Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: He there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and I love all things tech. And yesterday I published
Speaker 1: a tech News episode. Today's date, by the way, is July,
Speaker 1: in case you're listening in the future. But yes on
Speaker 1: July I published a tech News episode and mentioned in
Speaker 1: that episode a story, a fairly amusing story about how
Speaker 1: alien Ware, which is the the Dell Computers subsidiary that
Speaker 1: focuses on building you know, gaming PCs, recently acknowledged that
Speaker 1: the company was going to have to avoid orders from
Speaker 1: certain regions for a selection of gaming rigs, and that
Speaker 1: these regions included six states. Those states are, by the way, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Vermont,
Speaker 1: and Washington State. Now, the reason that alien Ware was
Speaker 1: going to have to cancel those orders is that these
Speaker 1: particular models of these particular gaming computers exceed the energy
Speaker 1: consumption rates that are allowed by those states regulatory bodies. So,
Speaker 1: in other words, these states have limits on how much
Speaker 1: electricity a computer system is allowed to consume per hour,
Speaker 1: and these particular computers exceed that. So if you prefer
Speaker 1: to look at it a different way, these computers are
Speaker 1: too powerful or really to power hungry, and are thus
Speaker 1: illegal in six states. Now that's being a bit hyperbolic,
Speaker 1: but it's also a way to spend this that could
Speaker 1: make those computers seem really cool, right Like if alien
Speaker 1: Ware said it's a computer, so fat asked it's illegal
Speaker 1: in six states, that could sell a lot of computers.
Speaker 1: But anyway, this all got me to thinking about energy
Speaker 1: efficiency and power consumption regulations in general. So we have
Speaker 1: different certifications for energy efficiency. You might have seen different
Speaker 1: labels on stuff that claims that a particular product meets
Speaker 1: a certain set of standards for energy efficiency. And as
Speaker 1: I've just pointed out, there are some states that have
Speaker 1: some fairly strict limits on energy consumption. So what is
Speaker 1: the history here, How did all this develop and why?
Speaker 1: And what do these different certifications mean and what is
Speaker 1: the history behind those? So today we're going to take
Speaker 1: a look at the issue of energy efficiency. Now I
Speaker 1: hope by the end of this episode you'll have a
Speaker 1: better understanding of why these regulations are in place in
Speaker 1: the first place, and why certain areas might have greater
Speaker 1: restrictions compared to others. And you also know what that
Speaker 1: energy star label actually means when you see it on
Speaker 1: say an appliance or maybe on a home listing. So
Speaker 1: this episode, like most of my episodes, is going to
Speaker 1: focus largely on the United States because that's where a
Speaker 1: lot of this evolved. But there are other regions of
Speaker 1: the world that have similar stories. It's just that to
Speaker 1: cover a global approach to this issue would require an
Speaker 1: entire podcast series, not just an episode. However, it will
Speaker 1: involve global events because, as it turns out, some big
Speaker 1: events on the global scale impacted the United States approach
Speaker 1: to energy consumption. So let's set the stage, and we
Speaker 1: do have to go quite ways back to kind of
Speaker 1: cover this. So way back in the early eighteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: most Americans were living in rural areas. Right like in
Speaker 1: the first few decades of the nineteenth century, only around
Speaker 1: ten or scent of the American population were living in cities.
Speaker 1: Even by eighteen sixty that percentage was still below twenty
Speaker 1: five percent of the population. For comparisons sake, today, more
Speaker 1: than eighty percent of all Americans live in a metropolitan area.
Speaker 1: So urbanization plays a part of our story today. But
Speaker 1: as we'll see the story is big and it has
Speaker 1: lots of moving parts to it. So another element is
Speaker 1: the rising dependence on fossil fuels. So up through the
Speaker 1: eighteen fifties, one of the main resources used for stuff
Speaker 1: like lighting fuel because you know before the light bulb,
Speaker 1: was whale oil. But by the eighteen fifties, whale oil
Speaker 1: was starting to get in short supply because of the
Speaker 1: shortage of whales because of how they were hunted extensively.
Speaker 1: But enterprising engineers learned how to produce kerosene by refining
Speaker 1: crude oil, and then in the eighteen sixties we get
Speaker 1: the first US oil refinery, which takes raw petroleum and
Speaker 1: then refines it into a fuel that provides an alternative
Speaker 1: to coal, and thus the oil rush begins. In the
Speaker 1: latter half of the nineteen hundreds, the United States takes
Speaker 1: the world lead in oil production and refining and provides
Speaker 1: around of the global supply of oil. In eight other
Speaker 1: parts of the world are getting into the oil speculation
Speaker 1: craze themselves, with countries like England and the Netherlands and
Speaker 1: Russia all discovering oil deposits, but the US continues to
Speaker 1: lead the global stage in that regard. At the same time,
Speaker 1: inventors start creating creating new technologies that rely upon refined
Speaker 1: oil for operation. So a growing consumption of oil is
Speaker 1: going hand in hand with the growing production of oil.
Speaker 1: So not only are you producing more of it, but
Speaker 1: we're finding new ways to use it. And thus the
Speaker 1: demand continues to increase along with the supply. Uh, we
Speaker 1: find and refine more oil, but we also consume more oil,
Speaker 1: and it's not like we quite hit an energy excess. Instead,
Speaker 1: we just find lots of new ways in order to
Speaker 1: need that good old bubble and crude. In the early
Speaker 1: nineteen hundreds, the rise of the automobile in the United
Speaker 1: States would further push oil consumption to new heights, and
Speaker 1: Ford would introduce the Model T in nineteen o eight
Speaker 1: that was a mass produced car that actually brought automobiles
Speaker 1: within the realm of purchase for a lot more households
Speaker 1: in America. So by nineteen ten, the US demand for
Speaker 1: gasoline had surpassed the demand for kerosene for the first time,
Speaker 1: because you know, kerosene was being used for things like
Speaker 1: lighting fuel and heating fuel. And now the fact that
Speaker 1: we were starting to see a motorized population in the
Speaker 1: United States meant that gasoline was becoming more in demand.
Speaker 1: And again Ford's approach to mass production means that automobiles
Speaker 1: are actually within the grasp of a significant percentage of
Speaker 1: US households, not all of them, but a lot of them.
