People say we should ignore polls; the country should make decisions based on pure science or pure economics. But the reality is that governments and companies take their cues from public opinion, want to be seen on the “right” side and certainly not in the forefront of something divisive, even if is beneficial. Several studies show a “green gap” between what people tell pollsters about living sustainably and actually doing it. Americans say they want to live sustainably and are willing to pay a premium to do so. But purchase behavior at the store is different. Price and value, not sustainability, rule.

A comprehensive survey by Ogilvy & Mather showed 4 categories of Americans:

• 16% “super greens”, who actually make decisions based on sustainability norms

• 33% “upper middle greens”, who make some decisions based on sustainability

• 33% “lower middle greens”, informed, but make most decisions based on cost

• 18% “green rejectors”.

The problem with the green movement, according to Ogilvy Earth study is that it is too polarized and is trying to counter the green rejectors who are too idealistic to change. The green movement will grow by swaying much of the 33% lower middle greens to be upper middle greens and the 33% upper middle greens to become super greens.
What makes people become more “green”? Two factors: guilt and social costs. If green becomes the norm, people will follow, as they want to show off as “correct” on the issue.

Therefore, to market “green” products better, Ogilvy Earth concluded their research by recommending the 3 P’s: Personal, Plausible, Positive.

• Get away from the “green” tag. Surveys showed that many people perceive that a brand marketed in a highly “green” way is only for the wealthy elite or old hippies, and not for them. Make the product normal and do not scream in big bold letters how green it is. Make prominent that it is a good product that also happens to be good for the environment, if mentioned at all.

• Make it normal. … to be sustainable. Make it personal. On energy bills, there is often a bar graph showing how much electricity you used that month, the same month the year before, and what the “typical” household uses. Surveys show this is very effective in getting people to reduce their electricity usage – that it’s personal and that others use less. Try to do something similar in your messaging.

• Eliminate the “sustainability” tax. Walmart saw that Twinkies were cheaper than apples. How can positive social behavior (eating healthier) succeed when the healthy alternative, already perceived as less satisfying, is also more costly? Walmart made them equal. “Green” cleaning products are perceived as not as effective as conventional ones and more costly. Don’t “tax” virtuous products.

• Bribe shamelessly and punish wisely. Give prizes, rewards for being green. As for “punishment”, one major gym chain charges its members more if they use the gym less than frequent users, hoping to encourage greater use, increasing the chance of renewal. Can something similar happen with “green” products?

• Don’t stop innovating and educating. Introduce new products and designs and educate consumers. Some seek this. For others (lower middle), an innovation may hit home and get them to try things they would not earlier.

• Package normally. Just because a product is “green”, it does not have to be packaged in burlap and colored green. It can still be packaged as stylishly as a non-green product. “Showing” green is outside the norm, which you do not want.

• Hedonism over altruism. Change is more likely occur if glamorous. An example is “organic chocolate”. While this may repel some, this can appealing to people’s strong desires, while assuaging some guilt. Toyota and Ford have marketed their hybrid and electric cars through standard means that it is a good, reliable car with the fact that it pollutes less and saves gasoline costs as a sidelight.

Business Attitudes

According to the Ogilvy Earth studies, businesses are reluctant to go green for a major reason. Managers and the business itself are reluctant to change anything (put their “necks” on the line) for something out of the mainstream without a virtual guarantee of success or major benefit to the company. The company is concerned that either the green efforts will not be appreciated because few people are interested or people will be skeptical about green claims and believe it is greenwashing. It is easier to do nothing.

Present facts of the business benefits of going green to counter worries. The key is not to sell ideology (save the Earth), but instead have a company do good because it will be good for careers and the business. As they get used to the good acts, more will come.

Get more useful information in our blog:

www.CCESworld.com/blog
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This Environmental News for You is meant to provide background on green attitudes. CCES experts can help you in the technical aspects of your sustainability or “green” program.

Let’s face it: it’s tough to sell a corporate “green” program in-house. You know of the many financial advantages for your company if it develops a robust program. But most companies – especially in these tough times – are conservative and don’t want to spend money on a program with even the slightest risk of not meeting goals. The manager recommending the program may put his/her job on the line should that small chance of something going wrong occurs (even if it’s not his/her fault). The status quo is tempting. Here are some ideas on how to frame a program to get senior management buy-in.

It’s all in a name. It’s not fair, but the phrase “green” has lost its cache, perhaps because of the public debate about climate change. Companies are worried about image. Here’s a suggestion. Implementing energy efficiency, et al. is smart operations. Call it the company’s “Smart” program. You would think everyone would favor that!

