Conserve

by Josephine Polifroni

Created on: May 26, 2010   Last Updated: May 27, 2010

Conservation is a powerful tool in the energy wars. Its most attractive feature is that it is something every one of us can do, right now, every day, to make a noticeable impact on usage. As more and more people conserve, the effect grows until the cumulative effect is quite overwhelming.

During the California energy crisis early in 2000 and 2001, conservation was vital in helping to manage costs and prevent rolling blackouts. A combination of deregulation and subsequent market manipulation, along with “unplanned” maintenance of California power plants wreaked havoc with California's ability to fill their energy needs.

While politicians and corporations such as Enron faced off, the one thing that saved Californians from the worst effects of this contrived energy shortage was conservation.

The campaign to encourage conservation reduced peak usage by 3,000 to 5,000 megawatts during the summer of 2001, a staggering amount that saved billions and prevented at least 150 hours of blackouts.

It is even more remarkable in light of the fact that it was a voluntary program, done largely without special appliances or light bulbs or new cars or additional mass transit. People simply changed their habits to cut back and reschedule some of their usage to off-peak hours and the deed was done.

In fact, because of the ease of this conservation effort and the realization their energy destiny was in their own hands, California was able to put policies in place for a cleaner energy outlook, developing solar and wind and energy efficient technology.

California attracts over half of the venture capital devoted to clean technology, an investment not only in sustainable energy but a sustainable economy.

There are many benefits for industry in practicing conservation as well. In addition to obvious savings from reduced consumption, equipment lasts longer which leads to reduced maintenance costs and less vulnerability to price spikes.

In addition, it enhances a company's public image to be environmentally responsible and a record of such responsibility reduces not only cost to the environment but legal fees from future litigation.

Conservation is necessary as a way to involve everyone in taking responsibility for their energy usage and recognizing that there are indeed options to runaway oil usage, foreign and domestic.

The fact is, regardless of how much certain sectors wish to uncover new sources of oil domestically and drill regardless of risk to human and environmental life, prominent geologists are questioning how many new fields can be found to replace depleted oil fields and keep up with increased demands.

In light of this, it is only common sense to practice conservation. When we look at the devastation in the Gulf from the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion and the huge quantity of oil in the Gulf, we must come to terms with the fact that there are serious trade-offs to continued drilling in sensitive areas.

We simply do not have the technology to extract this oil safely. The impact on wildlife and the livelihoods of those who live along the coast from this accident is almost beyond our ability to comprehend.

Instead of investing in more drilling and new nuclear power plants, we can use these same funds to make more of a difference, quicker and for longer, without the possibility of disaster or accident or the problem of disposing of radioactive waste safely.

New energy saving appliances, more energy efficient buildings, the elimination of stand-by mode on small appliances, as well as efficient mass transit and new electric cars-all and more will contribute to severing us from our dependence on foreign oil.

Of course, conservation is not the only way we can reduce our dependence on oil, foreign or domestic. We must be careful not to keep looking for the magic bullet that will solve all of our energy woes and put all innovative solutions to work to our benefit. With that in mind, we should not seek to centralize energy production in the form of giant solar or wind farms.

In fact, if we decentralize our energy sources, by working to put solar on individual buildings for instance, we can not only reduce our dependence on oil, we can greatly enhance our security by not having centralized sources vulnerable to attack.

Other forms of sustainable energy, small windmills, wave energy technology, can be used in areas or for times of the year where solar is not enough.

It is hard to change an ingrained habit. The U.S. is truly addicted to oil and the energy it provides in every aspect of our lives but it is not impossible to change, especially if we do not have to sacrifice every benefit we are accustomed to enjoying from the abundant use of energy by developing new technologies to help us conserve.

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