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Energy Efficiency

May 05
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The Case for Energy Efficiency – That Our Mothers Understand

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Utility Stuff 11 Comments
If energy efficiency programs are considered and measured to be a good thing in some states, why are they not good for all, or nearly all, states?  Even the utilities we work with in Minnesota and Iowa with programs since the mid 1980s believe in energy efficiency for their customers and their employing utilities.  I get the same vibe from California utilities, for another example.  However, like national elections, all eyes are presently on Ohio – a battleground state for energy efficiency. But this rant is about what happened in Indiana and how to combat it in Ohio.  In case…
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Apr 28
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Utility Death Spiral? The Duck has Your Back

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Utility Stuff 15 Comments
There is weekly, if not daily, chatter about the end of the monopolistic electric utility systems we have today.  They call it the utility death spiral, and it goes like this: Distributed generation, also known as DG, which includes rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) systems will compete directly with utility power. Utilities are stuck with fixed rate base for which they need to be paid through purchased energy from customers. Photovoltaic may produce competitively-priced energy for some customers after the bevy of incentives and tax breaks.  Home-generated electricity drives down the utility’s revenue. Utility raises prices to cover their fixed cost.…
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Apr 21
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Heat Pumps – Not a Weapon of Mass Destruction

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 2 Comments
In the 1970s, before STAR WARS, my childhood fantasy sci-fi favorite was Planet of the Apes.  Like STAR WARS, there were about five movies in the series, but I only remember the story lines of the first two.  Three guys travel through time in a space ship, supposedly light years away.  They land on a planet that is actually California, ironically (can tell from the landscape, and hey, movies were once made in California).  It is several centuries into the future as it turns out, and on the Planet of the Apes, the apes talked (in English of course) and…
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Apr 14
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Efficiency by Wi Fi – and Other Tricks

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant One Comment
The old cliché, “be careful what you wish for because you just might get it”, may be coming to energy efficiency portfolios everywhere.  It may be an unstoppable juggernaut that our industry will have little control over (pun alert).  Instead, it will drive implementers into ambulance chasing and drive evaluators whacky.  What is it?  Controls, especially Wi-Fi consumer control systems. Millenials, bear with me as I write like an old man, but I will avoid discussions of snow, hills, and walking to school (if you’re over 40 and from the Midwest, you know what I mean). 1970s: AM radio, broadcast…
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Apr 07
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Attribution and Net to Gross – Pop Tarts or Oatmeal?

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 4 Comments
Last week I attended the ACEEE National Symposium on Market Transformation in Baltimore.  Learning and information gathering from conference sessions are typically down the list of reasons I attend conferences.  This conference however turned out to be very beneficial on both of those counts.  In particular, the net-to-gross (NTG) football, as described in last August’s Energy Program Evaluation Asylum post, was uncased for another game.  This time I learned something. One session featured heavy doses of program attribution, and of course, the NTG football.  Speakers included Bob Wirtshafter from Wirtshafter Associates and Mike Messenger from Itron.  Both gentlemen demonstrated the…
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Mar 31
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Industrial Efficiency – Beyond the Librarian

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant One Comment
Sometimes I go into writing a rant with a blank slate.  I’m not fired up about anything.  It’s true.  Then I reach for a report in my pile and start to read the executive summary.  The ideas start falling off the shelf into my cart.  This week’s post is actually sponsored by the Department of Energy:  Industrial Energy Efficiency: Designing Effective State Programs for the Industrial Sector (I think they could use some help with pithier titles). A few weeks back, I wrote about nonsensical reasons industrial customers want to opt out of energy efficiency programs.  That was specifically in…
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Mar 24
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Customer Engagement – Beyond Beaver Pelts

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant No Comments
Last week I discussed behavior programs but in the larger sense, the fact that energy efficiency programs have traditionally treated people like animals.  They are treated like animals because they are essentially tricked into buying energy efficient appliances and doohickeys in exchange for cash rewards.  With some program exceptions, like custom efficiency and retrocommissioning, customers are not provided with information to make informed decisions. Technology and innovation move much faster outside the utility program space.  For example, nearly all credit cards provide some sort of cash back or other perks that can be equated to dollars.  I leverage my “free”…
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Mar 17
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Behavior Programs – Woof!

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant 2 Comments
I always like it when things converge to demonstrate points I make, after I make them.  Back in August, based on an article that consumers don’t trust savings from home energy audits, I said one reason for this is our industry has treated consumers and customers, in general, like animals.  Boiled down in simplest terms, customers get a “dumb” award for implementing some type of energy efficient measure.  A dumb award is something you give animals to do tricks or to get them to do what you want them to do.  They don’t know why.  All they know is, if…
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Mar 10
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Energy Efficiency Challenge – A Felonious Case of Acne

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant No Comments
Last week I read AESP Board Chair, Sara Van de Grift’s monthly letter/email to AESPers (if you are not a subscriber, get with it: aesp.org).  She describes diminishing opportunities for energy efficiency due to the industry’s addiction to widget-based programs {my phrase), but that there are still opportunities with homes and commercial and industrial facilities operation, and of course a few widgets here and there, like the Nest thermostat.  She ends by asking, “Are you up to the challenge” ?Hell yeah!  I’m also thinking that capturing savings isn’t the challenge in my view.  The challenge is convincing stakeholders, particularly governors…
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Mar 03
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Decoupling – A Love Story

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Utility Stuff 2 Comments
Perhaps I am naïve, but to be more effective it seems interveners would do well to understand motives of profit-driven enterprises and their customers.  Consider, for example, this recent article in Midwest Energy News lamenting CenterPoint Energy’s withdrawal from decoupling.  You may recall a post I made eons ago where I described the perverse impact of decoupling on prices for consumers.  Allow me to recap. Utilities have fixed cost of hardware and labor to deliver energy to customers – poles, wires, pipes, transformers, compressors, trucks, etc.  This stuff makes up the rate base and fixed cost of energy delivery.  They…
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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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