Topics: Energy Efficiency

The Washington State Building Code Council has acceded to Gov. Chris Gregoire’s request to delay economically beneficial improvements to the state’s energy code.

The actions – Gregoire’s request and the Council’s June 11 acquiescence – send the utterly false message that better energy efficiency is bad for homeowners. In fact, the code improvements now put on hold will save homeowners far more money than the improvements will cost, no matter what the Building Industry Association of Washington says.

State Rep. Christine Rolfes (D-Bainbridge Island) was honored by the NW Energy Coalition on Tuesday with a resolution praising her leadership in passing 2009’s Efficiency First legislative package, SB 5854, which will dramatically improve energy efficiency in buildings throughout Washington state.

The NW Energy Coalition Spring 2010 Conference in Missoula provided a forum for the message that energy efficiency is cheaper, faster to acquire and cleaner that any other resource that might meet new electricity demand in the coming decades. Fortunately, the Missoulian and other media outlets heard the message and delivered it to their readers/listeners/viewers…

The 2010 Washington state legislative session has finally ended. While results for environmental issues were mixed overall, defenders of the 2006 Clean Energy Initiative 937 were pleased that no changes were made to the law…

Clearing Up, the Northwest energy industry’s must-read weekly publication, last week published an opinion column in which longtime contributor Jude Noland lists many problems likely to derail any “nuclear renaissance” — including the high costs, waste-disposal problems and safety issues.

The 2010 legislative session has finally come to a close and it’s time to take inventory on how clean and affordable energy policies fared in Olympia. Read on to see where we stand…

Tech Blog Ars Technica has an extensive article about how energy efficient technologies, both old and new, are helping to reduce the energy consumption of the datacenters powering the modern world.

The Seattle Times is running a story on how the Bullit Foundation, a Coalition funder, is preparing to build a new headquarters that would also serve as a showplace for cutting-edge green engineering and architecture.

Read the full article online.

The State Legislature has passed a bill to create a convenient residential recycling program for compact fluorescent lights and other lights that contain mercury. The bill, ESSB 5543, now awaits only the governor’s signature to become law.

Coalition director Sara Patton discusses how The Northwest’s official electric power planning agency has confirmed, once again, that energy efficiency is the best and cheapest way to cover the next generation’s electricity needs in today’s Oregonian guest column.