New AC technologies to cut power use

The U.S. expends roughly 185 billion kilowatt-hours of energy each year on home cooling, the most by any nation in the world. Air conditioner sales are growing globally by roughly 20 percent per year, with the newly affluent in China and India leading the way. How do we beat the heat without increasing that heat through global warming caused by burning fossil fuels to power the air-conditioner? The U.S. Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy, ARPA–E, hopes to cut this hot forecast by reducing the energy required for air-conditioning.

Conventional air-conditioners employ refrigerants such as chlorofluorocarbons to absorb heat from the room to be cooled. That heat is then expelled outside, requiring electrically powered pumps and compressors. One idea to conserve energy is to replace coolant fluids and gases—which are often super-powered greenhouse gases capable of trapping more than 1,000 times more heat than CO2—with solid materials, such as bismuth telluride. 

A new device uses electricity to change a thermoelectric solid to absorb heat, and could lead to cheaper air-conditioners or refrigerators. Such refrigerators, which lack moving parts and are therefore less likely to break down, can be lifesavers in remote, rural areas for keeping medicines cool or food fresh.

Another approach is to employ specialty membranes to cool air by condensing water. These technologies are being developed by companies and now have acquired backing from the U.S. Navy, which requires efficient air-conditioners and dehumidifiers for both troops and equipment in hotspots such as Iraq and Afghanistan. "A 30 percent improvement in efficiency means 30 percent less fuel to drag to the front," Martin notes, adding that the Navy program aims for units that use 20 to 50 percent less fuel.

More efficient air-conditioners can provide cooling that could prove vital for people trying to adapt to more extreme heat waves in the future, whether in the U.S. or India. Meanwhile, a simple approach to cut down the HVAC bills would be to keep the knob a level higher than freezing temperatures - a practice in many places!

One more mouth to feed

Are we seeing another energy guzzler being forced down the citizens? The changing landscape of television viewing – set top boxes – is being accused of consuming much precious energy.

With over 35% households lacking access to electricity and the remaining denied quality power, can we afford this for some quality viewing? Views differ. According to the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, the energy consumed by one set top box could light more than 40-50 Homes with a 5 watt LED lamp for 4- 5 hours!

With digitization of TV services, Set Top boxes will be mandatory in the entire country by end of 2014. The set top boxes available in India range from 16 w to 20 W based on manufacturer’ specifications. Calculating a 12 hour run daily , it consumes 6-8 units in the month. Even in inactive mode it consumes energy, says NRDC. These devices squander the equivalent annual energy output of six coal burning power plants (500 MW) because they are not equipped to power down when not being used.

Finds NRDC that cable high-definition digital video recorder (HD-DVR) consumes more electricity annually than the new flat panel TV to which it’s typically connected and about 40% more than its basic set-top box counterpart.  In contrast, cell phones, which also work on a subscriber basis with a need for secure connections, are able to use extremely low levels of power when not in use – primarily to preserve battery life.

However, India’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has said set-top boxes (STBs) consume less power than a CFL light. The Ministry clarified in a statement that most STBs consume about 8 watts of power. It added that STBs consume even lesser electricity when they are on standby mode.

These boxes would consume only about one-fifth of a unit of electricity in a day against 1.5 units consumed by a fan, a TV or a tube light. Thus, cable STBs consume nominal electricity to the tune of 5-6 units in a month, which is insignificant in comparison with the electricity consumed by other electric appliances in a house, the Ministry said in a statement.

Whether it is 6-8 units or 5-6 units, fact is that we are adding to the monthly bill. Is this a wise decision in the times of massive power cuts ??

Water & energy: sustaining one another

Our leadership believes water is more important than oil, said the CEO of Masdar, addressing the Sustainability week at Abu Dhabi.

Now there are ways to look at that 'profound' statement. Incredulous. Cynical. Hilarious. How can anyone have believed that oil is more important than water? But believe it or not, it can happen in oil-soaked economies. The other way to look at the statement is the seriousness to be accorded to water prospecting, water conserving, etc vis a vis oil. An acknowledgement of tough times ahead. What better venue than the sustainability week at Abu Dhabi.
'We are gathered here today because we are confronted with a shared responsibility. A shared responsibility to address the intricate balance between our rising economies, our growing societies, and our limited resources. A balance that is crucial to achieving a sustainable future. And a balance that rests on two critical and deeply linked elements — energy and water. Without access to both, economic growth and human development cannot thrive and poverty and conflict cannot be prevented', said CEO Dr Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber said at the ongoing Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week, the 6th World Future Energy Summit, the 5th International Renewable Energy Conference. 'Achieving it will require creating the necessary regulations and policies, forging public and private partnerships, and driving the investment required to deliver real solutions. And solutions that will require a collective action, on a massive scale, from both governments and businesses.'