Keep it simple (and be smart). Don’t try to change the whole company in one year. Just have modest goals. Repeat them and the solutions often, but keep it simple. And monitor and show off the success. Just concentrate on one or two items only (reduce electricity, fuel, or water), and even then only one small portion of the item (lighting, fleet). Senior management has so much on their plate. They will want to know the progress on the program, but feed it to them gradually and simply.

Make it meaningful, fulfilling, but to the point. Some people are still idealistic and will feel a closeness and loyalty to a company that institutes a “Smart” or “Green” program. Don’t just give the facts about Kwh and boiler upgrades, but frame it in terms people can identify with, such as cars taken off the road, trees planted, and, of course, GHG emissions reduced and money saved (yes, always the bottom line). Getting the company certified “green” in some way, such as LEED certification of a new building, with the nice photo-op can improve the program’s image. And to strengthen your image with your employees, your company can give away an inexpensive gift, such as a compact fluorescent or sensor or arrange a webinar on home energy saving.

Tie the program to other successful ones. Associate your program with other initiatives to help forward it and assure longer-term acceptance. For example, state that the recent gains of the “green” program will reduce expenses so to enable your firm to expand its production or transportation network, etc. or to delve into new markets.

Give the boss what he/she wants. When it comes down to it, your job is to make your bosses and their bosses happy. What’s in it for your bosses? Saving money? A photo opportunity? Keeping up with your competitors? It’s important to know what makes these people tick and the deeper meaning of what they are looking for in the program.

CCES has helped others and can help you develop an organized, responsive, and goal-oriented “Smart” program.

Sept. 6, 2011

The roles of the renewable energy and green manufacturing sectors, the so-called “Clean Economy”, are set to be major issues in next year’s national elections and perhaps even sooner.

While some, such as the Tea Party and other conservatives attack anything to do with climate change and environment (funny, those two concepts appear in my company’s name!), they are more accepting of the “clean” economy, even though it derives from good climate change and environmental practices. Economists of all parties acknowledge that the clean economy is already a fast-growing piece of our attempted economic recovery and that if managed the right way, the US could be world leaders in the field and be able to make more money and develop jobs. Political candidates have been and will continue to have photo-ops in front of US solar panel and wind turbine manufacturing plants. But are currently policies optimizing the growth of the clean economy and its economic and environmental benefits?

We may not have to wait long for an answer. The so-called “Super Committee” which must come up with federal spending cuts by December to head off larger, across-the-board cuts, will need to address energy and clean economy policy issues. First, many environmental groups are lobbying hard to eliminate all energy subsidies or certainly subsidies to industries working in fossil fuel areas and keep and expand incentives for renewable fuels. However, many in the political arena oppose subsidies for renewable fuel development, stating that the federal government should not “pick winners and losers” in the business sphere and, of course, because they favor fossil fuel companies. In the atmosphere of cutting federal spending and heavy lobbying, it will be interesting to see what the Super Committee will recommend in spending cuts affecting the fossil fuel and renewable energy industries.

In fact, the clean economy and energy policy goes to the heart of the matter of the role of federal government. Developing policies to change our entire country’s energy profile from fossil fuels to renewable sources of energy is an enormous task with tremendous potential impacts if done poorly (unemployment, pollution, cost, energy shortages, etc.). This begs for government involvement and reaching out to industry, academics of all types (energy experts, economists, environmentalists, etc.), environmental groups, citizen groups, etc. But we also live in an era where many are calling for less government involvement and have the US take a chance on “the market” to settle what our future energy profile should be. This is a scary thought to not use our best intellectuals to analyze options and to make the best long-term decisions based on the available information.

On July 6, 2011, the USEPA finalized a rule intended to reduce emissions from power plants of fine particulate matter and pollutants that are precursors to smog, indicated by ambient ozone. This new Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) will replace current Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR) on Jan. 1, 2012, and will require 27 states to regulate power plant emissions that are normally transported to and affect other states.

The Problem

Recent medical research is demonstrating that emissions of fine PM (particles with an aerodynamic diameter of 2.5 microns or less, PM2.5) may be causing greater adverse health effects in the U.S. than previously thought. PM2.5 can penetrate past our natural defenses (i.e., bronchial tube cilia) and get lodged within lung vesicles, in many cases leading to their reduced function. Also, with a large surface area to volume, PM2.5 can attract and ultimately transport other toxic pollutants deep into the lungs which can then be exchanged into our bloodstream for transport throughout the body. Some examples include sulfur dioxide (SO2, which in our blood is converted to the acidic form, sulfuric acid) and metals, causing greater exposure to these than in a PM2.5-free environment.