Speaker 1: And before the automobile was essentially a vehicle for the
Speaker 1: idly rich. Right wealthy people could afford a car, no
Speaker 1: one else could until we started seeing, you know, the
Speaker 1: the principles of mass production applied to the automobile. So
Speaker 1: the US rapidly becomes motorized, much more rapidly than other
Speaker 1: parts of the world. You know, part like Europe was
Speaker 1: also getting motorized at this time, but at a much
Speaker 1: slower rate, and thus the United States dependence upon oil
Speaker 1: grew significantly as a result of this. World War One
Speaker 1: obviously would change things up quite a bit. Countries like
Speaker 1: Britain and France began to depend upon US oil exports
Speaker 1: when they were, you know, needing fuel to help in
Speaker 1: their war efforts, and of course, the Germans worked to
Speaker 1: disrupt supply lines between the United States and these countries,
Speaker 1: and when the US entered the war in nineteen seventeen,
Speaker 1: the demands for US oil exceeded domestic production. At that point,
Speaker 1: the US was still supplying oil to its allies, but
Speaker 1: it also needed oil to provide for domestic use right
Speaker 1: for people back here in the States, and so in
Speaker 1: order to supplement oil production in the US, the United
Speaker 1: States began to import oil from Mexico because now it
Speaker 1: just couldn't produce enough to meet all the demands. By
Speaker 1: nineteen nineteen, the U s Geological Survey comes up with
Speaker 1: a startling revelation and incorrect one, as it would turn out,
Speaker 1: but they didn't know it at the time, and that
Speaker 1: revelation was that the United States supply of oil was
Speaker 1: going to run out within a decade. So by nineteen
Speaker 1: twenty nine, oil reserves were going to be gone. Now,
Speaker 1: at that point, the United States was producing around a
Speaker 1: million barrels of oil every day, and consumption rates meant
Speaker 1: that of that oil was being consumed domestically. So again
Speaker 1: that means the only ten of US oil was available
Speaker 1: as an export. Everything else was was immediately being used
Speaker 1: because consumption rates were on the rise. Meanwhile, overseas in
Speaker 1: the Middle East, Britain and France were overseeing regions that
Speaker 1: they called protectorates. Though I'm sure the locals had less
Speaker 1: you know, nice words to describe them. The Middle East
Speaker 1: was proving to be rich with oil, and Britain and
Speaker 1: France were doing their best to keep US oil companies
Speaker 1: out of the Middle East because this way, you know,
Speaker 1: Britain and France, by overseeing these protectorates, could get access
Speaker 1: to that oil and thus remove their dependency upon US oil.
Speaker 1: They wouldn't have to win port as much because they
Speaker 1: would just essentially take the oil that was in these protectorates.
Speaker 1: By the late nineteen twenties and early nineteen thirties, oil
Speaker 1: diplomacy had become a major part of politics as various
Speaker 1: countries saw their energy needs hinging on access to oil
Speaker 1: production and oil refinery. So an agreement called the nineteen
Speaker 1: twenty eight Red Line Agreement established an oil monopoly in
Speaker 1: the Middle East, governed by the Iraq Petroleum Company, which
Speaker 1: in itself was made up of multiple partners, including an
Speaker 1: American oil company, and the agreement essentially laid out rules
Speaker 1: that prohibited these partners from independently drilling for oil outside
Speaker 1: of the partnership, you know, within this specific region of
Speaker 1: the Middle East that was defined by this Red Line,
Speaker 1: and they were all supposed to engage in what was
Speaker 1: called a self denial clause. So if any one partner
Speaker 1: of this group were to pursue oil interests within this region,
Speaker 1: that partner would then be obligated to share that with
Speaker 1: other partners. They could not claim it for their own.
Speaker 1: Every partner within this UH this organization would have equal
Speaker 1: right to it. This Iraq Petroleum Company, and again that
Speaker 1: was essentially a cartel. It was the the one authority
Speaker 1: for how the oil in this region could be exploited. However,
Speaker 1: it turned out that the back in the United States,
Speaker 1: that geological survey that said the US was going to
Speaker 1: run out of oil was totes wrong, and in fact,
Speaker 1: the US would begin to produce a surplus of oil.
Speaker 1: And that meant that the supply actually outpaced the demand
Speaker 1: for oil. And thus if you have a lot of
Speaker 1: supply and lower demand, prices drop an oil prices plummeted. Now,
Speaker 1: the government tried to respond to this by putting in
Speaker 1: quotas for oil auction, saying don't produce more than x
Speaker 1: amount in order to limit the effect of these price drops.
Speaker 1: Like so this was to protect oil companies from you know,
Speaker 1: having financial disaster because suddenly the stuff they provide is
Speaker 1: so plentiful that they can't make a profit off of
Speaker 1: it anymore. By the way, the Supreme Court would later
Speaker 1: overturn those quotas. But then we get up to World
Speaker 1: War Two, which obviously really complicated things. For one thing,
Speaker 1: Mexico took the step of nationalizing oil production within that country,
Speaker 1: something that many other countries would do in the following years.
Speaker 1: And in the process, Mexico revoked US oil concessions, which
Speaker 1: was a move that the US did not counter for
Speaker 1: fear that if it did counter that, if it put
Speaker 1: any sort of political pressure on Mexico, it might push
Speaker 1: Mexico to align with the access powers in World War two.
Speaker 1: So again politics plays a huge part in this. Now,
Speaker 1: during World War Two, the United States against to ration
Speaker 1: various resources and luxuries, and one of those resources is gasoline.
Speaker 1: The US government issues gas coupons which limits how much
Speaker 1: gasoline citizens are allowed to get, and also institutes a
Speaker 1: national speed limit of thirty five miles per hour, again
Speaker 1: to cut back on consumption. Uh, you know, the slower
Speaker 1: speeds would mean less fuel consumption even over great distances. Now,
Speaker 1: by the end of World War two, this would completely
Speaker 1: do a one eight. At that point, consumption would boom.
Speaker 1: Returning soldiers start buying homes and houses and appliances. At least,
Speaker 1: you know, if they were white, they were able to
Speaker 1: do that. There's plenty out there about the unfair practices
Speaker 1: that disproportionately harmed people of color who are coming back
Speaker 1: from World War Two. Anyway, there's a proliferation of inventions
Speaker 1: around this time and that gain popularity, everything from air
Speaker 1: conditioners to refrigerators, to televisions to brand new automobiles, including
Speaker 1: gas guzzlers. And here's the thing. At the time, there
Speaker 1: was plenty of oil to power all that stuff, whether
Speaker 1: it was you know, using oil in the process of
Speaker 1: electricity generation or oil being used in order to refine
Speaker 1: it into gasoline. There's enough to go around. It was
Speaker 1: a time of plenty. The US also starts to reach
Speaker 1: out to Saudi Arabia at this time and established connections
Speaker 1: just as that nation was discovering enormous oil fields within
Speaker 1: its borders. It would actually take a few years before
Speaker 1: the United States would import a massive amount of oil
Speaker 1: from Saudi Arabia. But this is where the foundation was laid.
