Red, Green, and Blue

Policymakers can make all the rules and regulations they want, but if the administration chooses not to implement and enforce them—or finds legal loopholes allowing them to shirk their responsibility—sometimes, there’s not a whole that can be done about it.

And that is exactly what has happened since 1975 when Congress passed the Energy Policy and Conservation Act, requiring the Department of Energy to come up with tougher energy efficiency standards on a broad range of products—from residential air-conditioners to industrial boilers—standards that decades of administrations have failed to do.

But decades of shirking the responsibility for writing those efficiency regs are coming to an end.

In a presidential memorandum to the Secretary of Energy, President Obama has ordered the DOE to finally come into compliance with the decades-old effiency laws, starting this year with nine categories of products, including ovens, vending machines, microwaves, dishwashers and light bulbs.

“This will save consumers money, this will spur innovation and this will conserve tremendous amounts of energy,” Mr. Obama said to a group of DOE employees on Thursday. “We’ll save through these simple steps over the next 30 years the amount of energy produced over a two-year period by all the coal-fired power plants in America.”

Mr. Obama also said the new regulations would save Americans more than $500 billion in their electric bills.

So, whether or not new funding for energy efficiency actually makes it into the economic stimulus package being discussed on Capitol Hill, we can now rest assured knowing that a 34-year-old law requiring energy efficiency standards will finally be set.

via: NY Times; Boston Globe
Image: CC licensed by flickr user Tracy O

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