'Realizing action on such scale, may be viewed by some as a challenge. However, the UAE views this as a unique opportunity. In the UAE, a nation with the 5th largest proven oil reserves, our leadership believes that water… is more important than oil. We believe that water and energy require the equal attention of world leaders.'

Today, roughly 7% of the world’s energy consumption is used for water, when nearly 50% of the water withdrawn is used for creating energy. No longer can we address water without considering the energy needed to withdraw, treat, and transport it. And no longer can we address energy without considering the water needed to extract, generate, and produce it. Care to take a guess on which is more important??

Ghost consumption

While on the subject of energy conservation, there are some simple stark facts most of us are unaware of. We know about replacing incandescent lamps, buying energy-efficient labeled products, etc. But there are some facts largely unknown. Energy experts have been trying to focus on these small but effective measures to release wasted power. For instance, many devices in our homes such as TV, DVD players, AC machines, music systems, etc have a standby mode. If not “switched off” they can consume as much as 6 Watt to 10 Watts of power!

Mosquito mats if not switched off consume 10 to 15 watts during day time. Frequent opening and closing of doors of refrigerators can drastically increase power consumption. Air-conditioners have a wide difference in power consumption for even 1 degree difference in cooling. By simply selecting a comfortable 24 deg rather than a cold 18 deg not only is comfort assured but much energy saved.

Use of excessive lighting should be avoided and task lighting can be chosen. Using table lamp in place of wall mounted 40Watt tube light is an example for this. Popular Zero Watt bulbs are not zero energy consuming devices. They consume around 15watts of power!

Solar cookers for day time cooking can save a lot of energy. Cookers are available which can be operated from balcony of a house.

Every little but conscious action counts.

Carbon tax or Sin tax?

The National Electricity Policy-2005 had promised: Access to Electricity - Available for all households in next five years; Availability of Power - Demand to be fully met by 2012. Energy and peaking shortages to be overcome and adequate spinning reserve to be available; Supply of Reliable and Quality Power of specified standards in an efficient manner and at reasonable rates; Per capita availability of electricity to be increased to over 1000 units by 2012; Minimum lifeline consumption of 1 unit/household/day as a merit good* by year 2012. The 2011 Census shows 9 crore households lack access to electricity!

There is not much hope that above promises can be met even in the 12^th five year plan unless certain urgent and strong measures are taken under the provisions of the Energy Conservation Act, 2001, the Electricity Act, 2003 and other relevant Acts & Policies.

In economic parlance, a demerit good is a good or service

whose consumption is considered unhealthy, degrading, or otherwise socially undesirable due to the perceived negative effects on the consumers themselves. It is over-consumed if left to market forces. Examples include tobacco, alcoholic beverages, recreational drugs, etc. Because of the nature of these goods, governments often levy taxes on these goods (specifically, sin taxes), in some cases regulating or banning consumption or advertisement of these goods.

Some energy experts have an interesting thought process: Considering the fact that 34 % of the households in India are still living without electricity, should over consumption/inefficient use/abuse of electricity be considered as 'Demerit Good' and be taxed heavily as 'Sin Tax' ?! What do you think??

In the grip of energy

Wastewater treatment involves steps like separation, settling, filtration, biological digestion, and chemical treatment. This means a lot of equipment and energy consumption! One evaluation has estimated that wastewater treatment uses 2% of the United States’ overall energy consumption.

Scientists now have come up with a microbial fuel cell (MFC) that has a 13% energy recovery capacity which means wastewater treatment for free making it possible for poor nations to find clean water affordably from wastewater.

While traditional fuel cells convert fuel into electricity without igniting it (combining hydrogen and oxygen, as in the hydrogen fuel cell), an MFC uses organic matter as the fuel and microbes to break them down.  As the microbes break down the organic matter, electrons (the movement of which constitutes electricity) are produced.  The new MFC uses sewage from a bog standard sewage treatment plant. It’s made of a sealed container and an unsealed container, separated by a membrane.

The microbes grow in a film on an electrode in the sealed chamber, sending electrons to the electrode and protons to the unsealed container. Oxygen in that container plus microbes on a second electrode plus the electrons from the sealed chamber combine to produce things that are not sewage and generate some electricity in the process.