Speaker 1: In the mid nineteen forties and from nineteen to nineteen fifty,
Speaker 1: we see a transformation in the United States. The increased
Speaker 1: consumption requires more oil than the US can produce. Finally,
Speaker 1: demand is actually outpacing supply, So in nineteen forty five,
Speaker 1: the US is a net oil exporter because it's producing
Speaker 1: more than it needs. But by nineteen fifty it's a
Speaker 1: net oil importer, bringing in nearly a million barrels of
Speaker 1: oil every day. This was just the beginning of a
Speaker 1: trend that would see the US import more and more
Speaker 1: oil from other nations, including the Middle East. In nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty two, the Prime Minister of Iran, Mohammed Massadiq, nationalized
Speaker 1: the oil industry there not by coincidence. Just two years later,
Speaker 1: there's a military coup in Iran, supported by British and
Speaker 1: US intelligence. By the end of nineteen fifty four, there's
Speaker 1: a new Iranian government headed by a shah who agrees
Speaker 1: to allow US oil companies to manage Iran's oil industry.
Speaker 1: So technically the companies don't own the oil, but they're
Speaker 1: allowed to manage the industry. Uh this, you know, this
Speaker 1: is again another one of those cases where you see
Speaker 1: energy and politics just tightly intertwined. Here. Then we get
Speaker 1: to the Suez Crisis, which was a very complicated affair
Speaker 1: that's best left to some other podcast than mine. And
Speaker 1: by nineteen fifty nine, the US faces another over supply
Speaker 1: of oil. So President Eisenhower issues an import quota and
Speaker 1: that limits foreign imports of oil to know more than
Speaker 1: nine percent of domestic production, saying all right, well, let's
Speaker 1: not bring in more and completely destroy this economy. While
Speaker 1: we'll have plenty of oil for our energy needs, we
Speaker 1: would also at the same time undermine the industry that
Speaker 1: it's built upon. So the following year, in nineteen sixty,
Speaker 1: a group of countries including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and
Speaker 1: Iran in the Middle East, and as well as Venezuela
Speaker 1: in South America, all form a group called the Organization
Speaker 1: of the Petroleum Exporting Countries or OPEC. Now, the reason
Speaker 1: that they did this was that the United States and
Speaker 1: various nations in Europe had been essentially dictating things like
Speaker 1: oil prices without actually consulting these countries in a lot
Speaker 1: of the countries where the oil was coming from, and
Speaker 1: so these these nations, like the United States and various
Speaker 1: countries in Europe were largely seen as being exploitative. They
Speaker 1: were exploiting the resources of these other oil producing countries
Speaker 1: for their own advantage. Now, it would take several years
Speaker 1: before OPEC would actually have enough political leverage and economic
Speaker 1: leverage so that countries like the United States would even
Speaker 1: really pay attention to them. But that would come to pass,
Speaker 1: and then we move ahead by like a decade a
Speaker 1: little more than that, and we come to a conflict that,
Speaker 1: depending upon your perspective, you might call the yam Kapoor War,
Speaker 1: or you might call it the Rama Don War. You
Speaker 1: might call it the nineteen seventy three Arab Israeli War.
Speaker 1: That conflict began on October six nine, and it lasted
Speaker 1: until October twenty six of that same year. Now, this
Speaker 1: was the fourth in a series of major conflicts between
Speaker 1: Israel and various Arabic nations in the Middle East, and
Speaker 1: it largely stemmed. This particular one largely stemmed from a
Speaker 1: demand that Egypt was making to Israel. Egypt was telling
Speaker 1: Israel to return certain territories that Israel had received in
Speaker 1: the previous conflict, the Six Days War, and Israel declined
Speaker 1: that demand, and then hostilities followed. Well. A full discussion
Speaker 1: of these conflicts again goes well beyond this show. I
Speaker 1: imagine the hosts of stuff you missed in history class
Speaker 1: would put together a phenomenal breakdown of the incredibly complicated
Speaker 1: scenarios that led to these conflicts. But for our purposes,
Speaker 1: the salient point here is that on October nineteenth, two
Speaker 1: weeks into the conflict, the then US President Richard Nixon,
Speaker 1: sent a request to Congress to extend two point to
Speaker 1: billion dollars worth of emergency aid to Israel, which was
Speaker 1: a move that Arabic countries would protest. I'll explain more,
Speaker 1: but first let's take a quick break. So, in response
Speaker 1: to the United States extending aid to Israel in the
Speaker 1: form of two point to billion dollars worth of it,
Speaker 1: the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Companies, so kind of
Speaker 1: a subset of OPEQ, elected to raise an oil embargo
Speaker 1: against the United States. Now this had happened once before
Speaker 1: in the conflict in nineteen sixty seven between Israel and
Speaker 1: Egypt and Syria and Jordan's that was the Sixth Day
Speaker 1: War I mentioned before the break, and during that time
Speaker 1: Arabic country is placed an oil embargo on all of
Speaker 1: Israel's allies but at that time, the United States was
Speaker 1: able to offset that embargo with domestic production, so it
Speaker 1: didn't really affect the US that much. But it was
Speaker 1: a very different story in nineteen seventy three. In fact,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three was a particularly vulnerable time for the
Speaker 1: United States. While the country had placed an import quota
Speaker 1: years earlier due to that over supply I mentioned where
Speaker 1: you know, the US could not import more than nine
Speaker 1: percent of domestic production, otherwise you would have over supply.
Speaker 1: While all that had changed, by nineteen seventy three, oil
Speaker 1: production in the United States was lagging behind the demand
Speaker 1: for oil. So this oil embargo ended up having a
Speaker 1: much larger effect on the US in nineteen seventy three
Speaker 1: than the one from nineteen sixty seven. Gasolene prices rose
Speaker 1: by forty percent. Now you know that that conspicuous consumption
Speaker 1: that had really driven the fifties and sixties was unsustainable.
Speaker 1: In the seventies, the big gas guzzlers that were the
Speaker 1: hallmarks of US automotive industry were now a liability. Politically,
Speaker 1: the US government moved to form a plan to gain
Speaker 1: energy independence by nine eight. Spoiler alert, that didn't happen.
