Energy Efficiency and Electrification

Simple behavior change could result in “savings of 123 million metric tons of carbon per year… which is 20% of household direct emissions or 7.4% of US national emissions, with little or no reduction in household well-being.” Conservative estimates of the reductions in energy use that are possible with simple behavior change include the following areas: weatherization, HVAC equipment, low-flow showerheads, efficient water heaters, appliances, low rolling resistance tires, fuel-efficient vehicles, change HVAC air filters, tune up AC, routine auto maintenance, laundry temperature, water heater temperature, standby electricity, thermostat setbacks, line drying, driving behavior, carpooling and trip-chaining. Education, social media and community building are the means to this end, according to the authors. 

Clean energy jobs, including energy efficiency, solar and wind, are already employing more than 3 million people in the US. The potential for continued growth in jobs and the human welfare attached to cleaner, less-polluting energy resources is massive. Even factoring in a loss of around 7 million jobs in fossil fuels, the net gain for renewable energy jobs would reach 11.6 million jobs according to IRENA’s Road Map to 2050. Be sure to visit CLEANetwork.com’s courses and toolkit on clean energy and jobs to learn more.

And again, we’re not only talking about traditional jobs like the ones above in energy efficiency, solar and wind. Consider the massive innovation required to transform our centralized grid. Key innovations include:

• Enabling Technologies that will amplify the use of renewables and the transformations of the power system;
• Market Design innovations to make power systems more dynamic;
• Aggregators – a new business model to optimise the use of distributed energy resources;
• Future role of distribution system operators – a system-operation innovation that boosts local power generation and consumption

We are just at the tip of the iceberg with this.