There’s a buzzword in energy that is either clever or dumb, I can never decide which. It’s “negawatt.”
The word is a collapsed variant of “negative watt” and means the amount of energy that you don’t have to use in order to accomplish a given task. “Zerowatt” would be more accurate, but then you wouldn’t have a pun of megawatt.
I mention this because Concord is embracing the idea indirectly through a “Weatherize Concord” campaign, to help people use incentives from the NHSaves program to spend less money by using less energy. There’s a kickoff event June 24 at the Community Center, 14 Canterbury Road, from 6 to 8 p.m. Details are at www.weatherizeconcord.org/
The program’s stated goal is to weatherize at least 100 homes and businesses in Concord this year via insulation, HVAC upgrades and other moves, “improving home comfort and reducing energy costs and carbon emissions.” More importantly, it strikes me as an overarching effort to get everybody in the city thinking about improving energy efficiency and doing more with less.
In other words, negawatt territory.
The move is part of the city’s longtime goal to achieve 100% renewable energy, which is done partly by adding solar and other renewable energy sources and partly by reducing the amount of energy needed in the first place.
It’s stupid to waste money buying electricity for heat or cooling or other forms of work if you don’t need to. This is why heat pumps and convection stoves and electric vehicles are such a good idea. Electric systems do 2 to 3 times the amount of work for each input of energy compared to systems that get their oomph by setting fire to gases. Switching to electric almost always saves energy, and often quite a bit of it.
Obviously, if Concord could cut the amount of energy it needs by 1/4 or 1/3, then it would be a lot easier to provide that with renewable sources. So a program like Weatherize is a no-brainer and all city businesses and residents should look into it.
Case closed. Except for that pesky Jevon’s Paradox.
Despite the name, this isn’t really a paradox — it’s more of an observation about human behavior. Basically, it says that when something becomes cheaper, we do more of it.
If it costs $500 a month to keep my house at 70 degrees in December with oil heat, I’ll turn the thermostat down. But if it costs $300 a month to do it with a heat pump, maybe I’ll keep the thermostat at 70, which would undo much or all of the energy savings.
There is a segment of the energy-transition community that downplays efficiency because of Jevons Paradox, saying that it never lives up to its billing. Its effect may well be overstated, but it still makes a ton of sense to do what you can to reduce basic energy usage, to give you the ability to save money, if nothing else. Having a heat pump and keeping the thermostat at 65 can save some serious bucks.
So don’t be shy about looking into being more energy efficient. Show that grumpy old Jevons who’s boss.