Speaker 1: Advisors were pointing out how energy dependence on imported fuel
Speaker 1: sources isn't just a matter of energy, it's also a
Speaker 1: matter of national security. And so in the early to
Speaker 1: mid nineteen seventies we saw the first programs launched dedicated
Speaker 1: to improving energy efficiency and lowering energy consumption. The oil
Speaker 1: embargo lasted until March of nineteen seventy four, but the
Speaker 1: effects of that embargo would stretch on much further. The
Speaker 1: experience really emphasized a need to reduce energy consumption so
Speaker 1: that when things are tight, the U. S economy would
Speaker 1: not grind to a halt. And so we started seeing
Speaker 1: some big changes, like here in the United States. One
Speaker 1: major change that happened was the US government passed a
Speaker 1: mandate that capped highway speeds to fifty five miles per hour.
Speaker 1: Now these days that's not necessarily the case. It can
Speaker 1: vary from region to region. But as a kid, I
Speaker 1: remember that all highways had that as the top speed
Speaker 1: limit fifty at the time. When I was a kid,
Speaker 1: I just assumed that those limits were there because somewhere
Speaker 1: some number crunchers figured out that there was a balance
Speaker 1: between letting people get to where they needed to go
Speaker 1: within a timely fashion and cutting down on the severity
Speaker 1: of traffic accidents. Except it wasn't really about safety, it
Speaker 1: was about conserving gasoline consumption. That's why that speed limit
Speaker 1: was there. Now, the state of California would lead the
Speaker 1: way when it came to setting energy efficiency standards. The
Speaker 1: state established energy consumption standards starting in nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 1: California has the largest population of the fifties states here
Speaker 1: in the United States, and the energy crisis was keenly
Speaker 1: felt in California, especially when it comes to gasoline. The
Speaker 1: matter was somewhat mitigated in that most of California actually
Speaker 1: has a pretty mild climate, so that reduces the need
Speaker 1: for energy consumption on a per capita basis for things
Speaker 1: like heating and cooling. That's not as big of an
Speaker 1: issue in California during most years. During the era of
Speaker 1: climate change, it's a different story. But we're talking about
Speaker 1: the seventies here, So the key here is that California
Speaker 1: has frequently led the pack when it comes to energy
Speaker 1: efficiency and power consumption policies. In ninet two really big
Speaker 1: things happened that relate to this podcast. One is that
Speaker 1: I was born and without me this episode wouldn't exist.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be here to talk to you. But the
Speaker 1: more important thing for this topic is that the United
Speaker 1: States government passed the Energy Policy and Conservation Act. The
Speaker 1: goals of this piece of legislation were many. One was
Speaker 1: to give the president more executive options in the face
Speaker 1: of an energy crisis in order to speed up the
Speaker 1: response process, so if something goes wrong, the president can
Speaker 1: do something about it quickly without having to go through
Speaker 1: all the bells and whistles that you would normally have
Speaker 1: to do. Another was to increase US energy production while
Speaker 1: simultaneously lowering energy consumption, so produce more but use less.
Speaker 1: In other words. Part of that focus was on creating
Speaker 1: rules about efficiencies, with a large focus on automobiles. This
Speaker 1: is where we start to see rules for a minimum
Speaker 1: miles per gallon rate for vehicles. So in the early
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies, the average miles per gallon rate for a
Speaker 1: passenger car in the United States was around thirteen to
Speaker 1: fourteen miles per gallon, which is pretty bad, and there
Speaker 1: were some gas guzzlers that were way worse than that.
Speaker 1: The new legislation set standards that car manufacturers would need
Speaker 1: to meet in order to you know, sell their cars
Speaker 1: or to receive certain incentives or subsidies, And in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy eight that minimum was set at eighteen miles per gallon,
Speaker 1: and it went up each successive year like with it
Speaker 1: reaching twenty seven point five gallons by the mid nineteen eighties.
Speaker 1: Now the law also gave authority to the newly formed
Speaker 1: Department of Energy in the United States to set energy
Speaker 1: conservation standards for equipment and appliances. So the Department of
Speaker 1: Energy began to set minimum efficiency standards for a selection
Speaker 1: of different technologies. In nineteen seventy eight, an oil workers
Speaker 1: strike in Iran escalated to an outright revolution, with the
Speaker 1: Iranian shaw fleeing in nineteen seventy nine and the country
Speaker 1: coming under new leadership, the Ayatola. And in addition, a
Speaker 1: group of Iranian students seized the US embassy in Tehran
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy nine and took more than sixty Americans hostage.
Speaker 1: The US President Jimmy Carter leveled an embargo on oil
Speaker 1: imports from Iran, and oil prices escalated to more than
Speaker 1: twice the going amount as a result. Following that was
Speaker 1: an oil shortage in the United States with long lines
Speaker 1: at gas stations and super high gas prices. President Carter
Speaker 1: signed the Energy Security Act, which encouraged the pursuit of
Speaker 1: fossil fuel alternatives. Now at this stage, the reason for
Speaker 1: doing that was primarily because of the continuing political and
Speaker 1: economic dependence upon fossil fuel imports. It was not because
Speaker 1: of the environmental impact of fossil fuels. That also is
Speaker 1: a factor, But the main concern here was if we're
Speaker 1: dependent upon fossil fuels and we're getting a significant percentage
Speaker 1: of our fossil fuels from foreign sources and then foreign
Speaker 1: conflicts breakout, we're kind of up the creek. So we
Speaker 1: need to find a different way. And that's why this
Speaker 1: Act was about looking into alternatives for fossil fuels. In
Speaker 1: this era, there was a lot of activity. Uh, there
Speaker 1: was a lot of innovation, and there was a lot
Speaker 1: of failure in the realm of energy efficiencies and lower
Speaker 1: energy consumption. By that, I mean organizations attempted to take
Speaker 1: some steps towards energy conservation, but with varying degrees of success.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it was the smallest of actions, like it was
Speaker 1: telling companies, hey put up signs that tell people to
Speaker 1: flip off the light switches at the end of a
Speaker 1: day so that they're not wasting electricity. And that's important,
Speaker 1: and it does reduce waste, but it's kind of a
Speaker 1: tiny drop in the bucket compared to some other activities.
Speaker 1: Were companies that were producing products that claimed to help
Speaker 1: reduce energy consumption, like plug this in between. You know,
Speaker 1: your outlet and whatever it is you're you're using the
Speaker 1: electricity for, Like this would be a go between that
Speaker 1: somehow would magically reduce the amount of electricity you were consuming.
