The Energy Revolution Already Happened. Time To Get On Board.

On this Earth Day, we reflect on the power of applied hope in the climate action field. Amory Lovins, an architect of the field of energy efficiency since the 1970s and founder of the world-renowned Rocky Mountain Institute, speaks with Corina Murafa, Ashoka’s global leader of Planet & Climate. (Full bios below).

Amory: you are one of the key architects of energy efficiency. What trends have caught your attention in recent years?

First, I want to reinforce the long-time feeling that the most effective thing to do about climate change is using energy efficiently. Energy savings provided three-fourths of the world’s 2010–16 decarbonization—three times as much as the wonderful growth in renewables. Yet hardly anyone noticed, because energy is invisible and energy we don’t use is almost unimaginable. This is what is so challenging about fully advancing energy efficiency. In our recent environmental research papers “How Big is the Energy Efficiency Resource?” and “Recalibrating Climate Prospects”, we point out that models everyone uses for climate projections and policy choices severely underestimate the impact of the efficiency resource. They focus on energy supply and don’t really take into account efficient use, so they give policy makers a severely distorted picture of what their options are.

Then what are our best, under-tapped options for climate action?

I’m particularly interested in the power of Integrative Design: how we choose, combine, time and sequence technologies. In my mind, design is even more important than technology and yet it is seldom thought of as a scaling vector. For example, in the past five years, the efficiency of the best new and retrofit buildings improved by roughly two- to tenfold, with terrific economic returns, simply because we became smarter about how to choose and combine the technologies. That can be done in vehicles and industry too: for example, doubling or tripling car efficiency at comparable cost. Or saving (if everyone did it) half the world’s coal-fired electricity, with juicy financial returns, by making the world’s pipes and ducts fat, short, and straight rather than thin, long, and crooked. But you will find no mention of, or applications for, integrative design in any climate model, government study, industry forecast, or any but one engineering text. Because it’s not a technology; it’s a design method. Most people think we need more and better devices, so efficiency will cost more. But actually, we need fewer and simpler devices. The more we save, the cheaper it gets. In integrative design, returns come from radical simplification. The uptake just needs to get accelerated.

How do we speed this up?

Some people are convinced by scientific evidence, but more people are convinced by experience. Being in a building like my house where I can grow bananas indoors high in the mountains in Colorado with no heating system; or driving my electric car, which pays for its ultralight carbon fiber by needing fewer batteries.

What I find most encouraging about integrative design is it can be spread at the speed of Twitter. You don’t need to go back to university – you just need a photographic example of how to lay out pipes efficiently. You can go do it today. And it uses the skills you have but rearranges your mental furniture. Young designers who haven’t yet lost their creativity to the traditional silos of education are usually very hungry for this.

You’ve spoken a lot about the idea of Applied Hope. Can you tell us more? 

Yes. It’s a topic that has been on my mind since 2011 when I gave a Commencement speech at Berkeley. As I explained earlier, when it comes to the climate, despair and complacency are equally unwarranted. In a way, Applied Hope is a Gandhian ideal: “Be the change you want to see.” I’d like it to be a contagious idea and mood. I am not sure how to do that, but I think TED’s newest initiative, Countdown, is a good step towards it. For the business world, this means helping them see that the energy transformation and climate solutions are not costly; they’re profitable. Our long-time strategy is one of transformation not forced by policy,  but led by business for profit. They just need to look at what’s cheaper and what’s winning in the market. In 2018, of all the net additions of electric generating capacity in the world, 68 percent were renewable—75 percent if we include hydro. In 2019, the world used more electricity but fossil-fueled generation fell, because renewables met more than all the extra need. The revolution already happened; sorry if you missed it. There’s a lot of education to be done here for incumbents to realize they’re in the wrong business.

So clearly, you believe action is urgently needed, but you don’t buy into the doom and gloom narrative that has become so pervasive.

Correct. The conventional approach to climate is that government have to solve it top down. That’s clearly not working well and not likely to work well despite vital best efforts, so governments need our help. Change must also be enabled by civil society and market actors. There are important synergies between them. Companies are sensitive to what we do or don’t buy; and the heads of the world’s largest companies are terrified of public opinion—much more than of legislation. Unusual constructive forms of activism of the kind Ashoka supports are timely and needed.

Amory Lovins is a physicist and social entrepreneur. He is Cofounder and Chairman Emeritus of Rocky Mountain Institute; energy advisor to major firms and governments in 65+ countries for 40+ years; author of 31 books and more than 670 papers; and an integrative designer of superefficient buildings, factories, and vehicles. Amory Lovins was elected as an Ashoka Senior Fellow in 2008.

Corina Murafa is leading Next Now/Planet & Climate and is also the Director of Ashoka Romania. Prior to joining Ashoka, she advanced long-lasting positive change in Eastern Europe as a public policy expert on energy and sustainability. She has worked for the World Bank, OMV Petrom, Deloitte, national governments and think tanks.

Next Now:  For the first time in its history, Ashoka is galvanizing the strength of its community on climate action. Next Now: Planet & Climate aims to change the course of history by uniting extraordinary changemakers around audacious goals that bring people and planet to a new equilibrium. This Ashoka series sheds light on the wisdom and ideas of leaders guiding the field. 

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