Here’s an interesting page for you, one where the same phrase can mean an energy wasting or an energy saving pattern, depending upon the use.

Stop-and-Go Traffic - The most common ‘activation’ for the phrase stop-an-go would likely be the context of ‘stop-and-go traffic’, the nemesis of our daily commutes between home and work or school.  Stop-and-go traffic is one of the larger inefficiencies in our societies which are contributing to excessive carbon emissions, and thus global warming.

While there are limits to what drivers can do about stop-and-go traffic, there are some things.  First, you can negotiate offset work schedules with your employer.  If you are looking for a job, or changing jobs, you can make an offset schedule part of your criteria.  Many employers understand the problem and are more than willing to make adjustments or accept this criteria since employees who come to work less stressed from the commute tend to have higher morale, greater productivity, and better health (absent less often).

You can also try to make career choices, or look for work situations, that allow telecommuting part or all of the time.  Again, many employers are happy to allow productive workers to work from home.  When your work output is not measured by how many hours you have spent some place, but the quantity and quality of the work you have accomplished, telecommuting is highly competitive with office work.  The employer also has the benefit of reduced costs when the ‘on site’ staff is reduced.

Stop-and-Go Washing - Here’s the other side of ‘stop and go.’  My son recently helped me come up with the best description of how some of us shower and wash dishes in our house.  If you turn the water on to wet yourself (or the pan), then turn it off to apply the soap or detergent and lather or scrub, then turn it on again briefly to rinse, you have a stop-and-go shower or dishwashing.  Clearly there is a savings of energy here, both in the waste of any hot water or even the waste of the energy represented by the pumping and pressurization of the water to your sink or shower, and the energy represented by the treatment of the wastewater once it is down the drain.

Agreed, this will require a bit more of the human energy, and certainly more thought, the interuption of old habits, and the formation of new habits.  But when you consider the future that looms ahead, with energy and water shortages on local and regional levels, this human energy is well spent.