How to Be an Energy Efficiency Hero

Some truths transcend their original context. In Jim Collins' modern classic, Good to Great, he classifies the qualities of businesses with exceptionally high growth rates over sustained periods of time. The findings sound a lot like timeless common sense, and one quality struck me as particularly applicable to energy consumption.

If you’ve read our blog before, you know our mantra, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” But sometimes measurement feels uncomfortable and painful. Fear of the unknown thwarts us from wanting to discover what ugly truth may lie behind door #1. Maybe it’s a test result that will have implications for our health or an auto tune-up that reveals this may be a more expensive bill than we’d planned on. That feeling of unknowing can be terrible.

And yet, Collins finds that truly excellent businesses, the ones that have gone from mediocre to awesome, share the quality of confronting the brutal facts. They don’t stop there, though. They possess the rare combination of confronting the facts while also having an unwavering faith that they will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties. Collins calls it the “Stockdale Paradox,” but for the purposes of this post, I’ll call it the heroic combination.

The second element, unwavering faith that you’ll prevail, can be difficult. The challenges of global warming or even the thought of having to change our behavior can make us want to throw up our hands. “This is too hard, too tedious, too hopeless,” we say. “I don’t want to know how bad it is.” But our greatest heroes are those who face the facts and press on with the faith that they will prevail.

Our goal at PlotWatt is to give you rich information about what’s happening in your home… which appliances are consuming the most energy and how much energy you’re consuming on a day-to-day basis. Sound scary? It may be, at first. Remember the heroic combination though. Armed with the facts, you can prevail to make far-reaching, sustainable reductions to save you money and prevent tons of energy from being generated. Then, you’ll be an energy efficiency hero. And who knows, maybe tomorrow you’ll fly around the planet so fast that you reverse time to save the world. With heroism, you’ve got to start somewhere.
Posted by Sarah Kate

9 comments:

  1. Great info. People need to know that while home energy efficiency is not as sexy as solar power, wind farms, etc., it is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce energy consumption. It is also something that you can start doing today and little to no cost or many times at an economic gain. Vist the "Get Informed" tab of www.austinauditors.com to learn more.
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  3. Thanks for the wonderful discussion here.The electricity bills are so high that it will be a boon when we can become energy effective.
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  4. I certainly agree with “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” Similarly, an empirical psychologist would assert that without good behavioral measures (and good experimental design) you cannot know if your intervention has worked or not. We now know that human behavior is quite subject to change, even on a large scale. Consider, as examples, the increase in seat belt usage and the decline in cigarette smoking. Both have occurred by the sustained use of a variety of approaches.
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  5. great article... there are many simple ways of becoming an "energy efficiency hero" and you will benefit fromit in the long run as well as the earth will benefit
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  6. Hi Sarah,
    I also made my contribution on my Blog about how to increase efficiency. I call it Action plan for increasing energy efficiency, and it's also applicable for home. The action plan consist of 5 steps to follow. The first one is the cheapest one. One big mistake people do is to start installing new equipment, and having no idea that repairing things, even changing behavior will be cheaper and will have a huge impact as well.

    Read more in my blog: http://www.green-and-energy.com/blog/action-plan-for-increasing-the-effectiveness-of-energy/

    Thank you very much,

    Olmo
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  7. Check out the ENERGY STAR Pledge as an easy first way to start changing behavior. And today in honor of Earth Day EPA is introducing ENERGY STARs Across America – a grassroots effort to help families learn about energy saving actions they can take at home and in their communities. To get involved, check out www.energystar.gov/changetheworld to learn about energy efficiency events in your community, take the ENERGY STAR Pledge, and even enter the Be an ENERGY STAR Video Challenge.
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  8. I have tried so hard to get people to go energy efficient. Although its one paerson at a time at nearly a snails craw, i think this article was good and would love to see some kind of National Campaign for people to actually become "Energy Efficient Heros". I'd do anything to help support the cause I can.
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  9. Excellent point -- measuring energy efficiency is much more effective than relying strictly on heuristics or 'conventional wisdom'. It is also important to KEEP measuring as changes are made, and revise energy costs (current and projected) in calculating the ROI.

    The rapid rate of energy cost increases is changing the ROI calculation -- many projects which didn't make sense a couple years ago are clear winners today -- and even better 5 years from now.
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