Nitrogen oxides (“NOx”) are known precursors of smog. Catalyzed by the sun, smog is composed of thousands of compounds, many of them toxic. Ozone is a lung irritant.
The Clean Air Act requires states generate real-time data of ambient air concentrations of these pollutants to determine whether regions attain national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) or not. Much of the U.S. is non-attainment for ozone NAAQS, and has been so for decades despite stringent rules to reduce NOx emissions. There is evidence that continued elevated ozone levels are due to transport of NOx from other states, many of which are in attainment with ozone NAAQS and have little reason to stringently regulate emissions from power plants, a major source of these compounds.

What CSAPR Intends to Achieve

Basic information about CSAPR, including which states are covered, may be found at: http://www.epa.gov/airtransport/basic.html. CSAPR requires 23 states to reduce annual SO2 and NOx emissions to help downwind areas attain the PM2.5 NAAQS. 20 states are required to reduce NOX emissions during peak (summer) ozone season only to help downwind areas attain the 8-hour ozone NAAQS. CSAPR divides the states required to reduce SO2 into two groups with Group 1 states required to achieve additional emission reductions by 2014 because of their large contribution to downwind air quality problems.
CSAPR allows allowance trading among covered sources, utilizing an allowance market infrastructure based on allowances given to states based on the estimated baseline downwind impacts of their sources. The final rule allows sources to trade emission allowances with other sources within the same program (i.e., ozone season NOx) in the same or different states, while firmly constraining emission trading that may occur by requiring a strict emission limit in each state based on its budget plus a variability limit.

For prompt implementation, the USEPA is adopting a federal implementation plan (FIP) for each affected state; a state may replace its FIP with a State Implementation Plan (SIP) should it choose by 2014. The rule allows a state to modify its FIP, such as allowance allocations (crediting sources for allowances banked under earlier programs).

What This Means

As is commonplace in these days of political attacks on the USEPA, the agency has published substantial data to justify the new CSAPR on sound economic and health bases. According to the USEPA, CSAPR will, by 2014, reduce SO2 emissions from target power plants by 73% and NOx by 54% (2005 baseline) and annually avoid:
• 13,000 to 34,000 premature deaths
• 19,000 hospital and emergency room visits
• 1.8 million lost work days or school absences

Emission reductions will also lead to improvements in visibility in parks, and increased protection for ecosystems including lakes, streams, coastal waters, and forests.
The USEPA estimates that, by 2014, CSAPR will result in $120-$280 billion in annual health benefits, far outweighing its estimated additional annual cost of $800 million.

Get more useful information in our blog: www.CCESworld.com/blog
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This Environmental News for You is meant to provide background on the new CSAPR. Please obtain specific legal and technical advice before addressing specific provisions. CCES experts can help you in the technical aspects of your Air compliance program.

August 8, 2011

As this blog article is being written, the global economy is in the straits of crisis. The recent downgrading of the rating of U.S. Treasuries by Standard & Poors has caused much consternation, volatility, and insecurity in the world economy. In the U.S. and worldwide, are we heading toward a new, stronger recession? Or a prolonged, slower, more painful recovery? Even minds much smarter than I cannot accurately predict this. So what do companies and people do in the middle of such uncertainty and probable bad times? Invest in ideas that have both short- and long-term benefits for our companies, families, etc. And one of them, I maintain, is the green, clean economy.

The “clean” economy is already an established part of our economy, as many large corporations and municipalities have invested in clean, sustainable, innovative growth ideas, whether it be extensive vegetation roofs in downtown Chicago or the many Fortune 100 firms that have robust sustainability programs adding to their bottom lines.

A report issued in July 2011 by the Brookings Institution focuses on the importance of continued research in and implementation of clean technologies to aid in U.S. economic growth. And in this politically-charged period, it should be noted that the Brookings Institute does not take a political stand and is, in fact, headed by policy makers from both parties. The report (“Sizing the Clean Economy: A National and Regional Green Jobs Assessment”) encourages governmental policies to foster understanding by investors and demand by consumers for clean technologies and other innovations.

