As you can see, this is a radical difference in energy use!

What I want is to not have to rely on Remote Desktop. I would like to  
use the energy saver settings and tweak them using the "pmset"  
command. I have been playing with it to no avail.

Does anyone -- Ahhem, Steve -- have any suggestions?

Thanks
(former mactugger) Don