There was a great Time article recently about energy efficiency. The article mentions that it is the great untapped energy resource of this country, which might sound trite or fantasaical, but it’s true. Energy efficiency is basically defined as using less energy input for a given output. That is to say, energy efficiency is most fundamentally about using less energy to heat your home, power your factory or run your microwave.

When people talk about energy independence in America, reducing our use of foreign oil, not being held hostage to price shocks in energy commodities and things of this ilk, nearly always the conversation focuses on the supply side. We need to build more wind farms a la T. Boone Pickens. We need to drill for more oil. We need to find more natural gas reserves. We need to kick ethanol production into high gear and start using biodiesel more frequently. We need to increase our refining capacity for oil so that more supply of the resource can enter into the pipeline. We need to invest billions and spent untold man hours developing the ability to deep sea drill for energy resources. On and on the conversation goes.

But rarely do we ever hear about the other side of economic equilibrium, the demand side. Reducing demand on a macrocosmic level with everyone doing their part on an individual basis is oftentimes overlooked in contemporary energy discussions. Reducing demand by increasing the efficiency of our collective energy usage is cost-effective, scalable, less time intensive and not nearly as environmentally destructive  as supply side solutions. The process, for example, of figuring out how to create more energy efficient lightbulbs, producing them and then getting them in homes nationwide doubtless carries with it a corresponding carbon footprint. However, the negative environmental impact of this increased carbon footprint is dwarfed by the reduction in total carbon output  that comes with billions of lightbulbs being installed in homes that run longer at higher levels of brightness and use less energy. The same kind of thing is not quite observed when it comes to building new coal plants to satisfy consumers’ energy demands.

Time ingeniously referred to all of this as the drive to save “negawatts” (reducing systemic demand by X amount of megawatts means that we experience negative megawatts demand growth, or negawatts) as opposed to producing more megawatts. In essence, there are two ways to do this: by using things more efficiently or by using things more productively. The former can be seen in the lightbulb example, with the latter’s exemplars evinced in such things as weatherizing our homes by caulking windows and doors and insulating pipes and ducts so that the home itself is using energy more productively. Either way, energy efficiency is not being overlooked anymore.

Barack Obama called efficiency “the cheapest, cleanest, fastest energy source.” And Steven Chu, his Energy Secretary, said to a crowd he was speaking to that “I cannot impress upon you how important energy efficiency is.” But, we can sure try.

America’s power plants waste enough energy to power all of Japan. Only 4% of the energy used to run a lightbulb is actually used for light. The rest is lost as the power travels over transmission lines and or is given off as heat at the plant and by the lightbulb itself. Our consumer electronics, the fastest growing segment of power demand, are incredibly inefficient. There are some gaming consoles that are shipped by manufacturers with the auto power-down disabled, burning up enough energy over the night after the user forgets to manually shut them off to be able to run two refrigerators. Little examples like this, writ large, are we waste such incredible amounts of energy.

Quite simply, this is neither acceptable nor right. But it is this way because of disincentives to change the status quo. Power companies make more money if they sell more power, so it is not in their interest to help reduce demand. This is a very powerful example of monetary disincentives on the supply side.  But they exist on the demand side as well. Most efficiency investments pay for themselves over a few years, but all of them require up front costs, which can seem daunting to finance. And top of the line efficient appliances can be extremely expensive. Truly, when people and business are living paycheck to paycheck and month to month, a few dollars up front can mean a world of difference. And there is the money donated by entities like the Big Three Automakers to politicians to try to keep fuel-efficiency standards lower. So there are political, as well as economic, disincentives to altering the system. Entrenched interest can be very hard to fight, especially when it is well heeled, with deep pockets.

However, in the long run, it is in ALL of our best interests to have a sustainable and renewable green economy and a healthy planet. And that ultimate logic wins the day. So, Obama and others are doing things to get rid of the current disincentives that are standing in the way of that ultimate goal. Having states legislate the decoupling of profits from sales volume for utilities, providing for a massive expansion of government assistance in paying for the poor’s cost to retrofit their houses with more efficient goods and machinery, mandating better and more efficient fuel and appliance standards, and the like, are all things that are currently in the hopper to build momentum towards becoming a much more energy-conscious nation.

So, this is akin to the next step. First, there is the development of ecological intelligence. And then comes putting that collective knowledge to use through concrete action, like making energy efficiency a national priority. It is true that energy efficiency alone will not save the world, nor rightcycle our economy out of its current doldrums. But, it sure can go a long way towards making our country stronger and our world healthier.