The report states that the U.S.’s greatest shortfall is that there is no organized planning for promoting clean technology development, infrastructure, and implementation, unlike in many other countries. The U.S. federal government, while talking up the clean economy, has provided too little material support, such as research grants, tax incentives, and available markets for investors to invest in such enterprises. Currently, there is too much risk for investors that although ideas make sense, they may have no markets to succeed even if technologies are developed.

There is heightened debate about how to promote the clean economy. Should the federal government give direct grants to good, potential technologies, at the risk of some not working out? What criteria should be developed on awarding such grants or incentives? Remember the strong ethanol tax credits by the federal government to encourage that renewable fuel, but which lead to a food crisis as corn and other staples became of short supply. Therefore, should incentives be given to consumers only to purchase successful clean technologies? Should grants be given to municipalities to be “laboratories” of clean technologies and strategies? Whatever strategy is chosen, clean technology can lead to energy, water, and cost savings which is what American business and municipalities need to be more competitive in the future.

August 2, 2011

We all know that the most effective way to get a company to do something is to require it to do it through regulations. While EHS or Sustainability Managers may want to achieve good things, there is nothing like a regulation to get upper management to open the purse strings and dedicate resources and labor to address a problem.

Well, a new approach is being tried in recent years in some venues. For example, thousands of small and medium-sized companies are preparing their carbon footprint or product life cycle analyses based on requests from their customers. Requests by giant Walmart have been made to its roughly 100,000 suppliers to complete surveys of environmental and carbon emission data to the Carbon Disclosure Project’s (CDP) Supply Chain Program. A request by such a large customer simply cannot be ignored.

Suppliers submitting a CDP Supply Chain Assessment are asked a variety of questions: not just for emissions data, but even more about strategies, acknowledgement of risks, goals, and planning. This gets management thinking for the first time about an integrated sustainability program. More important, CDP publishes the results on its website (www.cdproject.net) for all to see. Customers and the public can now see a company’s sustainability ratings, as well as those of competitors. Companies that see that their sustainability achievements are weak or non-existent could be “shamed” into implementing meaningful actions to improve their ratings and visibility in the future.

Another example is the new “Greener, Greater Buildings Plan” in New York City to encourage energy consumption reduction in large buildings. New rules require subject buildings to perform an energy efficiency evaluation, with annual public disclosure of results on a public website. Such a public listing of energy efficiency may affect business (attracting renters) for the roughly 16,000 properties affected. Since perspective renters can use this data to compare different buildings, such visibility is expected to encourage buildings with poor scores to not just stop at collecting and inputting data, but to delve deeper into the data, evaluate why their scores were so poor, and upgrade their energy efficiency, even if not required. Regulations require the initial assessment action, but public visibility is driving positive efficiency actions.

In addition to environmental benefits, calculating a carbon footprint or improving energy efficiency will lead to cost savings, which should satisfy senior management to continue to upgrade energy use even more, saving more money and improving ratings and impressions on CDP or a NYC website. Perhaps with no climate change regulations coming from a divided Congress, actions driven by public visibility will be more effective.

CCES can help your company complete the CDP Supply Chain or other assessment and can help perform an energy efficiency study. We can work with you to assess your scores and develop a cost-effective plan to improve your scores and image.

July 26, 2011

Despite the rancor in Congress about federal government spending, a new low-cost, money-saving initiative began this year to incentivize energy conservation. President Obama and the Dept of Energy (DOE) launched the “Better Buildings Initiative”, which hopes to channel private sector investment through incentives to upgrade offices, stores, schools and other municipal buildings, universities, hospitals, and commercial buildings. The goal of the initiative is to make commercial buildings 20% more energy efficient over the next decade, reducing the demand for electricity and new plants. The initiative is also expected to reduce energy bills for businesses by about $40 billion annually. To get more details, see: www1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/betterbuildings.

A summary of the initiative’s five components:

1) Tax incentives – The Initiative showcases existing tax incentives for building owners who perform energy efficiency upgrades, such as a tax deduction of up to $1.80/sf for buildings that reduce heating and cooling energy usage by at least 50%. There is a 30% investment tax credit (ITC) for solar energy and qualified fuel cell and small wind energy property. A 10% ITC is available for combined heat and power systems (CHP) and geothermal heat pumps.

2) Ease financing for energy retrofits – The Initiative directs the Small Business Administration and DOE to increase low-cost lending to small businesses for energy retrofits. The total amount of available loans is currently being negotiated.

3) “Race to Green” competitive grant program – This program will provide grants to states and/or local governments to research and upgrade their codes and programs to encourage energy upgrades and private sector investment.