The device also removes the vast majority of organic matter and potentially disease-causing microbes, though not quite at the point of creating drinkable water along with electricity. But it is a step towards that. Today, every activity involves some energy expenditure. That is how comfort has been introduced into our lives – by using energy. That was fine at a time when energy was believed to be abundant. Today the move should be to release more and more of these processes from dependence on energy, at least energy from fossil fuels.

Wasting energy

A new study has found that leaving everyday appliances on "standby" costs UK households between £50 and £86 a year on average. Televisions, satellite boxes and other video and audio equipment are the worst offenders, but people are increasingly leaving computers, mobile phones and other appliances from washing machines to dishwashers on standby, where it is still using energy.

Standby use accounts for about 9% to 16% of the average electricity bill of £530 a year and is helping to push the UK's electricity use upwards, but with little benefit to consumers, according to a new study called Powering the Nation, from the Energy Saving Trust (EST).

People are also failing to use their domestic appliances efficiently, the study found, especially when washing clothes and dishes. According to the study, households are spending at least £80 a year on laundry with 5.5 washes a week when they could be more sparing with water and still remain clean!

In households with a tumble dryer, more than four-fifths of the washing is dried using electricity, while households with dishwashers fare even worse, spending twice as much washing their crockery as they do on their clothes.

The findings come from the Household electricity use study, undertaken by the Energy Saving Trust and Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Under the study, a total of 251 households had their habits examined from 2010-11, with 26 of these watched for a full year and the remainder for about a month. This is a situation not only in UK but the worldover. Who will call a halt to such wasteful practices? Is this due to lack of awareness of the energy situation? Or is it simply because power still is largely cheap?

UK schools to cut energy use

Hundreds of schools across England have signed up to take part in the Carbon Trust’s recently announced energy saving challenge.

The Trust’s Collaborative Low Carbon Schools Service will help over 400 schools in 52local authorities tackle the sector’s £543 million annual energy bill.

Through the implementation of simple, cost-effective energy saving measures like switching off lights when not in use and installing more efficient heating systems, the initiative aims to save up to £40 million in costs and 270,000 tonnes of carbon.

The pilot programme will run for 10 months, with the aim of saving schools up to 25% on their energy bills. The Carbon Trust will offer an expert advice on installing measures like energy efficient lighting and heating.

On average, a typical secondary school could save £21,500 a year in energy costs – almost as much as employing a newly qualified teacher.

“The Carbon Trust’s work with local authorities shows that schools can play a pivotal role in helping the public sector to save millions of pounds while slashing carbon emissions,” says Richard Rugg, director of Carbon Trust Programmes.

Gadgets in the times of scarcity

Go visiting a friend and chances are that the talk will veer around to some new acquisition, a gadget. Guest and host will discuss the new models, the tricks it has up its sleeve, the price, and so on. Very rarely will the discussion touch on the aspect of efficiency or power use!

In developed countries this is more so, but developing nations with fast rising aspirations are catching up on their electric toothbrushes, smartphones, big fridges, flatscreen TV, tablet PCs. In the UK, a report from the Energy Savings Trust has warned of the nation falling below meeting its target on reducing emissions if this gadget craze continues.

The number of domestic gadgets and appliances in the average UK household increased by three and a half times between 1990 and 2009, according to the report, and overall energy consumption from consumer electronic goods rose by more than 600% between 1970 and 2009.

The new report finds that despite householders' efforts to switch to energy-efficient products, we are actually consuming more energy than five years ago, with almost a third of all the UK's carbon emissions coming from the home.
The proliferation of new gadgets such as laptops, tablets and powerful desktops shows no sign of abating, however. Between 2000 and 2009 electricity use from home computing more than doubled, and the number of devices in Britain's homes rose from 30,000 to 65,000!

This could well be the truth for most cities across the globe. The cost of running gadgets is often forgotten given the cheap and subsidised rate of fossil backed power. This awareness must be strengthened if homes are to stop being energy guzzlers.

More with less

Is a low-carbon necessarily a low-energy future?

Given the intermittency issue of solar and wind, and the huge investments needed for storage and long distance transmission, low-carbon path requires a high rate of growth in that expensive sector, and therefore high rates of investment. Governments would have to jump-start the transition with big subsidies—a tough order!

Global coal production will max out in the next few years and start to decline. And then there is China which now burns almost half the world’s total and is starting to import enormous quantities, driving up prices worldwide. Costs of production of natural gas and per-well depletion rates also are high.

