The Snyder administration’s latest-and last-draft report on Michigan’s energy future says what it should: The state’s five-year-old energy efficiency mandate, known as Energy Optimization, is not only working well, there’s plenty of room for utilities to do more to help their customers save electricity and natural gas. But we have only until Wednesday, Nov. 4, to submit comments on the draft and influence what that final version says.
There are lots of happy faces around our office since the Snyder administration released its draft report on renewable energy. Based on last winter’s energy forums, it says we can get to 30 percent renewable energy by 2035 without straining the power grid-or our wallets! But the report is subject to some revision before it’s finalized, which is why we’re reaching out: We’d like you to chime in!
Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration is earning high marks for its draft report on the possibilities for renewable energy in Michigan. But now some clean energy advocates and entrepreneurs, who strongly praised the report’s conclusions and the unusually open, public process Snyder’s administration used producing it, are submitting comments before a Oct. 16 deadline asserting that its findings, while correct, are too conservative.
MLUI’s special report, “The Power of Energy Efficiency,” introduces some of the people already making Traverse City and northwest Michigan “efficiency-ready”: homeowners, business people, contractors, officials, and experts with first-hand knowledge of just how well energy efficiency works.
Energy efficiency puts our contractors to work; boosts local retail sales; keeps more of residents’ hard-earned dollars in town; increases property values; makes the community more attractive; and by lowering overall energy demand, slows the rise of everyone’s energy costs.
TCSaves showed that a well done, public-private, residential energy efficiency program can reach many homeowners, make them more comfortable and lower their utility bills, produce good-paying jobs, keep more cash in the local economy, increase home values, and make financial sense.