designing
The perfect automobile...The perfect house

The idea of a "basal metabolism rate" for an automobile or house occurs to some people who would like to make their automobile or house as efficient as they can.  That would give something to aim for, some ideal, minimal, amount of "energy" or "fuel" needed.

However, that idea misses the point.  The concept itself is faulty.  For an automobile, essentially no fuel is needed—if the various friction effects can be nullified: friction is the primary source of entropy in machines.  We ordinarily use the brakes to slow down or stop.  Brakes are friction devices; so instead we should slow down or stop by using an electric generator that charges up a battery which then delivers the power to get going again.  When we roll down hills we should use the same generator, and the energy stored can be used to go back up the hill.  The only reason for needing fuel after a certain minimum—sufficient to go to the top of the highest hill and accelerate to the fastest speed—is friction "losses," which can, in principle, always be reduced further and further.

After we've installed frictionless bearings everyplace that moving parts rub against each other,  we still have to deal with air friction.  We can either drive in a vacuum or travel very, very slowly to overcome air friction.  (In general, the slower a process, the less the entropy generated.)

Such an ideal car has no need for fuel, for "energy," at all.  We are avoiding all generation of entropy.  That would be perfect efficiency, the ultimate goal to aim at--but the second law is the observation that we will never make it.  Heat transferred reversibly does not increase entropy, but that's an unattainable ideal because it requires infinite time for the process. Zero speed of travel on a road, and even zero rate of heat transfer inside the engine, are parts of the bargain of 100% efficiency. Bad bargain, but there are some interesting ways we can avoid the entropy generation; like orbiting beyond the atmosphere.  However, we will always notice that convenience and satisfying our needs always comes with an entropy bill.  So, when we discover (and understand) thermodynamics we are not surprised to discover that the "hybrid" gas-electric car is the most efficient yet invented: it works by the above principles.
 

The ideal house (for keeping us warm in cold weather) is similarly designed.  We simply insulate it so well that any occupants supply the heating by their body heat.  All heat flow carried out faster than infinitesimally slowly generates entropy.  Entropy avoidance is our goal.

When the weather is hot, we can operate an air conditioner, probably a heat pump like the one in our refrigerator.  But if we have a cool basement, we might draw warm air into the basement and then blow it (perhaps through our furnace ducts) into the rest of the house.  The basement gets warmer by cooling that forced air. The house stays cool.  Much less electrical power gets used running the fans than is used running the air conditioner.  (And less peaking power is needed at the generating station; furthermore, if the nights and mornings are very cool, we are less likely to need to operate the furnace to warm the house.)

Thermodynamics is about transfer of energy.  Learn it.  Understand it. Use it.  To your advantage.