Speaker 1: But a lot of these were of dubious effectiveness and
Speaker 1: amounted to a little more than a black box that
Speaker 1: didn't really do anything at all. Also, they were scams.
Speaker 1: In other words, most of them were. This is something
Speaker 1: we still encounter today. In fact, manufacturing companies were having
Speaker 1: a little bit more impact. Guided by the requirements of
Speaker 1: the Energy Act of nineteen five and a subsequent amendment
Speaker 1: to that Act in nineteen seventy nine, companies making big
Speaker 1: appliances like refrigerators and washers and dryers and air conditioners
Speaker 1: and that kind of thing began to innovate in being
Speaker 1: able to do more while consuming less energy. The days
Speaker 1: of seemingly endless energy were long gone, and now the
Speaker 1: name of the game was figuring out how to outperform
Speaker 1: the competition while still being energy efficient. California continued to
Speaker 1: lead the way news standards in night set new goals.
Speaker 1: The state consulted with various engineers and energy experts to
Speaker 1: draft the standards, and further, those standards would increase the
Speaker 1: efficiency requirements every three years automatically, so you would have
Speaker 1: a certain set of standards. Three years later, those standards
Speaker 1: would get more strict. Three years after that they would
Speaker 1: increase again. They would do so no matter who was
Speaker 1: in office. Uh that included the building code in California,
Speaker 1: so every three years, the building code would get more
Speaker 1: strict and there were numerous benefits to this approach. One
Speaker 1: was that due to those higher standards, Californians were starting
Speaker 1: to consume less energy on an individual basis, which meant
Speaker 1: their electricity bills were going down. People in California were
Speaker 1: spending less for electricity even as electricity costs would increase.
Speaker 1: The consumption was going down, so the bills were going down.
Speaker 1: The standards also meant that California didn't have to go
Speaker 1: into a phase of building out new power plant facilities
Speaker 1: they didn't have to increase production, in other words, because
Speaker 1: they were reducing consumption, and obviously if they had increased
Speaker 1: production and built more power plants, that would have had
Speaker 1: an enormous negative environmental impact. So this also helped cut
Speaker 1: down on smog generation, which was a problem that was
Speaker 1: huge in California, to the point that if you grew
Speaker 1: up in the same era that I did, you probably
Speaker 1: associated the words smog with Los Angeles like that was
Speaker 1: a defining feature of l A and it didn't appear
Speaker 1: to come at the cost of California's economy. In fact,
Speaker 1: California's economic growth outpaced that of the US as a whole,
Speaker 1: so the state was able to do this and not
Speaker 1: have it make a negative impact on economy. That's often
Speaker 1: a counter argument to adopting environmentally friendly or energy efficient
Speaker 1: processes is that it could have a negative economic impact,
Speaker 1: But in reality, in the regions where we see states
Speaker 1: and other countries adopt more restrictive regulations, we don't tend
Speaker 1: to see a huge hit to the economy. That seems
Speaker 1: to be a fallacious argument. So there were both federal
Speaker 1: and state energy efficiency regulations at play here, and if
Speaker 1: you are in the United states. The ones that apply
Speaker 1: to you depend entirely on where you reside. For example,
Speaker 1: I live in the state of Georgia. Now, according to
Speaker 1: the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy, my state
Speaker 1: ranks number forty two out of fifty one in the
Speaker 1: United States. And you might say, hey, the United States,
Speaker 1: it only has fifty states. Well, the a c e
Speaker 1: E is also including Washington, d C in this scorecard.
Speaker 1: That ain't great. And uh, the neighboring states to Georgia,
Speaker 1: at least to our right and left, are kind of
Speaker 1: in a similar boat. So South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, and
Speaker 1: Louisiana all rank in the forties. But some other states
Speaker 1: like Vermont, Massachusetts, Washington State, and several others have adopted
Speaker 1: energy standards similar to California's, and they have a much
Speaker 1: better track record when it comes to energy consumption. Now,
Speaker 1: before I move on, I should also point out that
Speaker 1: you can't just compare apples to apples. There are a
Speaker 1: lot of factors at play here. For example, the Southeastern
Speaker 1: United States has a climate that's pretty brutal for about
Speaker 1: half the year. Although with climate change, I think we've
Speaker 1: got some pretty stiff competition now but we often have
Speaker 1: very hot, very humid summers, and that means we're frequently
Speaker 1: using more energy to keep cool during those months. But honestly,
Speaker 1: over the past few years, we've seen a lot of
Speaker 1: areas of the country hit just as hard, if not harder,
Speaker 1: than we are, So that story is changing over time.
Speaker 1: Now I've got a lot more to say about energy efficiency,
Speaker 1: but before I get to that, let's take another quick break.
Speaker 1: So I've mentioned a couple of things here about energy
Speaker 1: efficiency and the factors that that play a role, but
Speaker 1: there are a lot of other complicating factors that also
Speaker 1: come into play. So the economic and political issues with
Speaker 1: oil provided the initial urgency to move towards energy efficiency,
Speaker 1: But then there was also this growing awareness of the
Speaker 1: environmental impact of fossil fuels that was developing around the
Speaker 1: same time. Now, there were environmental activists working hard in
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties and nineteen seventies, of course, but you
Speaker 1: know that, I think an event that really brought this
Speaker 1: issue into the national focus was a man made disaster
Speaker 1: that happened in nine That's when the Exxon valdis And
Speaker 1: oil tanker carrying more than ten million gallons of crude
Speaker 1: oil struck a reef off the coast of Alaska and
Speaker 1: spilled its contents into the region, and it caused an
Speaker 1: unprecedented man made environmental disaster. So this was in the
Speaker 1: news day after day, complete with disturbing videos of the
Speaker 1: impact on the Alaskan coastline and the wildlife, and it
Speaker 1: would stand as the worst oil spill in American history
Speaker 1: until twenty ten. That's when Deepwater Horizon, when that oil
Speaker 1: platform released even more oil in the Gulf of Mexico.