Of course, even if one were to continue on the high carbon track, things are bound to grind to a halt soon. Enormous amounts of coal, oil, gas, and other fossil fuels still remain underground, but each new increment will cost significantly more to extract (in terms of both money and energy). Most of what is left is lower quality, expensive-to-produce, less accessible resources.

After a certain point, even if gross energy production is still climbing, the amount of energy actually useful to society starts to decline anyway. From then on, it is impossible to increase the amount of useful energy available. Whatever the path, we have less energy to use.

As more energy observers concur, energy conservation must be brought from the background to centrestage. This covers not only efficient use of energy which releases more energy for other uses, it should also look at discouraging extravagance. For many of our daily requirements, this means a re-look at new (or old) ways to do things.

Surprisingly, in releasing so much energy from our menu, we could find ourselves living healthier lives than before.

A low energy future is the sane choice. Agree?

It's Code Green!

Here's how coders can join the save-energy campaign! If you can afford one error every 100,000 operations or so, you can already save a lot of energy. Up to even 90 percent!

A University of Washington project sees a role for programmers to reduce the energy appetite of the ones and zeroes in the code itself. Researchers have created a system, called EnerJ, that reduces energy consumption in simulations by up to 50 percent, and has the potential to cut energy by as much as 90 percent.

The basic idea is to take advantage of processes that can survive tiny errors that happen when, say, voltage is decreased or correctness checks are relaxed. Some examples of possible applications are streaming audio and video, games and real-time image recognition for augmented-reality applications on mobile devices.

Some experts believe we are approaching a limit on the number of transistors that can run on a single microchip. The so-called "dark silicon problem" says that as we boost computer speeds by cramming more transistors onto each chip, there may no longer be any way to supply enough power to the chip to run all the transistors.

The UW team's approach would work like a dimmer switch, letting some transistors run at a lower voltage. Approximate tasks could run on the dimmer regions of the chip. Today's computers could also use EnerJ with a purely software-based approach. For example, the computer could round off numbers or skip some extra accuracy checks on the approximate part of the code to save energy.

For sure, we need to cut the energy flab in every which way possible. In every walk of life, in every area.

Time to slow down

Fo regular readers of The Guardian, a recent long-drawn spar has been one taken up by columnist George Monbiot that began with being cautious about nuclear to openly batting for nuclear power. To his opponents, Monbiot has had many points to quote on why he considers nuclear to be a clean option, wastes and security issues notwithstanding.

But a much recent off-shoot of the discussion has been his rhetoric to environmentalists advocating renewables and how they expected to live with lesser energy which this would mean, at least initially. An interesting retort by a fellow columnist brings up a valid point - 'the most obvious way of cutting production is to make things to higher standards. If everything were made to last twice as long then we would only need to make half as much of it. This requires us to slow down the rate of technological progress so that goods (and humans) do not become functionally obsolescent so quickly'.

To Monbiot's query on how to find the energy required to make bricks, glass, metal tools and utensils, textiles … ceramics and soap, Simon replies: 'Take bricks: for several years I lived in a cob house – built in 1911 from rammed unbaked earth – which was warm and delightful. I have also made unfired bricks with a device called a block ram, and 30 years later they are weathering fine.'

He goes on to say very pertinently that reducing consumption of goods is not a recipe for abject poverty. Half the world still lives without superabundance, but where there is misery 'it is because of lack of food, water, simple medicines and adequate shelter – not because of a shortage of cheap T-shirts, factory-fired bricks, or 17 varieties of cleaning product.'!! How true.

A large populace the world over is led to believe taht techno-fixes that will allow us to go on extracting the world's resources at an ever accelerating rate. What a fallacy.

En-eff vs En-con

We know that along with energy conservation, energy efficiency is probably the most important component of getting a handle on humanity's growing energy use and the environmental damage that currently entails.

A new study from the University of Cambridge really lays it bare again. Julian Allwood's team found that 73% of global energy use could be saved through energy efficiency improvements.

Some of these are easy and possible today, such as in the building sector, while some of the more radical energy efficiency improvements in vehicle design require bigger changes.

Fine. But one wonders how the extrapolation was done from the developed world to the developing world where industrialisation is not of the same degree yet. Time and again experts have maintained that in the developing world, energy efficiency must be improved but the gains are not of the same kind as in the developed world. Should we be focussing on efficiency or conservation?

