Energy Efficiency

by Michelle de Arruda

Panelists:

Cyntia Adams – Local Energy Alliance Program (LEAP)

Ben Bixby – My Energy

Matt Short – Johnson Controls

Dale Stanton-Hoyle – CleaResult

Moderator: Casey Lichtendahl

In this blog, my plan is to present a brief summary of the discussion that took place at the Energy Efficiency Panel through the main questions addressed at the panel.

In this panel we learned that the biggest challenges we face today for a scenario of more efficient use of energy are to create a regulatory environment that fosters such change and to grow public education in this matter.

What’s the role of government policy?

Government policy can impact in three ways: technology, building code and incentivizing.

Policies should help the consolidation of energy efficiency, but regulatory environment differs from state to state. So, in the US policies should aim to leverage successes starting at state level.

What government should be doing?

According to our panelists, the government should increase energy efficiency standards, “bark together” and portray an all-in commitment to the issue as a public policy need because it costs much less (around 1/3) to develop energy efficiency solutions than to build power plants.

Where’s the industry heading?

We already see some examples of smart grid application; nevertheless the available options today still don’t have a satisfactory high resolution. In addition, many companies are already engaging in cutting unnecessary energy use mainly for cost cutting purposes.

However, our panelists believe that for a greater leap, we need to have software components or intelligent software to help people adapt and be more efficient without having to think about it and greater ubiquity of highly resolution data.

What’s the role of human behavior?

Budgets are being squeezed and if each person saves only a bit (2% to 3%) on his/her energy consumption, we can have a tremendous impact. Additionally, US households pay very little for their energy use; in other words, energy bills still represent a very little part of their monthly budget. Finally, one of the panelists also pointed out the issue of the American households attitude towards consumption – “I have the right to keep things on.”

In order to change consumer behavior, advocates of energy efficiency should focus on efficiency rather than focus on sacrifice, emphasizing the positive aspects. The question must be reframed to “how we do it?”

Finally, according to our panelists, MBAs have to challenge convention wisdom and drive change in the energy industry.