Michael Grunwald tells us in the latest TIME that ?We don?t need new drilling or new power plants. We need to get efficient.? (Trust me: It?s the subheadline in the print version of this article.)
To bolster his case, Grunwald explains:
In fact, we’ve already started; the Alliance to Save Energy calculates that without the efficiency gains we’ve made since the last energy crisis, in 1973, our economy would use nearly 50% more energy today. That’s more than we get from oil, twice what we get from coal or natural gas and six times what we get from nuclear plants.
But we could save much more. A McKinsey study found that a global effort to boost efficiency with existing technologies could have “spectacular results,” eliminating more than 20% of world energy demand by 2020.
What?s scary about Grunwald?s ?global effort? is it sounds as if it involves the heavy hand of government. He doesn?t note that efficiency gains largely result from market processes. Companies free to compete for business will find ways to cut costs, including energy costs, as part of the normal business process.
When the government diverts resources away from productive uses and toward its ill-conceived goals, the result is not ?efficiency.? You can get a sense of the true result here, here, and here.
