But I have three concerns with making standard decoupling a federal requirement. First, utilities operate under constraints that prevent them from capturing efficiency measures that a better policy framework would capture, and capture at a lower cost.

Second, I don’t believe we can get to the kind of reductions we need with those constraints in place. As long as utilities are the only players in the game, we’ll get less efficiency at a higher cost than if non-utility aggregators were allowed to compete for capacity.

Yeah, standard decoupling is one of the best policies we have in place — but if best in class isn’t good enough, then we’re going to have to go up a grade or two to get what we need.

What do you do when the best you got isn’t good enough? You come up with something better — if we continue to use the existing policy tool box to come up with solutions, it will be kind of like trying to jump the Grand Canyon in 10 foot increments.

Why don’t I just shut up and celebrate the progress we’re making? “Cause we’re not going to get a lot of bites at this apple. Once we’ve passed decoupling, it’ll be decades before we get another chance to revisit the regulatory and policy framework governing utilities — I doubt we’ll do it in either an energy bill or a climate bill.

Peter Darbee @ UN, Feb 2008.

I have heard him talk, he’s passionate about this, it shows up in people who work for him, and in PG&E demand response programs.

CA may not go far enough, but Darbee is pretty credible.

Decoupling is a good — but flawed policy. The utility still has the ability to set the price of efficiency, and in many areas, it makes efficiency cost more than it should. (the $9 CFLs, for example — less than the cost of new power, so it could be sold as an efficiency measure by utilities at that price).

New England ISO’s forward capacity market not only decouples, it allows non-utility efficiency aggregators to compete for capacity, thus keeping the price lower, and creating a powerful incentive to maximize the amount of efficiency bid into a market.

We don’t have time for good but flawed policies. Pick up any journal, and the following sentence is likely to appear “Scientists are finding that xxxx is happening 10 times faster than climate models projected …”

You’ve documented the urgency better than anyone. We need to optimize our policy response — pretty good policies won’t cut it.

Decoupling is just a first step. The next will be to change the balance sheet to make renewables more appealing than coal. If Obama and Waxman follow the California model, then there will be renewable targets to meet, a price on carbon, and so on… So that coal-fired power loses its financial advantage.

The power of energy efficiency — no pun intended — to change the system is impressive. Demand reduction will allow the utilities to meet foreseeable future growth at a per kWh price that is below that of coal, and it will greatly slow the need for new coal plants. But I don’t expect that utilities will go quietly, even if it makes sense… There will be a big fight.

And I do believe that Obama and Waxman have caught them flat-footed. I write a and edit a tiny (non-technical) newsletter on energy efficiency and demand reduction, and I didn’t see this coming so soon…

I did a happy dance around the office!

One Blue Marble is just a brand-new site, so I don’t know if we can have an impact, but we’ve got good writers and a graphic designer (my niece) who’s an art director in New York, so we might start making waves.

We’re launching four or five campaigns in the first half of 2009, and one of them is going right after the Alberta Tar Sands. I thought about being diplomatic, and trying to work with conservatives who believe in protecting the planet, but in the end, I’ve decided to go for the jugular — especially after Canada won the dubious Colossal Fossil Award at the climate summit in Poznan.

With Obama coming to Canada soon, and the Alberta Tar Sands on the agenda, the timing could be perfect.

But I’m curious about the opinions of Climate Progress readers… because I learn so much here, and so many climate warriors are among your number. Like Bill McKibben’s call for civil disobedience, I feel the time for civility is over. It’s time to be tough, brutal, honest.

Thoughts… Comments?

“Never pit one region of the country against the other when you develop economic policy.” – This kind of thing is almost invariably the words of a scoudrel who is championing one privileged region of the country against all the others.

If there remained any doubt: “all questions of energy policy are a question of national unity.” Where spoken on behalf of the tar sands industry, this rhetoric and the feudal concept underlying it are out-and-out fascistic.

I heard that somebody recently published a book claiming that there’s a veritable tar-sands coup d’etat going on in Canada. I’ve been meaning to look into that, which is why I find Ignatieff’s ideology on this telling.

As for decoupling (to get on topic), it’s great to finally see some federal progress on this. And I love that Waxman at least wants to give the enemy a taste of its own medicine and try to use time as a weapon, the way the republicans have so successfully so many times.

I know if I was the incoming president right now, given what mandate I have and the psychological state of the people, how ready for real change so many people seem to be, I’d want to see if “shock and awe” can work in the opposite direction.

Alas, they seem on the whole more interested in “continuity” and appeasement….

I wish it was so simple. Student parliaments are nice but they get almost no coverage and don’t really mean anything. Look, we know how it’s going to be solved ultimately: Alberta will have to shape up, or they won’t be able to sell their tar sands in the US; that’s the only thing people like Harper will listen to. The bottom line is money, plain and simple.

To get back on the subject, I don’t really understand the mechanics of decoupling. The marginal cost of adding a MWh clean generation capacity is probably greater than the marginal cost of a MWh of energy savings, so it makes good sense to finance programs to stabilize demand. On the other hand, decoupling doesn’t give electric companies an incentive to mothball their coal-burning plants and replace the dirty plants by solar or windfarms, because in their minds, there is no profit in building at 8-10 cents a kWh when you can have the same kWh for 5 with coal.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT

* 1 The 80th British Columbia Youth Parliament opposes the development of the Alberta Tar Sands and calls for a halt to both existing and future Tar Sands projects.

Wes Rolley: CoChair, EcoActon Committee Green Party US

My hope is that the sheer force of Obama’s personality, will, and dedication to constructive change is going to drag Canada along in his wake. Harper, of course, will say all the right things publicly, but he’ll be dragged along, kicking and screaming privately. Tough times for him and for all those who can’t see beyond their vision of the tar sands as some kind of economic salvation.