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Energy Efficiency

Jul 14
Love0

Major Tom to Ground Control – Enough Already

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant One Comment
I think the time when we pine for simpler days may be just around the corner.  The rage in recent years has been smart grid and more recently, smart home controllers and learning thermostats.  The problems with these things are multiple. They are too complex. Who wants to be tethered to their coffee pot, stereo, and porch light 24/7? They may even result in greater peak demand and energy use than “back in the day”. On a related note, everyone knows about the hazards of using a cell phone for talking, texting, checking email and the weather forecast while driving. …
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Jul 07
Love0

Misunderstood Uranium – Boogeyman and Small Boxes

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 4 Comments
If we are to get serious about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we must put down the mud balls, enjoy some sacred-cow burgers, burn the little boxes in which we confine ourselves, and maybe have a little counseling about that boogeyman under the bed. This post first addresses the little boxes and may assuage fear of the boogeyman. A major step in the right direction is a rebirth of nuclear power as discussed in a recent post, The Nuclear Option. One thing is for sure, if you find yourself in any sort of reader comment and chat session, there is apparently…
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Jun 30
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Steps too Far- Don’t Forget the Customer!

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant No Comments
I haven’t taken any marketing courses like I haven’t taken political science courses – but this does not mean I, or anyone else, can’t learn some things about these two, or any other, subjects. The one thing I learned about marketing, and have repeated a thousand times within our organization is: it doesn’t matter what we think or what our opinions are for certain matters. We must view things from the other side. What does the buyer think? What are their “pain points”, concerns, anxieties, problems and bottlenecks? I think it is safe to assume that the vast majority of…
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Jun 23
Love0

Cooling System Temperature Control- No Savings

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 5 Comments
Let’s skip the energy supply side this week and talk about thermostats used for cooling. Let’s broaden the discussion to include both programmable thermostats and “smart” or “learning” thermostats. The Nest falls into the latter group. Speaking for the Nest, which I have controlling my heating and cooling, it will learn user patterns by when, and to what level, the user changes temperature setpoints. It also secretly learns the users’ occupancy patterns by keeping an infrared eye on them. For instance, if the thermostat is in a heavy traffic area, it will learn to expect a lot of traffic, and…
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Jun 16
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The Nuclear Option – Show Me the Love

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 2 Comments
The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) announcement a couple weeks ago to decrease carbon emissions from power generating plants by 30% has kicked up a lot of cheering, but also mudslinging and absurd statements. As an engineer, I am an emotionless number crunching, skeptical coot constantly in search of reality and facts – trying to illuminate others who are swayed by hype, 24/7 news, and the internet. Opinions may change, and should, based on facts that do not. Friday morning I was stretching in my hotel room and reading The Wall Street Journal on my iPad when I came across this…
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Jun 09
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Carbon Abatement – Is that Pulp in Your Teeth?

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 3 Comments
Easy peasy lemon squeezy, to repeat a phrase of one rant fan a while back – that describes carbon slayers’ victory laps in the past couple years.  I am talking about the natural gas boom introduced by the development to near perfection of the hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling methods used on private land, mostly east of the Mississippi River.  Pile on top of this last Monday’s release of the EPA’s carbon goals by 2030, and we have about three or four weeks of blog material.  So, let’s get started. Natural gas is a wonderfully versatile energy source.  It doesn’t…
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Jun 02
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Energy Program Evaluation, Not Activism

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 4 Comments
In my day, we didn’t have peewee soccer, football, gymnastics, or tee-ball.  We had to improvise and make up game rules to play two-on-two football.  We had no gear; not even the cheap plastic crap from Sears.  We set the lawn mower as low as it would go to cut the sidelines and goal lines and made up the rules as we went.  We were a bunch of hayseeds throwing a rubber football around, inflicting bone-on-bone pain to each other, pretending to be in the NFL – and we liked it!This may sound like the Grumpy Old Man, but it…
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May 27
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Energy Efficiency Under Attack – Stalin Would be Proud?

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 3 Comments
Last week I attended the Midwest Energy Efficiency Alliance’s (MEEA) annual meeting for its members in Chicago.  It was well worth my time and expense.  As one might guess, it featured sessions of accomplishments, organization metrics, and feedback sessions for improvement – what’s important to members.  I think many attendees would agree the premier session of the day was “Energy Efficiency Under Attack”, namely in the Midwest battleground states of Indiana and Ohio.  What an irony, as this has been the subject of a couple recent posts, The Case for Energy Efficiency – That Our Mothers Understand and Failing Energy…
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May 19
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Failing Energy Efficiency- From Russia, With Love

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 3 Comments
A couple weeks ago, you may have noticed we published The Case for Energy Efficiency – That Our Mothers Understand not entirely out of coincidence, just before Mother’s Day.  That described how to keep messaging simple so common folk can understand the benefits.  This week we feature the opposite – how not to promote energy efficiency.  The first and dominant rule is to avoid anything that has a whiff of politics.I declare myself an armchair amateur political scientist having followed and read much about politics for more than 25 years.  The political spectrum is not a straight line in my…
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May 12
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Electric Utility- A CEO’s Many Bosses

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Utility Stuff One Comment
I’ve come to realize over the course of many years that the electric utility business is fascinatingly challenging.  No other industry that I can think of has more bosses than an electric utility.  In fact, high ranking utility people promoted from Executive Vice President to President/CEO leave a job with one boss and accept a job with dozens of bosses. A utility must take orders from Washington.  Recently, the Supremes overturned a lower court ruling that effectively said, Michigan, you don’t have to listen to New Jersey to set limits on your emissions.  Now Mr. CEO, you do.The utility pleas…
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All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

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