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Energy Efficiency: Achieving the Potential

By Steven Chu, U.S. Secretary of Energy For the next few decades, energy efficiency is one of the lowest cost options for reducing US carbon emissions. Many studies have concluded that energy efficiency can save both energy and money. For example, a recent McKinsey report calculated the potential savings assuming a 7% discount rate, no price on carbon and using only “net present value positive” investments. It found the potential to reduce consumer demand by about 23% by 2020 and reduce GHG emissions by 1.1 gigatons each year–at a net savings of US$ 680 billion. Likewise, the National Academies found in 2009 that accelerated deployment of cost-effective technologies in buildings could reduce energy use by 25-30% in 2030. The report stated: “Many building efficiency technologies represent attractive investment opportunities with a payback period of two to three years.” Some economists, however, don’t believe these analyses; they say there aren’t 20-dollar bills lying around waiting to be picked up. If the savings were real, they argue, why didn’t the free market vacuum them up? The skeptics are asking a fair question: why do potential energy efficiency savings often go unrealized? I asked our team at the Department of Energy to review […]

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Weekly Clean Energy Roundup: March 17, 2010

First Solar Developing 550MW Solar Project in California Chevron to Build 1MW CPV Plant in New Mexico Interior Dept: $3.7M to 13 Tribes for Renewable Energy Utilities in California, Ohio Test Energy Storage FTC Proposes EnergyGuide Labels on TVs Poll Finds Clean Energy, not Efficiency is Solution to Energy, Climate Woes First Solar Developing a 550 MW Solar Project in California On March 9, First Solar announced a power purchase agreement to supply California’s Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) with 300 MW of renewable energy from Desert Sunlight, a 550 MW utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) solar facility the company is developing in Southern California. The other 250 MW portion of the project is already under contract to Southern California Edison (SCE). The facility, near Desert Center in eastern Riverside County, California, will produce enough power for about 160,000 homes, using the company’s thin-film PV modules made from cadmium telluride. The Bureau of Land Management fast tracked the project’s permit application – First Solar plans to break ground this year and to complete it as early as 2013. First Solar recently completed the largest PV project in the state, and the second largest in the country, a 21 MW power plant […]

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