4) Building construction technology training and tools – This program will create pilot programs to standardize training for workers to implement the next generation of energy auditing and building operations. The program will also enable normally expensive teaching tools to be more affordable.

5) “Better Building Challenge” – This effort will encourage the private sector to upgrade their facilities and make investments to decrease energy use and create jobs. Partners will commit to a series of appropriate goals and will in turn receive public recognition, technical assistance, and best-practices sharing to meet them.

Just how well this program will be funded will be based on the current debt ceiling – federal spending debates going in Congress. But the program will move forward.

Climate Change & Environmental Services, LLC (CCES) can help your building manager assess where it stands now in terms of energy conservation, the feasibility and benefits of different potential energy conservation strategies and technologies, and review available financial incentives offered by the federal government to make such strategies economically viable and maximize the benefits for your building.

July 2011

You are aware of the business arguments for establishing a sustainability or “green” program (see last month’s newsletter!) and are seriously considering or have begun such a program. It is therefore important to plan the proper metrics of your program in order to demonstrate success so that all stakeholders understand your benefits and achievements, be able to compare your program to others, and avoid any accusation of “greenwashing”. You need to feel sure about standards that certify your success. This article discusses the proper approach to successful metrics and several rating systems.

The first concern is your immediate goals. It is important to focus on one or two matters so you can show early progress. Given its high cost, energy and therefore greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions are most popular. Water conservation is critical in certain locations and also a good metric. Waste reduction or recycling is another. In any case, focus on developing a baseline that estimates accurately the parameter in question. One can normalize data using production parameters (tons GHG per square foot of space or per unit of product or per revenue) for better comparisons.

Whatever changes you implement for your program, be sure to correlate these to changes in the metric in question. So if you performed projects that have improved your energy efficiency, be sure to determine the energy parameter reduced (Kwh of electricity or gallons of fuel) and convert that using the proper published emission factor to tons of GHG emissions reduced. Of course, it’s also helpful to correlate this to money savings. Remember that stakeholders often care more about the summary metrics of GHG emissions reduced rather than the details of your energy efficiency strategies.

As your sustainability program grows and successes achieved, develop reports to show how successful your efforts have been and will be in the future. You should develop a written and online Sustainability reports to show progress, often in pie charts or graphs.

As your program matures, you may be asked or want to provide data to an ever growing number of sustainability indices to publicize your achievements There is a huge number of such sustainability rating systems. According to SustainAbility, there are over 100 rating systems, 80% of which started in the last decade. Some are part of mainstream organizations (i.e., Walmart’s Sustainability Index; Newsweek’s “Green Rankings”); others are its own specific entity (i.e., Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP); Climate Counts’s “Company Scorecard”). Some systems are specific to one area (i.e., carbon), while others treat sustainability as a broad issue. Sustainability ratings are being used by a growing number of investors, consumers, the press, etc. to judge companies.

Typically, these rating systems request specific information from target companies. For example, CDP sends an annual questionnaire to all S&P 500 firms. Other rating systems only review publicly-available documents about a company. Some do both. With a company potentially receiving dozens of such requests of different complexities each year, it is easy to not respond. An estimated 2/3 of indices rate non-respondent companies. How does a company choose which to cooperate with and which not?

It is important to research any rating system that may rate your company and you wish to provide information for. Here are 3 major criteria. First, does it have high credibility? Is it well read and respected? As discussed above, many well known organizations with large readerships provide sustainability ratings, such as Newsweek and Bloomberg. This guarantees name recognition and readership. Others, though less known, have strong sponsorship to ensure respect (i.e., CDP). Research into how many people read these indices and how often they are cited in reports can address this first criterion.

A second criterion is credibility. Are the ratings believable based on publicly-available documents which may lack true context? Or are ratings not posted for a company that does not supply data? For example, in the CDP, companies that do not return their questionnaire are not rated, but pointed out as a non-responder. Related to this is the thoroughness of the data sources. Is proper data reviewed before being evaluated? A credible rating system is thorough in its data evaluation.

A third criterion is transparency. Does the rating system publish in detail its evaluation methodology? This is critical to know how different companies are evaluated in terms of sustainability achievements and policy. A rating system without an overt methodology may change from year to year. Also, a transparent methodology saves you time in gathering and submitting data in a knowledgeable and professional manner.

