Clean Energy In the News

AUSTIN - With war raging in the Middle East, volatile oil and gas prices, and air pollution making our families sick, we cannot wait to change the direction of our nation's energy policies.

Unfortunately, at a time when the public is crying for a transition to clean alternatives, some industries are pushing Texas down the road of increased reliance on dirty fossil fuels. TXU's announcement that it won't build eight coal plants is great news, but there are still 11 other coal plants in the works, including the three dirtiest plants proposed by TXU.

The good news is some Texas lawmakers have proposed commonsense solutions to our energy problems that will save consumers money, enhance electricity reliability, and help reduce the air pollution that causes tens of thousands of Texas children to have asthma attacks each summer.

Texas' current energy use is like leaving your windows open while you run the air conditioning: wasteful and unnecessarily expensive. But just like you can close the windows, there's a simple solution to reducing our energy use: making common products more energy efficient.

We already have the technology to waste less energy. In our homes and businesses sit commonly used appliances - DVD players, walk-in refrigerators and freezers, portable hot tubs, and more - that use much more electricity than they need to do the job.

Take pool pumps for example. Texans with a swimming pool at home probably are taking advantage of the amazing weather we're having to enjoy a nice dip. However, the pool pump, used to filter and circulate the water in the pool, is usually the single largest electricity user in a home, making up almost half of the kilowatt-hours on your electric bill.

Requiring the sale in Texas of currently available efficient pool pumps would save the average pool owner more than $700 over 10 years, which is nothing to sneeze at. But the savings for the state as a whole by 2020 would be enormous, some 472 gigawatt hours every year. That's enough to power more than 41,000 homes - from pool pump efficiency alone! And since pool pumps are usually run during hot summer afternoons when electricity is most used (and pollution most produced), the savings would likely be even greater.

State Sens. Kip Averitt and Rodney Ellis and Rep. Rafael Anchia have proposed legislation to set a floor for the efficiency of 10 types of residential and commercial appliances, including pool pumps. According to the State Energy Conservation Office, the standards set in these bills would be feasible and have benefits far exceeding costs for Texas consumers, and by 2020 the standards would save enough electricity to power 200,000 Texas homes, reduce consumer electric bills by $230 million per year and reduce peak demand by 600 megawatts.

Using less electricity means less pollution coming out of power plants. At a time when our major cities are struggling to comply with federal air quality standards, the standards would reduce smog pollution by 1,000 metric tons per year.

Texas' growing population is increasing demand for electricity, but before we let greedy electric utilities lock us into 50 more years of pollution we just can't afford, we should make sure we're taking advantage of the cheapest, cleanest and quickest options.

The proposed appliance legislation alone could offset 20 percent of the projected growth in demand, offsetting the need for two to three average-size power plants. Together with other pieces of Texas' largely untapped "strategic reserves" of energy efficiency, like stronger building codes and expanded investments in renewable energy, we could meet the vast majority of our future energy needs.

We need these appliance efficiency standards to help make our air safe to breathe again and to give our families some relief on their electric bills. Texas is counting on the Legislature to lead us toward a new energy future.

Luke Metzger is the director of Environment Texas, a statewide citizens' advocacy group based in Austin.