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Clean Power Plan Arms Race

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government No Comments
I imagine the EPA is working feverishly on their final ruling for the Clean Power Plan (proposed under the Clean Air Act), due this June.  Meanwhile, many states and one prominent company, Murray Energy, are digging in to do legal battle for decades to come, possibly.  The “possibly” part of that would occur if the Clean Power Plan is upheld by the courts.  That will result in endless litigation.  If it is thrown out, the federal government may have to actually pass laws for once – you know, the political process. Here is the problem with the Clean Air Act:…
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Clean Power Plan & 111(d)

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government One Comment
Last week I attended the Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance (SEEA) conference in Atlanta.  With that, I have a confession to make: I rarely sit and listen to speakers or take notes either because there is nothing new, and there is rarely any sort of technical or programmatic breakthrough to learn from.  There are certainly differences in programs, but it comes down to blocking and tackling, so to speak – the basics – hard work, communication, persistence, trust, and so on.  A couple speakers pulled me away from my work.  One was a talk by Tim Echols, Commissioner from the Georgia…
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Why Is Electricity Use Flat? – A Different Look

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Utility Stuff 3 Comments
As readers of this blog are sure to know, electricity consumption growth has leveled out and essentially disappeared in recent years. This is celebrated, but I say, beware of what you wish for – kind of like winning the lottery. It may seem wonderful until reality and the unintended consequences set in. But I want to do a deeper dive into why energy consumption in buildings, in particular electricity, is on the fall. As ACEEE reported back in February of this year, Why is Electricity Use No Longer Growing, efficiency is a significant contributing factor. I agree. But I also…
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Federal Fuel Mileage Con Job

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government No Comments
A few weeks back I lampooned the federal government’s desire to implement energy efficiency policy, and in particular, Shaheen Portman.  You can view the key elements of that in that post, but one thing mysteriously missing is automobile mileage – the crown jewel of federal energy efficiency regulations.  Why is this?  I don’t know, but one thing I can explain is how these regulations are as modern as building codes for ancient pyramids.  Nobody knows why pyramids were ever built, but I’m sure it involved male instincts prior to the development of calculus.  For example, put a guy in charge of…
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Governors Crush Shaheen-Portman

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government 5 Comments
This week’s post is brought to you by the National Resources Defense Council.  Yes indeed; states are leading the way in energy efficiency and  considering the bumbling federal government that can’t get anything done or come close to living within its means,  supporters of Shaheen-Portman in our industry should think long and hard or short and easy about what they wish for. Most states have a genuine interest in the well being of their citizens across the entire state.  They balance their budgets, sometimes by force (law), and this is also the expectation of state governments and citizens alike.  Expectations…
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f(x) where x = Energy Cost

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government One Comment
It has been a while since I’ve picked on an economist for his or her seemingly foolish statements and theories (other than the Ben Bernanke but I’ll get back to him later). Ed Dolan, university / government wonk, states in an interview that there is no lock-step relationship between economic growth and energy cost.  Rather, the world’s best performing economies have substantially increased their energy efficiency in terms of energy consumption per gross domestic product (GDP).  He states while the OECD countries (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) - about 35 mostly free countries – increased efficiency by an average…
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Retro-commissioning Savings

Old School EE

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Retrocommissioning (RCx), Tax Stuff, Utility Stuff One Comment
Forging on from last week’s Arthur Fonzarelli crash into Arnold’s chicken stand, this week I will posit some challenges and problems presented with state takeovers of energy efficiency programs.  Per last week’s post, Wisconsin has fallen from 8th place in the nation to 17th place since the state essentially took over its energy efficiency programs.  This is according to the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy, ACEEE, a well respected national think tank (my term) and advocacy organization for energy efficiency. One problem is the money moves further away from where it is collected.  The further program spending is…
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Adrift

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Utility Stuff 2 Comments
Being a critic and a manager, I always love it when somebody else does my work for me and I can lay low, because I often feel like a grumpy old man.  For example, some of my guys are tougher and harsher than I am on issues, people, and their work both inside and outside the company. On a related note, there is a big difference between whining and complaining.  I use a more vivid term for the latter, and I’ll leave it to the reader to guess what that is.  How does one define the difference?  The difference is…
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Tea Party On, Dudes

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Utility Stuff No Comments
Jeff Erickson of Navigant Consulting presented an interesting paper at last week’s American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) Summer Study for Buildings.  The title was, “Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party Battle over Energy Efficiency.”  I thought it was just clever (aka bait and switch) advertising, but the presentation featured, almost exclusively, how the free market, small government tea party and the profit-bad, regulation-good occupiers might view energy efficiency. The tea party would favor consumer choice for incandescent light bulbs and gas guzzlers over government regulation of these common, and other uncommon for that matter, consumer goods. …
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Nationalize EE – Boooo!

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Utility Stuff 2 Comments
The widget world of energy efficiency is governed by the Technical Resource Manual, or TRM.  A technical resource manual includes energy calculations requiring baselines and efficient equipment specifications, hours of use, and duty cycles.  It also includes cost differences for baseline and efficient equipment.  Costs and savings from TRMs are used across the board for mass market, and even in some cases large, far too large in my opinion, equipment. Technical resource manuals may be held at the state level, which may apply to all programs/utilities in the state, or at the utility level.  Some in our industry are advocating…
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