Get more useful information in our blog: www.CCESworld.com/blog
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This Environmental News for You is meant to provide background on ways to maximize your “green” benefits. CCES experts can help you develop the metrics of your sustainability program and a system for collecting data, saving you much time and better ensuring success. We can also assist you in addressing and preparing appropriate questionnaires for sustainability indices.

July 12, 2011

Sustainability, the concept of using fewer resources and polluting less to be productive while saving our natural resources, is thought to apply only to “those big polluting manufacturers.” Well, that’s not really true. While we poke fun at offices thanks to the brilliant TV comedy of the same name, any office or store, big or small, can make sustainability gains to save resources and also save money and expenses and motivate personnel. Here is a list of common environmental concerns in an office setting:
• Printing of needless documents or excess copies, resulting in increased waste
• Leaving lights on
• Not recycling excess paper or other waste
• Inappropriate climate control or setting of thermostats
• Excessive use of paper products, like cups, plates, etc.
• Coworkers not printing double-sided when they can
• Having to store paper copies of documents when they already exist electronically
• Not powering down computers when going home

These are legitimate concerns and all can be addressed in an office. Many of these concerns can be effectively addressed with conservation. You and your co-workers need to ask yourselves of whether the light bulb, computer, or other device really needs to be on all the time or at the end of the day or during lunch. You can begin an office culture that it’s important to turn off unnecessary devices. This can provide your company with best savings, going from on to completely off. While lights are obvious to turn off, appliances, computers and other equipment use power even in “sleep” mode. Therefore, if feasible, develop procedures to turn them off, too.

Another approach can be use of simple software or technology. Yes, it means an initial investment to purchase and train on the software, but will pay you back if used properly. For example, there are software products with print management capabilities. Such software can manipulate printer commands to significantly lessen ink jet or toner usage. While printers are fairly inexpensive, businesses are learning that the costs of replacing toner and ink jet cartridges are more significant. Printers can also be set to automatically perform double-side copying. Not only will this reduce paper use and cost, but this will also reduce shipping costs and the recipients of your reports will probably be happier to lug around lighter documents and reduce the necessary storage.

Forming an office “team” can effectively reduce expenses and, at the same time, engender company spirit and loyalty and a sense of accomplishment.

CCES can assess your energy, paper, water and other resource use, develop an office carbon footprint, and help you develop realistic solutions of cost-saving alternatives.

July 5, 2011

I hate to bring up this issue on Independence Weekend when we should celebrate the many great things about America. But we are falling behind the rest of the world in one area of great importance to us, and that is, clean energy and energy efficiency.

The U.S. has an estimated 120 million homes, but most of them can improve energy-wise. This is not only a great business opportunity, but with proper policy and incentives a great way to effectively reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions without ominous regulations. Yet partisan politics has stopped progress. Much of Europe has already achieved massive home upgrading, thanks to incentives, supported by even right wing parties. Although few Europeans are climate skeptics, even they understand the added value of energy upgrades (reduction in costs, dependence on foreign oil, etc.).

In addition, many European and Asian governments encourage companies to develop new energy efficient, renewable power, and GHG reducing technologies thanks to direct investment, tax breaks, and regulations. And now they have a new market to continue growth: the U.S.! A recent report by the Pew Charitable Trusts found that the clean technology sector was stagnant here because of policy uncertainties in Congress, as the debate over climate change distracts it from setting policies and creating incentives.

Despite some positive measures in the U.S., there is still too much uncertainty, upfront costs, and risk to attract U.S. capital to invest in areas like “smart” technologies, energy-efficient appliances, insulation, or renewable energy, despite the need and large potential market. Not only is this an opportunity to grow a many billion dollar clean energy industry, but also to grow associated work areas, such as banks and legal.

So how should we encourage energy efficiency? There is a healthy debate. Some say we should mimic the European model above. Daniel Esty, the new Commissioner of the Connecticut Dept of Energy & Environmental Protection, recently stated that because government has a bad track record of picking winners, it should stay out of investing in new technologies (lest such picks also be dictated by politics and special interests) and only encourage or mandate demand from the public instead for successful technologies.

On this Independence Day holiday, as we celebrate so much that is good about the U.S., let’s take some time to work toward bettering ourselves. To work toward greater awareness of clean and efficient energy and push to make this country incentivize more basic research in renewable energy and energy efficiency and the public to implement such technologies for our betterment and to grow our economy and produce jobs.

CCES technical professionals can help your company perform an energy evaluation to determine cost-effective energy-saving strategies for your maximum benefit.