Earth2Tech has a post on energy efficiency and the Stimulus package.
The Most Important Words in the Stimulus Package for Energy Efficiency
Written by Katie Fehrenbacher
Posted February 20th, 2009 at 12:00 am in Policy
The most important provision in the stimulus package for promoting energy efficiency in the U.S. could be a piece of ambiguous language wrapped up in a section on state energy grants. A few sentences encourages states to consider a policy for utilities known as decoupling (though the stimulus text doesn’t name it specifically) in return for energy grants. Decoupling, a strategy that has proven successful at promoting energy efficiency in states like California, disconnects utilities’ sales from their profits, and thus encourages utilities to implement energy efficiency programs. The text in the stimulus bill doesn’t require decoupling per se in order to get funds, but requires the state governors to get certification from their respective commissions that the states in question will:
“…seek to implement…a general policy that ensures that utility financial incentives are aligned with helping their customers use energy more efficiently and that provide timely cost recovery and a timely earnings opportunity for utilities associated with cost-effective and verifiable efficiency savings, in a way that sustains or enhances utility customers’ incentives to use energy more efficiently.”
What is the excitement?
Fans of energy efficiency were electrified when House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) introduced “decoupling” as a condition for state energy grants in the House’s version of the stimulus package. But the language in the final package, which Obama signed into law this week, was toned down from Waxman’s original provision.
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Reid Detchon, executive director of the Energy Future Coalition, said: “Most utilities make more money by selling more energy than they do by saving it. Flipping that incentive structure is the key to unlocking greater national investment in energy efficiency.”
But get ready to prove your energy efficiency with monitor. Note from the above text, the word verifiable. This means you need to prove your energy savings for a green data center.
“…seek to implement…a general policy that ensures that utility financial incentives are aligned with helping their customers use energy more efficiently and that provide timely cost recovery and a timely earnings opportunity for utilities associated with cost-effective and verifiable efficiency savings, in a way that sustains or enhances utility customers’ incentives to use energy more efficiently.”