Columnists: Rob Kool,

Published on: 17 Jul 2009

Energy Efficiency Watch - holiday reading

On the 13th of July The Energy Efficiency Watch launched the final report of this European IEE project. The project started as the result of a parliamentarian call for “Action, Not Talk” with the aim of making Europe the most energy efficient economy in the world.

Eufores brought the main actors in the field, including industry and eceee together to analyse what has been done, and most of all what positive lessons can be drawn if we really want “Action, Not Talk”.

Reading the final report, we can only conclude the goal of the parliamentarians has not been achieved yet.  Instead, the Energy Services Directive of the EU led to the biggest jigsaw puzzle ever. The recipe to create this puzzle is quite simple. You take 27 countries, one non-binding target (but two chapters and 9 articles to describe them), a clear time line (but options to operate outside it in “early action”) and a deadline to produce National Energy Efficiency Action Plans (NEEAPs). Then you carefully avoid a proposal for monitoring and standard lay-out of the national plans. The result is a record breaking pile of totally different energy efficiency plans.

Ecofys and the Wuppertal Institute made a heroic attempt to compile this collection of assorted policy plans into a comprehensible report. Hence “light reading” for the holidays.

Their conclusion that the structure might work for future NEEAPs isn’t really groundbreaking. My interpretation that even very well trained Sudoku players will fail when it comes to compare figures presented in the NEEAPs also didn’t come as a shock.

The real added value lies in the report’s conclusion that the individual national plans contain coherent policy measures. They allow mutual learning among member states. The report supports this by more than enough evidence. Indeed there is a danger that only “enthusiasts” will read the whole report.

However, for politicians that only deal with this topic from time to time the conclusions of this report makes their lives much easier. First of all it shows that we can go for binding targets in the next period , as there are more than enough possibilities to implement measures that deliver the desired results.  Second it give them opportunities to show off with these results, as they are often economically sensible as well.  And finally the European parliamentarians get the possibility to turn messy legislation into a piece that focuses national policy into a joined effort of the EU in a way where we can learn from and encourage one another.

The conclusions of the final report seem a no-brainer for the new elected parliament to act upon. To collide the Energy Efficiency Watch mantra with that of our recent summer study: Innovate, Act, No (Small) Talk, and Deliver!

The final report and more information on EEW can be found here:
http://www.energy-efficiency-watch.org/

See also: Call to issue template for national efficiency plans http://www.eceee.org/news/news_2009/2009-07-15/

The views expressed in this column are those of the columnist and do not necessarily reflect the views of eceee or any of its members.

Other columns by Rob Kool