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Available: Home with free electric (photo by Kainet, CC 2.0 Sharealike license)

From MIT’s Technology Review comes this column from Kevin Bullis, about a recent report from Deutsche Bank on the economic benefits of investing in new energy projects:

It argues that it’s possible to address challenges related to climate change, energy security, and the financial crisis at the same time by investing in four specific areas: energy-efficient buildings, electric power grids, renewable power, and public transportation. The report cites figures that suggest investing in these areas creates more jobs than investing in conventional energy sources because much of the old energy infrastructure is already in place. It says that “a $100 billion investment in energy and efficiency would result in 2 million new jobs, whereas a similar investment in old energy [such as coal or natural gas] would only create around 540,000 jobs.”

Of course, Obama has already pledged to do something along these lines, and the blogosphere (including me, here) has chimed in as well. But the imprimatur of Deutsche Bank adds some gravitas to the proposal.

If you want to read the report yourself, it’s here.

There is lots of opportunity to reduce energy intensity throughout the U.S. economy

In “a few policies to hedge against crashing oil prices,” the latest post on the Rocky Mountain Institute’s “Environmental Lovin’s” blog, Amory Lovins himself provides some suggestions on how to keep making progress on energy independence despite the recent dip in oil prices. Of course, efficiency is the star of the show:

We now have techniques to save half our oil and gas, and three-quarters of our electricity, at about an eighth of their price. Energy efficiency remains one of the highest-return and lowest-risk investments in the entire economy.

The basic argument is that no matter how low oil prices go, efficiency remains more cost effective than almost any other investment. His specific suggestions, such as “fee-bates” to encourage purchasing more efficient cars, rewarding utilities for cutting energy use (as we do in California), and implementing policies that get older less efficient cars off the road faster, are covered in much more detail in RMI’s two books Winning The Oil Endgame and Climate: Making Sense and Making Money (both free for download).

Efficiency investments pay for themselves twice over - saving money on energy usage, while reaping numerous benefits as side effects - improved productivity in businesses, faster learning in schools, better sales in shops. As Lovins concludes:

Conscientiously pursued, this … approach would solve the oil, climate, and proliferation problems at a profit, over a few decades, totaling trillions of dollars.

There have been calls already for President-elect Obama to bring Lovins into the cabinet to help drive us to energy independence. He won’t do it (he wants to remain independent), but hopefully Obama and his team will at least take the advice - it will definitely pay off for all of us - and help us out of the recession to boot.

Image via Wikipedia

On Wednesday, the Freakonomics blog asked:

If you had a seat at one of the tables where Obama will be meeting over the next days and weeks, what would be some of your suggestions for how he should shape his administration, address the economic mess, consider the energy future, engage the global community, and so on and so forth?

My suggestions for the president-elect:

1. Energy independence is the biggest lever you have - it generates jobs (including lots in the red states for solar and wind farms and transmission lines as well as high tech jobs in the blue states), technological leadership, economic growth due to new global industries that should be based here in the States, a “sending a man to the moon” type of national goal, and the potential to change the political calculus with the Middle East, Russia, and Venezuela. Yes, we want a market-based approach, but you have a great opportunity to accelerate the revolution through good policies and emphatic “nudges.”
2. Quick action to start rebuilding relationships with the rest of the world, especially the parts that are not already our close friends - we really need friends everywhere, not just in Europe. Many options here, from driving worldwide action on climate change to a dignified drawdown in Iraq to, yes, drawing Iran, Cuba and some of our other “enemies” into the world community to reduce their threat to us.

At this critical juncture for the U.S. and the world, and with the world-changing potential of a new administration, energy and sustainability are the common thread leading to a desirable outcome.

In the comments, please let me know your thoughts on Obama’s next steps.

Fillmore Street in San Francisco; Image via Wikipedia

The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the conclusions of a study just completed by the California State Air Resources Board that “going green” will be extremely beneficial to the state’s economy.

Under the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, the state must impose a limit on the amount of pollutants companies emit and expand renewable energy. These changes, along with others, would result in 100,000 new jobs, boost the state economy by $27 billion and increase personal income by $14 billion, the study said.

It’s traditional to believe that becoming green - reducing energy usage, switching to renewable energy, and curbing greenhouse gas emissions - is costly and a net drag on economies. But studies like this one, as well as many others (see the Rocky Mountain Institute website for many more examples), show again that the future is going to be both green and profitable.

Thomas Friedman’s OpEd on Sunday describes how Denmark has achieved energy independence, and illustrates the numerous benefits for the country, including a very low unemployment rate and a large new export market.

When the 1973 oil shock hit, Denmark got 99 percent of its energy from the Middle East. Now they get zero. The country has combined massive energy efficiency programs, such as using waste heat from power plants to heat homes (known as “cogeneration”), with alternative energy sources like windmills (20% of their energy comes from the wind now), effective use of their own petroleum resources in the North Sea, and incentives for lowering energy use via high taxes on gasoline.

As a result, Danes enjoy one of the highest standards of living in the world, an extremely low unemployment rate, and a healthy export sector in alternative energy products.

Because it was smart taxes and incentives that spurred Danish energy companies to innovate, Ditlev Engel, the president of Vestas — Denmark’s and the world’s biggest wind turbine company — told me that he simply can’t understand how the U.S. Congress could have just failed to extend the production tax credits for wind development in America.

Engel suggests why this might concern us here in the United States.

“We’ve had 35 new competitors coming out of China in the last 18 months, and not one out of the U.S.”

If Denmark has been able to achieve 100% energy independence, at net benefit to their society economically, what does that say about America’s chances? Denmark has some advantages - it’s much smaller than the U.S., it has new oilfields in the North Sea - but we have advantages as well - our Southwest is much better for solar than anywhere in Denmark, we have whole states available for wind power, we have comparatively high rates of energy inefficiency that represent massive “negawatts.” Amory Lovins of Rocky Mountain Institute has outlined a set of steps for getting the U.S. off oil by 2025 - Winning The Oil End Game - that provides one possible, well-researched scenario for a profitable transition.

In the 35 years since the ‘73 oil shock, Denmark has accomplished something remarkable. Now we in the U.S. need to set ourselves a similar goal. Using new technologies, such as the fuel cell breakthroughs I mentioned last week (here and here), we should be able to get there a lot faster than 35 years.