Speaker 1: But arguably the Valdis was one that was far more
Speaker 1: visible because of the impact it had on that region. Now,
Speaker 1: while these were acute disasters with a truly enormous scale,
Speaker 1: there was this growing understanding in the general public as
Speaker 1: to the effects of fossil fuels on the environment in general,
Speaker 1: even without disasters. The idea of greenhouse gas emissions, of
Speaker 1: the emissions of various chemicals that could lead to acid
Speaker 1: rain like these were things that were starting to become
Speaker 1: clear in the American consciousness around this time. And so
Speaker 1: around the late eighties and early nineties, we saw the
Speaker 1: conversation around energy consumption include not just energy costs and efficiency,
Speaker 1: as in, you can save money by switching to you know,
Speaker 1: more efficient technologies. But now we also had environmental impact
Speaker 1: become part of the conversation, so the story gets a
Speaker 1: bit more complicated in other words, And interestingly, these days,
Speaker 1: you're far more likely to see energy efficiency come stations
Speaker 1: contextualized as an environmental issue. Which, don't get me wrong,
Speaker 1: it is an environmental issue, but it's also all these
Speaker 1: other things that we've already talked about. You know, it's
Speaker 1: also a national security issue, it's an economic issue, it's
Speaker 1: a political issue, etcetera. It's all of these things at
Speaker 1: the same time. Personally, I believe if you reduce it
Speaker 1: down to just one factor, it's misleading. Now, admittedly it's
Speaker 1: way easier to talk about if you reduce it down
Speaker 1: to one. You know that that makes it an easier
Speaker 1: to message, but it actually reduces how important this is
Speaker 1: on multiple fronts. So this brings us up to that's
Speaker 1: when the Environmental Protection Agency or e p A, introduces
Speaker 1: a program called green Lights. The e p A formed
Speaker 1: on December two, nineteen seventy, under the executive order of
Speaker 1: President Richard Nixon, and the purpose of the e p
Speaker 1: A was to consolidate the U. S. Government's environmental responsibilities.
Speaker 1: The government was responding to various environmental crises and issues,
Speaker 1: and this was a way of kind of focusing the
Speaker 1: government's role with that regard. Now, over the years and
Speaker 1: over the various presidential administrations since nineteen seventy, the e
Speaker 1: p a's role has changed a great deal. But on
Speaker 1: January six and initiated the Green Lights Program, which pushed
Speaker 1: for US organizations, including companies and government agencies to adopt
Speaker 1: energy efficient lighting. Now, at the heart of the matter
Speaker 1: here was energy waste. According to the e p A,
Speaker 1: twenty five of all electricity consumption at that time was
Speaker 1: going to lighting, and stuff like incandescent light bulbs were
Speaker 1: highly inefficient, with most of that energy the vast majority
Speaker 1: of the ergy sent to these light bulbs going into
Speaker 1: turning into waste heat rather than light. In fact, incandescent
Speaker 1: bulbs only convert somewhere between five and ten percent of
Speaker 1: the energy they receive into visible light, and the rest
Speaker 1: is waste heat. Fluorescence or CFL bulbs are far more
Speaker 1: energy efficient than incandescent bulbs. Commercial and consumer led light bulbs,
Speaker 1: like the kind used you know that you would use
Speaker 1: to light your room, those really didn't have a presence
Speaker 1: in the early nineties. They are obviously available today, but
Speaker 1: those are even way more efficient than both incandescence and CFLs.
Speaker 1: But let's get back to green lights. So the e
Speaker 1: p A was advocating for a move for less wasteful
Speaker 1: you know, light lighting solutions, which would not only provide
Speaker 1: an environmental benefit, but would also lead to lower energy consumption.
Speaker 1: Thus it would costs to use these kinds of light bulbs.
Speaker 1: In the long run, the bulbs or the tubes or
Speaker 1: whatever would last longer, they would use less power, and
Speaker 1: that meant over the course of a single light bulb
Speaker 1: the organization would spend less money on it. That would
Speaker 1: mean that the organization would actually profit off of cutting
Speaker 1: back on waste. It might be a higher upfront investment
Speaker 1: to buy CFLs over incandescence, but over the life of
Speaker 1: that CFL you would more than save the money you
Speaker 1: would have spent on a larger number of incandescent bulbs.
Speaker 1: So this was a pretty good message and it would
Speaker 1: also be part of the move to abandon incandescent bulbs.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can still find some types of incandescent
Speaker 1: bulbs today, especially like those specialized like Edison bulb types,
Speaker 1: but for the most part, we've moved away from those.
Speaker 1: The e p A stated, quote, every kilowatt hour of
Speaker 1: electricity not used prevents the emission of one and a
Speaker 1: half pounds of carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas,
Speaker 1: also five point eight grams of sulfur dioxide, a principal
Speaker 1: component of acid rain, and two point five grams of
Speaker 1: nitrogen oxides, precursor to both acid rain and smog, as
Speaker 1: well as the pollution attendant upon mining and transporting power
Speaker 1: plant fuels and disposing of power plant wastes in the quote.
Speaker 1: So the e p A was taking a pretty big
Speaker 1: picture approach with this messaging, of which I approved because
Speaker 1: when we get a really narrow focus, we miss out
Speaker 1: on a lot of stuff. In the e p A
Speaker 1: made another move, one that would have a big effect
Speaker 1: on the consumer electronics industry, and that is when the
Speaker 1: e p A launched the Energy Star Label. Now, the
Speaker 1: program identified energy efficient products with a special Energy Star
Speaker 1: label or sticker. Products that matched or exceeded the energy
Speaker 1: efficiency standards that were set by the e p A
Speaker 1: would qualify for this designation, which would serve as a
Speaker 1: guide for consumers. When it came time to shop for
Speaker 1: various types of technology. When we come back, I'll talk
Speaker 1: a little bit more about energy Star to explain how
Speaker 1: it works. When the e p A first launched energy Star,
Speaker 1: which would eventually actually incorporate the green Lights program that
Speaker 1: that had launched the year before. Green Lights would then
Speaker 1: incorporate into energy Star, well, when it launched it, the
Speaker 1: focus was on computer systems and computer displays, or rather,
Speaker 1: I should say computer monitors display as being far too
Speaker 1: grand to describe what we were using back in those days.
Speaker 1: So this kind of gets at an issue that we
Speaker 1: saw with alien where and its computers. Because the six
Speaker 1: states that Dell is not going to be shipping alien
Speaker 1: Ware computers to or these specific models, I should say,
Speaker 1: all have energy standards for computers that the alien Ware
Speaker 1: models don't meet. They exceed those standards, they're not as
Speaker 1: energy efficient as is required, so they cannot be shipped there.
