Promote Energy Conservation

Energy efficiency and conservation have the potential to reduce total energy usage by several percentage points and the use of fossil fuels by an even larger percentage.  All forms of energy conservation, be it recycling, reuse, energy efficient lighting, hybrid vehicles, carpooling, public transportation, high efficiency appliances, programmable thermostats, or just the simple, common sense things like turning out lights, turning up the thermostat in summer and down in winter, lowering the temperature on your water heater, washing dishes by hand instead of in the dishwasher, combining trips, keeping tires properly inflated, and driving less, are laudable efforts that should be strongly encouraged.  Numerous government programs already exist to promote energy efficiency and conservation technologies and techniques such as Energy Star, Smart Grid, Clean Energy, and energy saving home and commercial building practices.  Only the areas where we seem to be lagging are addressed here.

Our main objective is to reduce the total demand for energy.  We can not only accomplish that, but we can help the economy at the same time by increasing consumer spending on manufactured goods using incentives, such as tax deductions or tax credits, to promote the expansion of conservation and efficiency improvement efforts.  This can be accomplished with the following:

Encourage the purchase of fuel-efficient vehicles
Provide more incentives for first time purchasers of hybrid, electric, hydrogen, compressed air, or other unconventionally fueled vehicles, provide incentives for converting an existing vehicle to unconventional fuels, and consider incentives to encourage the trade-in of a "gas guzzler" for any new vehicle that gets double the miles per gallon of the trade-in or 35 mpg, whichever is higher. There is still an incentive program in place that provides tax credits for purchasing specific vehicles.  It was successful in bringing many new models to market, but almost all of the credits have since been phased out.  A new program is required that focuses on decreasing total fossil fuel usage by increasing the total number of alternative fuel vehicles in use with significant incentives and also encourages replacing low gas mileage conventional vehicles currently on the road with new higher mileage conventional vehicles with smaller incentives.

Encourage home and business energy efficiency improvements
Provide more incentives to encourage the replacement of older, less efficient heating, air conditioning, and hot water systems with new, high efficiency models and to upgrade insulation, roofing, doors and windows.  Current incentives are very limited and should be increased as well as expanded to include refrigerators, washers, dryers, dishwashers, ceiling fans, and even some types of landscaping.

Many power companies already offer low or no interest loans to upgrade certain appliances, free audits of your home's energy efficiency, and inserts with their monthly bills offering conservation tips and other information.  We should provide incentives to encourage all utility companies to offer those services as well as free upgrades to programmable thermostats and free water heater temperature adjustments.  Should a home energy audit detect a significant problem, provide increased incentives for making the indicated improvements.  We should also provide the utility companies with useful conservation information to incorporate with their billing inserts that is coordinated with corresponding public service advertising to make it more effective and to reach more people.

Compact fluorescent lights (CFL) are much more energy efficient than regular incandescent bulbs.  Newer LED light bulbs are comparably priced to CFL, are even more energy efficient than CFL, and do not release the hazardous waste mercury if accidentally broken.  LED bulb use should be strongly encouraged with regulations requiring some percentage of the lighting in federal buildings be produced from standard sized LED bulbs and other LED lighting systems to help increase their acceptance and to reduce the cost to consumers even further by guaranteeing a market for higher volume production.

Encourage co-generation in homes and businesses with waste heat
Provide incentives to encourage the use of waste heat to increase efficiency.  Buildings with gas or oil furnaces or boilers can often install a capability to reduce the wasted heat or to capture some of it to use for some other purpose such as generating electricity and heating or preheating hot water.  We should strongly encourage the use of co-generation capability and waste heat reduction wherever it is appropriate with incentives such as tax credits.

Expand recycling programs
Recycling saves energy, landfill space, and natural resources as well as creating jobs and reducing air and water pollution.  About half of Americans now participate in at least some recycling efforts and about 30% of recyclable products are currently recycled.  Many more people and businesses would participate if curbside pickup was available or if recycling was mandatory.  State and local recycling programs should be strongly encouraged by offering incentives, such as grants and loan guarantees, to develop mandatory recycling programs for households and businesses and provide curbside pickup for various types of recyclables such as paper, plastic, metal, glass, used oils, yard debris, and eventually food waste or other biodegradables.

Reward innovation
Sponsor competitions with cash prizes for meeting specific goals (like the Ansari X Prize).  Major improvements in electric motor efficiency, energy storage techniques, reduction of vampire loads and line losses, and dozens of other areas could be the subject of various energy efficiency competitions.  The same type of competitions should be used with the other initiatives of this plan to help find innovative solutions for solving problems with, or improving the efficiency of, all forms of energy generation, storage, or consumption.