No infinite growth possible

A study that relates global energy use to economic growth, published in the January issue of BioScience, finds strong correlations between these two measures both among countries and within countries over time. They conclude that an "enormous" increase in energy supply will be required to meet the demands of projected world population growth and lift the developing world out of poverty without jeopardizing standards of living in most developed countries.

To support the expected world population in 2050 in the current US lifestyle would require 16 times the current global energy use, for example. Noting that 85 percent of humankind's energy now comes from fossil fuels, the BioScience authors point out that efforts to develop alternative energy sources face economic problems of diminishing returns, and reject the view of many economists that technological innovation can circumvent resource shortages.

The team found the same sort of relationship between energy consumption per person and gross domestic product per person as is found between metabolism and body weight in animals. Cities and countries, like animals, have metabolisms that must burn fuel to sustain themselves and grow. This shows that the linkage between energy use and economic activity is causal, although other factors must also be in play to explain the variability in the data, the authors conclude.

Finally, it all boils down to use less of everything, and waste even lesser!

Tighten belts to fill more!

In the developing world, reducing greenhouse gas emissions is often seen as being in conflict with alleviating poverty. A clean energy development initiative in rural Nicaragua, however, demonstrates that there are cost effective steps developing nations can take to reduce carbon emissions and at the same time help the rural poor reduce their energy expenses, according to researchers from the University of California, Berkeley.

The villages of Orinoco and Marshall Point are off the nation's electric grid and obtain their power from diesel generators. Until last year, however, the homes had no electricity meters; homeowners were billed according to the appliances they owned. This encouraged indiscriminate energy use, with lights, televisions and radios remaining on, even when not being used.

After the government installed meters, however, energy use dropped by 28 percent, and many people's electric bills also dropped.

Villagers were offered two efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) in exchange for two incandescent bulbs. This program reduced household energy use by an additional 17 percent, on average.

The net result was less diesel burned, even allowing for the fact that the community's reduced energy needs allowed the local energy supplier to run its generators two extra hours each day, providing longer service to customers. In the month after the conservation campaign, electricity bills dropped in 37 percent of the households in Orinoco.

Microgrids like the one in Nicaragua, often powered by diesel generators, are found by the thousands around the world, particularly in India and China. They're dirty, have high emissions, high energy costs and questionable reliability, so targeting these microgrids has the potential for improving access to energy services for those communities while at the same time, for the money invested, getting greater reductions in carbon emissions than you might get investing in similar measures where the cost of energy is cheaper, such as in the cities.

There are two arguments to this kind of scenario. Should we remove the subsidies for the poor to discourage wastage? Or is there better way to monitor the same?

New production paradigms

Every bit of energy that is saved goes a long way in securing the needs of present and future generations. So also every bit of material that necessitates more mining of some metal or ore. Finally, any innovations to production processes that reduce wastage and minimise energy and material is welcome.

Flexible circuits can be found in many devices where space and weight considerations are dominant in the design of electronics: in cars, in cameras and video equipment, in mini-computers or in inkjet printers. According to the business consultancy Frost & Sullivan, sales in this area will grow to more than $16 billion by the year 2014.

No wonder research in this area is leaping in bounds. A new reel-to-reel technology for the production of flexible circuits and biosensors, known as "P3T," which is shorthand for "Plasma Printing and Packaging Technology" involves considerably fewer process steps than existing processes, and it conserves raw materials.

During production of circuits for an RFID antenna, you often have to etch away between 50 and 80 percent of the copper used. This results in considerable amounts of copper scrap that either has to be disposed or reprocessed using relatively elaborate methods. The IST approach is different: there, scientists use the additive process to apply the structures they want directly to the substrate sheeting.

Researchers are currently working very hard to improve the individual processes involved in the manufacture of flexible circuit boards and biosensors. They are closely scrutinizing all of the P3T production steps -- from plasma printing to assembly and coordinating all of the processes with one another in a production line.

Technological improvisations are headed in the right direction, what is lagging is the change in attitudes, especially when it comes to individual lifestyles. We still are used to a season of plenty.

By force or voluntary?

When it comes to energy conservation, the big question that divides experts is whether the approach should be that of regulation or marketing. Government organisations associated with energy often tend to spen a lot of money on advertisements and marketing campaigns. Critics believe this is a waste of money. There should be a way of making conservation mandatory, they insist. For instance in India, we have the EC Act which has remained largely on paper. If implemented in earnest, the nation stands to save and hence produce much needed energy.

Another way of thinking believes that force is not the way, but persuasion and education. Or marketing!