Speaker 1: According to an e p A publication that was celebrating
Speaker 1: the twentieth anniversary of the launch of energy Star, the
Speaker 1: program was apocryphal. Lee sprung from an office tour that
Speaker 1: the then director of the e p a's Atmospheric Pollution
Speaker 1: Prevention Division took back in nineteen nineties. So the idea
Speaker 1: is this director is walking around an office after hours,
Speaker 1: just taking a look to see what's going on, and
Speaker 1: according to the story, he was upset that a number
Speaker 1: of the employees at the e P A, we're not
Speaker 1: shutting down their computers at the end of the day.
Speaker 1: And his point was, we know that increased energy consumption
Speaker 1: leads to increased greenhouse gas emissions, and that this in
Speaker 1: turn affects climate change, and yet we, the people who
Speaker 1: know this and who are in charge of trying to
Speaker 1: protect the environment, are doing this. So the machines were
Speaker 1: continuing to run after hours, consuming electricity and thus contributing
Speaker 1: to air pollution. And so he saw the need to
Speaker 1: launch a program that would encourage technical solutions to human problems.
Speaker 1: If people were too lazy to turn off their computers,
Speaker 1: or if for some reason they believe that turning computers
Speaker 1: off and on again too many times would decrease the
Speaker 1: useful lifespan of those machines, there needed to be some
Speaker 1: sort of technology solution to encourage computer manufacturers to build
Speaker 1: in standby or low power modes that would engage automatically
Speaker 1: after some period of inactivity. Now the e p A
Speaker 1: says this story is only kind of sore true, and
Speaker 1: that there were in fact a lot of people working
Speaker 1: on ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and how to
Speaker 1: create a path for companies to go that particular route.
Speaker 1: It wasn't enough to say this will cause less pollution.
Speaker 1: There needed to be some economic incentives as well. So
Speaker 1: here's your proposition. If you're the e p A. You
Speaker 1: tell companies, hey, here's how much money you're spending just
Speaker 1: to keep those machines running when no one is there
Speaker 1: to use them. That's just money down the drain. And
Speaker 1: businesses hate throwing money down the drain. Now, I mean,
Speaker 1: some businesses are actually pretty free with their cash, and
Speaker 1: you could argue that some of the stuff that business
Speaker 1: has spend money on effectively is the same as throwing
Speaker 1: it down the drain, but they prefer to feel like
Speaker 1: they're getting something out of using cash, and just spending
Speaker 1: money to keep computers running when no one is around
Speaker 1: to use them doesn't really make the cut. So then
Speaker 1: you've got these companies which need to use computers, wanting
Speaker 1: a solution to an economic problem, and this creates an
Speaker 1: incentive for the computer manufacturers who want to land those
Speaker 1: suite orders with big businesses to provide, you know, a
Speaker 1: truckload of computers for an office. So the computer manufacturers
Speaker 1: have an incentive to create a more power efficient computer
Speaker 1: to meet the expectations of these customers, who in turn
Speaker 1: see these computers as an investment both in resources and
Speaker 1: in decreased wastage. And along the way, we see electricity
Speaker 1: being used by the organization's computer systems UH at a
Speaker 1: lower level, and that means less of a load on
Speaker 1: the power grid and ultimately less of an environmental impact.
Speaker 1: So this is kind of like three D chess, y'all. Now,
Speaker 1: I should also remind you the bag in the early nineties,
Speaker 1: computer monitors, as I kind of alluded to early were different.
Speaker 1: We are not talking about flat led displays that are
Speaker 1: really energy efficient. I'm talking about big, old, honking electricity
Speaker 1: hungry cathode ray tube or CRT monitors. Sometimes these things
Speaker 1: weighed more than a small child and they were not
Speaker 1: energy efficient devices. So the e p A launches this
Speaker 1: market driven approach towards energy efficiency totally voluntary. This is
Speaker 1: not like you must meet these qualifications or you're not
Speaker 1: allowed to produce monitors. Instead, it's if you meet these,
Speaker 1: then you get an energy Star rating. You know, that
Speaker 1: Energy Star rating was originally for computers and monitors that
Speaker 1: would go into a low power sleep mode after a
Speaker 1: period of inactivity. That was pretty much it. This mode
Speaker 1: meant that they should consume thirty watts or less when
Speaker 1: they're operating, so when they're in sleep mode, it should
Speaker 1: be thirty watts or less to keep them in sleep mode.
Speaker 1: As long as it met those criteria, then the Energy
Speaker 1: Star label could be slapped onto those products, and that
Speaker 1: Energy Star label would then give consumers the heads up
Speaker 1: regarding which systems were compliant with these specifications. Even if
Speaker 1: they didn't know what the specifications were, they knew, oh,
Speaker 1: this particular monitor has an Energy Star label on it,
Speaker 1: which means it consumes less electricity. And no one was
Speaker 1: required to do this. It was totally voluntary. But following
Speaker 1: those specs, men a company could include that Energy Star
Speaker 1: label and that became a marketing tool and the program
Speaker 1: saw some early success, and before long the e PA
Speaker 1: began to extend the Energy Star program to other types
Speaker 1: of technology. At first, it's stuck around with office technology
Speaker 1: and then moved on to things like like printers instead
Speaker 1: of just computers and monitors. So the idea here was
Speaker 1: that corporations and offices have a lot of technology and
Speaker 1: them and it gets a lot of use, right And thus,
Speaker 1: if you get a few big companies to make the
Speaker 1: investment into lower energy uh consumption, high energy efficiency products,
Speaker 1: that would have a bigger impact than trying to convince
Speaker 1: individual consumers to follow suit. So the strategy was that
Speaker 1: the companies would lead the way and then consumers would
Speaker 1: also follow along. And for the most part that was
Speaker 1: true consumers looking to save money on their electric bills
Speaker 1: or those who are concerned about the impact that their
Speaker 1: lifestyle was having on the environment. And to be fair,
Speaker 1: there was some overlap with those two groups. They began
Speaker 1: to rely on the energy Star label as one of
Speaker 1: the factors that would matter when they start making a
Speaker 1: purchasing decision. I mean, if you've got to go out
Speaker 1: and buy a new fridge, it kind of makes sense
Speaker 1: that one of the criteria you consider is how much
Speaker 1: energy is that fridge going to require? How much is
Speaker 1: that fridge going to cost you in electricity bills over
Speaker 1: the course of you owning it and getting one that's
Speaker 1: going to cost you less while having the features you want.
