As administrations and congresses come and go, one thing remains the same: “there is no clear energy policy”, and “we need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil”. Neither one is ever addressed. First, what the heck is a clear energy policy anyway and are we sure we want one? When the government messes with any market, the result is always negative for consumers and in some cases bordering on catastrophe. The only exception I see is utilities, which lend themselves to monopolistic efficiency. You may need to lie down after that head-spinning oxymoron. But seriously, in order to have…
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I’ve spent most of my career in energy efficiency marketing and selling energy efficiency to clients and anyone who might listen. Come to think of it, I marketed and sold to a lot of people who didn’t listen, to be sure. So no one is safe. A major component is removing barriers; also known as excuses, and sometimes bad ones. Selling EE is very challenging but rewarding and it’s the way it should be rather than jamming laws down the gizzards of the public by the dysfunctional, corrupt, and clueless bunch in Washington. Last week a guy actually presented a…
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It has been quite a year for protests. From Glenn Beck (although he swears it wasn’t a protest) and Jon Stewart (ditto) taking up the entire National Mall in Washington, to the months long battle royale in the 85 square miles surrounded by reality – also known as Madison, WI. For what it’s worth, you can check out the spin in both directions regarding the recent jobs report and Wisconsin. More time is needed to draw any conclusions. The primary problem of course in all these cases, including the greased pig wrasslin match in Washington in recent weeks, is governments…
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As you must know, last week congress failed to pass a repeal of the incandescent light bulb with their “Better Use of Light Bulbs” (BULB) act. There you go right there - God awful marketing. Who comes up with this junk? Why does every bill have to be called an “act”? It’s like every scandal has “gate” attached to it. Do the Millennials even know where gate comes from? Climategate. Memogate. Blagogate. Filegate. Macacagate. Monicagate. Nannygate (2 each). Travelgate. Troopergate. Guess who has the most gates. I don’t know but I’ll bet Bill and Hillary have to be in the…
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A couple years ago I was attending an ACEEE conference and I was speaking with a gentleman who with his company was a program implementer. I remember him saying that program evaluators should always work for the regulators. If evaluators worked for the program implementer, which in many cases is the utility directly, the results would be biased. I thought, no way. There is no way our profession is to be swayed by the desire to not make waves with the client. As I say on our staff page I will tell people what they need to know, not what…
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My mother informed me during my annual July 4 visit to her house that I’m getting more gray hair. Thanks for that information, Mom. I can do things such as exercise and stretch to keep my body in a youngish condition but I’ve never heard of anything not fake that keeps non-silver hair growing from my melon like a chia pet. As I’ve gotten older I have taken a much greater interest in history to determine cause and effect. While figures never lie and liars never figure, or something to that affect, I think I can look at data and…
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Warning: I am not a CPA or tax attorney, and I do not have 63 years available to determine for myself that all contents of this rant are correct. A couple years ago I wrote an Energy Brief about the need for life cycle cost analysis to make the right decisions for selecting the best option for an energy project. Since that time, we haven’t exactly been living up to this ideal, in large part because we’ve been doing a lot of work for profit-driven enterprises. Life cycle cost analysis for non-profits is pretty easy. It includes first cost, borrowing…
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Many states have opt-out provisions for major consumers of energy so these consumers do not have to pay into EE programs. The reasoning typically goes something like this: They are major users of energy so they naturally are going to cut energy cost to increase profit; they can take care of themselves They shouldn’t have to provide outside subsidies to these programs They don’t participate in the programs so why should they have to pay in The facts are these concessions are required to get EE laws (bills) through legislatures and/or governors. Consider that typical opt-out regulations require that these…
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As my crop of silver hair continues to expand, I have become more of a historian, particularly when it comes to cause and effect, and peoples’ behavior. I step back and observe what is happening and what has happened as a result of this or that policy. Theories are nice, and they may be well thought out and make sense but if they fail miserably, should we double down and try it again? Policy isn’t like launching rockets or breaking the speed of sound. For those things, you can test, observe failure/problems and make adjustments. For example, Chuck Yeager was…
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The thing that pushed me over the edge this week was a fine blog post by Elisa Wood. My comment was that Gavin Newsom’s list of jobs created by resources including coal, nuclear, wind, solar, and EE, does not include return on investment. Only EE has return on investment for the end user. All other sources cost the end user, not save the end user money. But this is not the topic of the day. I am not a tech geek. I just want things that are stable, reliable, and relatively fast and snappy. I will pay for it. I…
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