The OurEnergyLibrary aggregates and indexes publicly available fact sheets, journal articles, reports, studies, and other publications on U.S. energy topics. It is updated every week to include the most recent energy resources from academia, government, industry, non-profits, think tanks, and trade associations. Suggest a resource by emailing us at info@ourenergypolicy.org.
Resource Library
101 to 110 of 1132 item(s) were returned.
Many analysts have argued that energy efficiency investments offer an enormous “win-win” opportunity to both reduce negative externalities and save money. This overview paper presents a simple model of investment in energy-using capital stock with two types of market failures: first, uninternalized externalities from energy consumption, and second, forces such as imperfect information that cause consumers and firms not to exploit privately-profitable energy efficiency investments. The model clarifies that only if the second type of market failure cannot be addressed directly through mechanisms such as information provision, energy efficiency subsidies and standards may be merited. We therefore review the empirical …
View Full ResourceThe Obama Administration believes strongly that the United States must lead the clean energy economy of the 21st century. When more of our electricity comes from clean energy, our economy will be more stable, our country more secure, our people healthier, and our environment more sustainable. In addition, building a robust clean energy industry will help create the high-paying, high-technology jobs our country’s future requires.…
View Full ResourceEnergy efficiency is an over-rated policy tool when it comes to cutting energy use and CO2 emissions— that’s the basic message promoted by the US think tank the Breakthrough Institute (BTI), and amplified in major news outlets like the New Yorker and the New York Times. Their logic is that every action to conserve energy through efficient use leads to an opposite reaction to consume more energy—a “rebound” mechanism, which, according to the BTI, can negate as much as 60-100% of saved energy, and in some cases can backfire to increase net energy consumption.
In this research note we refute …
View Full ResourceWe analyze the cost-effectiveness of electric utility ratepayer-funded programs to promote demand-side management (DSM) and energy efficiency (EE) investments. We specify a model that relates electricity demand to previous EE DSM spending, energy prices, income, weather, and other demand factors. In contrast to previous studies, we allow EE DSM spending to have a potential long-term demand effect and explicitly address possible endogeneity in spending. We find that current period EE DSM expenditures reduce electricity demand and that this effect persists for a number of years. Our findings suggest that ratepayer-funded DSM expenditures between 1992 and 2006 produced a central estimate …
View Full ResourcePublic policies to promote the diffusion of energy-efficient technology for providing energy services in residential and commercial buildings, which were introduced in the United States in the 1970s, are receiving new attention as a means of reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Energy efficiency (EE) is currently undergoing a dramatic resurgence, stimulated by its potential contribution to CO2 emissions reduction. In 2009, prior to the U.S. House of Representative’s approval of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454, often referred to as Waxman-Markey after its two primary sponsors) in June, the combined increase in federal EE funding—in the administration’s …
View Full ResourceEnergy efficiency is recognized as one of the nation’s most valuable untapped energy resources. The National Action Plan for Energy Efficiency states, “Improving energy efficiency in our homes, businesses, governments, and industries … is one of the most constructive, cost effective ways to address the challenges of high energy prices, energy security and independence, air pollution, and global climate change (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2006). According to various sources, the United States could meet 25-40% of energy demand through energy efficiency (Granade, 2009; American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, 2010). Idaho has recognized the overall cost-effectiveness of energy efficiency as …
View Full ResourceThis report documents energy efficiency improvements being implemented at airports across the country that are low cost and short payback by means of a survey, interviews, and a literature review. It targets small airport terminal managers, staff, consultants, and other stakeholders interested in energy efficiency.
Craig R. Lau, Joel T. Stromgren, and Daniel J. Green, Miller Dunwiddie Architecture, Minneapolis, Minnesota, collected and synthesized the information and wrote the report. The members of the topic panel are acknowledged on the preceding page. This synthesis is an immediately useful document that records the practices that were acceptable within the limitations of the …
View Full ResourceThis report catalogs by sector—buildings, transportation, industrial, and power—energy efficiency policies at the federal, state, and local levels, and identifies some prominent policy trends. Four key findings emerged from this report: 1) leadership on energy efficiency is necessary—and is found—at each level of government; 2) there is no widely accepted methodology for evaluating energy efficiency policies; 3) coordination among the three levels of government—and across sectors—is increasingly important, and there are opportunities to significantly improve policy performance through a unified strategy; and 4) there are efficiencies to be gained by informing policies in one sector with experience from others.…
View Full ResourceThis report catalogs by sector—buildings, transportation, industrial, and power—energy efficiency policies at the federal, state, and local levels, and identifies some prominent policy trends.
…
View Full ResourceAn analytical job creation model for the US power sector from 2009 to 2030 is presented. The model synthesizes data from 15 job studies covering renewable energy (RE), energy efficiency (EE), carbon capture and storage (CCS) and nuclear power. The paper employs a consistent methodology of normalizing job data to average employment per unit energy produced over plant lifetime. Job losses in the coal and natural gas industry are modeled to project net employment impacts. Benefits and drawbacks of the methodology are assessed and the resulting model is used for job projections under various renewable portfolio standards (RPS), EE, and …
View Full Resource