Electricity use eases a trickle

Not only are Americans conserving on the use of petroleum products, but they are saving electricity, too. That's the news from the Edison Electric Institute.

So far this year, 1.55 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity has been sold to residential and industrial users, against 1.58 trillion kwh. in the same period of 1981 - a drop of almost 2 percent. Formerly demand for electric power had been growing (until the early '70s) at the annual rate of about 7 percent. Heavy publicity on the conservation of electric energy, cost restriction incentives, and a relatively cool summer across the United States are said to be responsible for the decline.