Energy Efficiency: The Heart of a Clean Energy Future
Life as we know it depends on energy.
We need it to run our cars, homes, businesses, and industries. We’re reminded of this when gas prices spike or when lights go dark during power outages.
Our energy use, though, can cause climate-warming pollution. We need to find a way to reduce climate impacts while keeping the lights on and the economy vibrant.
Energy efficiency can help do this.
It can transform how we use energy so that everyone benefits. It is often the least expensive way to cut harmful emissions. And it creates jobs and protects human health. That’s why it is the foundation—the heart—of a clean energy future.
What is energy efficiency?
It’s doing more with less. It’s using less energy to get the same job done.
It doesn’t mean we have to sacrifice or do less; it means we waste less and often gain more. It’s a car that uses less fuel to go a mile or a light bulb that uses fewer watts to provide the same amount of light. These products save energy and money.
Yet energy efficiency goes beyond a single product, vehicle, or building.
It optimizes how we use energy throughout the economy. It gets all the parts, across sectors, to work better together—like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
This systems-wide version is not your grandparents’ energy efficiency.
It uses big data, advanced technology, and sophisticated design to optimize how we do things.
What does systems-wide efficiency look like?
➜ Streamlined freight delivery routes that minimize empty truck space and wasted miles, thereby requiring less fuel.
➜ Locating homes near public transit, stores, and other amenities to reduce the need for driving, making an entire community efficient.
➜ Electrifying vehicles and buildings with efficient motors or heat pumps, reducing energy demand while integrating systems to maximize use of renewable power.
➜ Less-energy-intensive products such as recycled steel or low-carbon concrete, shrinking the carbon footprint throughout the built environment.
We can also optimize energy use with behavior that reduces waste.
While efficiency uses less energy to do the same job, conservation prevents the waste of that energy. We need both. For example, we can buy an energy-saving washing machine and wash clothes in cold water.
Efficiency partners well with renewable energy.
It makes the transition to renewable power such as solar and wind faster, easier, and more affordable.
Here’s how: The less power we use, the less we need to generate. And the emissions-free energy we do generate can power more homes, cars, and buildings, lowering costs. With smart appliances and equipment, we can also shift when we use power, such as charging electric cars when the sun is shining on solar panels.
Voices of Efficiency: Energy Professionals Valerie Richardson and David Goldstein
What does energy efficiency do?
Creates jobs and boosts competitiveness.
Efficiency supports more than 2.2 million U.S. jobs —more than twice the jobs in the coal, gas, and oil industries combined. It cuts operating costs and helps U.S. manufacturers retain a global competitive edge.
Builds security and reliability.
By reducing total energy demand, we can limit energy imports, the impacts of rising oil and gas prices, and pressures on the power grid.
Saves money and advances equity.
Efficiency standards for appliances and equipment save the average U.S. household $500 each year. Energy-saving appliances and home upgrades particularly help low-income households, many of whom struggle to pay their utility bills and often have higher energy burdens (share of income spent on energy). Efficiency reduces those burdens.
Protects health and comfort.
Well-insulated homes and buildings keep out drafts and harmful pollutants, improving comfort and indoor air quality.
Reduces pollution and combats climate change.
By generating cleaner energy and using less of it, we avoid harmful emissions from burning fossil fuels. Everyone benefits, especially low-income households and communities of color that pollution and climate change disproportionately hurt.
Voices of Efficiency: Community Members Diane Taylor and Nikia Pickett
Credit: David Falconer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
What has energy efficiency accomplished?
Though invisible, efficiency is a remarkable success story. It gained traction after the 1970s oil embargo and has delivered impressive results. Consider this: From 1980 through 2021, in inflation-adjusted terms, the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) increased about 300% but energy use increased by only 25%.
Energy efficiency accounts for more than half of this achievement, with the rest coming from structural changes, such as a shift toward a more service-oriented economy.
Source: ACEEE
We can see the difference in our products. New refrigerators, for example, are now bigger but use 65% less energy than in 1980.
Voices of Efficiency: Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Lisa Murkowski
What's next for energy efficiency?
The efficiency story is just beginning.
With innovative technology and policy, we still can—and must—do a lot more to reduce energy waste. With robust investment, energy efficiency can cut U.S. energy use and emissions in half by 2050 .
It can get the United States halfway to its 2050 goal of a net-zero emissions economy.
We need to act quickly.
To reach that goal globally, the International Energy Agency says that we need to triple the speed of efficiency improvements.
How? We rapidly scale up energy-saving efforts across the economy.
Industry
Adopt technologies, practices, and products that are less energy- and carbon-intensive.
Transportation
Electrify vehicles and make remaining gas models more fuel efficient, as well as support mass transit and transit-oriented development.
Buildings
Update efficiency standards for appliances and equipment, retrofit buildings with energy-saving upgrades, and require new buildings to use much less or zero net energy.
Efficiency connects the dots.
It’s the foundation for transforming and optimizing how we use energy. It’s the heart of our clean energy future.