Speaker 1: Just makes sense. So the e p A expanded beyond
Speaker 1: consumer products with its Energy Star program, and in it
Speaker 1: extended the program to evaluate homes so that people looking
Speaker 1: to buy a house could look for homes that meet
Speaker 1: Energy Star specifications. So stuff like insulation and energy efficient
Speaker 1: doors and windows and all this kind of stuff would
Speaker 1: all count towards an Energy Star designation, which would tell
Speaker 1: the consumer, Hey, I'm gonna have to spend less to
Speaker 1: heat or cool this house because of that label, and
Speaker 1: I have the good feeling of knowing that it meets
Speaker 1: these requirements, and I'm going to be less wasteful and
Speaker 1: thus have less of a negative impact on the environment. Now,
Speaker 1: I think a big thing to take away from the
Speaker 1: Energy Star program was how it helped create a market
Speaker 1: based solution for energy efficiency. By creating a designation that
Speaker 1: gives consumers an idea of the impact of in particular product,
Speaker 1: the e p A created a way from manufacturers to
Speaker 1: try and stand out against the competition, and then that
Speaker 1: created a market pressure that meant other companies needed to
Speaker 1: follow suit or else get left behind. If your products
Speaker 1: do not meet those Energy Star standards and your competitors do,
Speaker 1: then you might see a negative impact in sales, and
Speaker 1: so Energy Star in that sense was a really big success.
Speaker 1: It pushed companies to create more energy efficient products. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: we saw both the federal government and some states but
Speaker 1: into place tougher energy consumption standards. So in two thousand
Speaker 1: five of the U. S. Government passed the Energy Policy Act.
Speaker 1: That legislation set new appliance energy standards, also created new
Speaker 1: tax incentives designed to encourage more efficient use of energy
Speaker 1: and lower energy consumption in general. Growing energy prices prompted
Speaker 1: another law in two thousand seven that was the Energy
Speaker 1: Independence and Security Act. This again increased standards in various
Speaker 1: areas regarding energy consumption, and as the name suggests, the
Speaker 1: goal is to find an equilibrium or or better case
Speaker 1: in which the United States energy needs are met by
Speaker 1: the United States energy production, making it unnecessary to import
Speaker 1: stuff like oil from other countries. This was a big
Speaker 1: focus of the proposed hydrogen economy, the idea being that
Speaker 1: the United States could transition from a fossil fuel based
Speaker 1: economy to one based on hydrogen, we would have no
Speaker 1: need to import oil from foreign sources. Of course, the
Speaker 1: problem there is that switching to anything besides fossil fuels
Speaker 1: is big and expensive and hard. We've got an infrastructure
Speaker 1: for fossil fuels that dates back more than a century.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of inertia that's built up there. Further well,
Speaker 1: hydrogen is the most abundant element in our universe. It's
Speaker 1: also the type of element that bonds with other stuff.
Speaker 1: So in order for us to get hydrogen so that
Speaker 1: we can make use of it for the purposes of energy,
Speaker 1: we first have to exert some energy in order to
Speaker 1: break those chemical bonds and free up hydrogen. So unless
Speaker 1: we do that in a way where the energy and
Speaker 1: the hydrogen is greater than whatever energy we had to
Speaker 1: pour into the system in order to get the hydrogen,
Speaker 1: you're at a losing proposition. But the hydrogen economy is
Speaker 1: really a matter for another episode, and in fact I
Speaker 1: have covered it in the past. Generally speaking, energy efficiency
Speaker 1: remains a pretty big topic. I would say that most
Speaker 1: of the time we see this conversation revolve around the
Speaker 1: environmental impact of fossil fuels and the issue of climate change,
Speaker 1: and these are undeniably important and big and real concerns,
Speaker 1: and energy consumption definitely plays a part here, as electricity
Speaker 1: production makes up one quarter of total greenhouse gas emissions
Speaker 1: in the United States and transportation is twenty nine so
Speaker 1: even more than electricity, at least according to the e
Speaker 1: p A. So energy efficiency standards really matter here. They
Speaker 1: can make a huge difference. And as we move forward
Speaker 1: with an increased emphasis on switching to alternative energy sources
Speaker 1: and moving away from fossil fuels as well as pushed
Speaker 1: towards electrifying the fleet of vehicles out there, energy efficiency
Speaker 1: will continue to be a critical part of our strategy.
Speaker 1: You want to be efficient, you want to have lower
Speaker 1: energy consumption. That's going to be important for all sorts
Speaker 1: of things with electric vehicles. It will be important for
Speaker 1: the you know, the purposes of how much driving range
Speaker 1: do you get with this car? Because we can only
Speaker 1: make batteries up to a certain size. Before that starts
Speaker 1: to become an issue too, you start seeing issues like
Speaker 1: weight and safety and other things play a part. So
Speaker 1: you have to say, well, if we can make more
Speaker 1: efficient use of electricity, then a charge on this battery
Speaker 1: will allow this card to go much further than if
Speaker 1: we're not careful. Right, So they're a lot of reasons
Speaker 1: to be careful with energy consumption. Even should we make
Speaker 1: the move away from fossil fuels. So that I think
Speaker 1: is a good encapsulation of the concept of energy efficiency
Speaker 1: and energy consumption and why it's important to have these
Speaker 1: regulations and standards in place, and that it is more
Speaker 1: than the climate. Like if you're the type of person
Speaker 1: who doesn't see the big deal about climate issues, well
Speaker 1: I I don't understand that. But even if you are,
Speaker 1: there's still the matter of the fact that it just
Speaker 1: makes more economic sense to be more efficient with your
Speaker 1: energy usage. And if money doesn't matter to you and
Speaker 1: the climate doesn't matter to you, I'm wondering how you
Speaker 1: ended up getting equipment to be able to listen to
Speaker 1: a podcast. But anyway, that's it for this episode. I
Speaker 1: hope you learned something. I hope you enjoyed it. Like
Speaker 1: I said, there are a lot of complicated parts of
Speaker 1: this story that I hope are being covered in other
Speaker 1: podcasts because I would also love to hear them. Uh,
Speaker 1: And they are important for us to have an understanding
Speaker 1: of how we got to where we are and helps
Speaker 1: inform us of the decisions we need to make to
Speaker 1: get to where we want to be. All of that's
Speaker 1: really important. If you have suggestions for topics that I
Speaker 1: should cover in future episodes of tech Stuff. I welcome
Speaker 1: you to reach out to me and let me know.
Speaker 1: The best way to do that is on Twitter. The
Speaker 1: handle for the show is text Stuff H s W
Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you again really soon. Text Stuff
Speaker 1: is an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from
Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.