"I left the Settings app running" shouldn't be a laptop battery killer.

Anyone interested in significantly lowering power consumption of the #GNOME Settings (control center) app when idling on the WiFi, Bluetooth or Sound panels? My suggestion is to throttle the hell out of it when the window is not in focus: gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-c…
This is not an unheard of idea, it's been done in the gaming industry (I saw #PathOfExile doing exactly that, when I last played… a long time ago)

Reduce CPU and battery consumption: throttle / stop refreshing WiFi networks and Bluetooth devices when window is defocused (#3263) · Issues · GNOME / Settings · GitLab

Usecase I sometimes (often) launch GNOME Settings to configure something related to the WiFi or to turn a bluetooth device on/off,...

^GitLab