A recent study by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found that what really gets people engaged when it comes to slashing energy use is aggressive marketing campaigns. After a hot summer, the average person is getting back into routines of school and work, not tracking energy savings. (The US is celebrating energy conservation month now.)

While buying a new EnergyStar appliance at Home Depot on a MasterCard means that 10 percent will go to Habitat for Humanity during Energy Awareness Month, most US consumers are more likely to wait for Black Friday or post-holiday sales to replace a washing machine. Experts believe a better strategy would be for utilities around the country to have marketing pushes to let people know about home energy audits, rebates and tax breaks for retrofits -- or to host series of neighborhood meetings about how to save energy in the home, as suggested by LBNL in its study.

One comment on an energy website had this comment from a reader: ‘The way to inspire people might be to show the difference between before and after energy bills. American culture is slowly transitioning from the mindset of energy as a disposable resource. Up to this time we havent given it much thought, just plug it in and it magically works, cheap. Now that energy costs are going up we are re-thinking that slowly but surely. My combined electric, gas and water bill is under $100 a month, I know some people that are half of that. It doesnt take much to make it happen other than a few minor house upgrades and more importantly, a revised mindset in regards to energy use conciousness.’

Besides the glitz of advertising, how many of us (whether in the US or India) would really buy a product simply beause of the marketing? But again, will we change voluntarily unless we are pushed into it, by way of a steep energy price rise?

27 pc food produced in US wasted

Stretching the Occam's Razor (principle that simplest explanation is often the most correct one) and applying it to the problem of energy, one can say that the simplest solutions are often the simplest ones. You don't have enough energy? Simple - conserve. And how best to conserve? By reducing your waste!

A new study is reported in the ACS’ semi-monthly journal Environmental Science and Technology and states that the United States could immediately save the energy equivalent of about 350 million barrels of oil a year simply by being careful about how much food they produce and consume.

The analysis of wasted food found that the US wasted about 2030 trillion BTU (British thermal unit) of energy in 2007, the equivalent of 350 million barrels of oil or about 2 percent of the countries annual energy consumption. And if that astounds you, wait. The wasted energy calculated here is a conservative estimate both because the food waste data are incomplete and outdated and the energy consumption data for food service and sales are incomplete!

The study found that it takes the equivalent of about 1.4 billion barrels of oil to produce, package, prepare, preserve and distribute a year’s worth of food in the United States. This totalled between 8 to 16 percent of the nation’s energy consumption in 2007.

But despite this massive allocation of energy, 27 percent of the food prepared and distributed is wasted each year

New power saving technique

A new magnetic device being tested promises peak power saving of 39 percent. The device not only conserves electricity, but produces far less heat and produces less electromagnetic interference than conventional technologies.

Designed by the Tokyo Institute of Technology and fine-tuned by researchers at MERSTech in partnership with the ONR Global's office in Tokyo, the Magnetic Energy Recovery Switch (MERS) harnesses and recycles residual magnetic power that is produced by electrical current.

After working with several overhead fluorescent lights that require 24-hour power, scientists proved that the MERS technology significantly reduced lighting energy consumption.

Policies to drive energy efficiency

Whether it be about tackling climate change or energy crisis, the simplest and most obvious solution has simply not been pursued as earnestly as desired. And that is energy efficiency.

"Efficiency Works" a new report by Bracken Hendricks, Bill Campbell, and Pen Goodale, finds that a straightforward set of policies aimed at upgrading just 40 percent of the residential and commercial building stock in the United States would create 625,000 sustainable jobs, save 64 billion dollars and bring in large investments.

Some 10 key energy efficiency policies that states in the US are adopting or experimenting with to varying degrees are already providing examples of how policy-driven energy efficiency markets can create a new industry to power job creation, combat global warming and lower a nation's reliance on foreign fossil fuels.

Some of these are worth being considered by any country. For instance, policies that not only require utility companies to meet a set portion of demand from renewable energy but also include energy efficiency as a qualifying form of clean energy. And policies that establish markets for tradable clean energy credits and include energy efficiency as a qualifying clean energy resource.

Having specific standards that require utilities to plan for meeting a percentage of future growth in demand through energy efficiency instead of increasing supply; decouplingd utility rate structures, where utilities' rates are adjusted to compensate for changes in the volume of energy sold, removing the structural disincentive to conserve energy; penalties for noncompliance with energy efficiency standards, etc are some policies worth pursuing.

Any thoughts?