Toward a Sustainable Energy Policy

I'm working with Cherokee Nation to enunciate a functional energy policy.  Its easy to say we want to do more to save energy, enjoy cost savings and lessen our contribution to greenhouse gas-based carbon loading in the Earth's atmosphere.  Its tougher to say "how much" and "when" we make the decisions.

One approach might be to start at zero--- a carbon neutral footprint for the government, businesses, vendors and citizens.  (THAT's an ambitious goal.)  And if so, then the next question might be, "When do we want to deviate from that?" 

Today Cherokee Nation has a FONSI process for when we don't use energy efficiency as a measure.  We publish a notice saying that we didn't use the best practice model (yet in progress) and then state why:  Cost, tech limits, etc. 

Each department might want to answer, "When is it impractical, too costly, or not possible to take energy conservation or efficiency into consideration in every decision?"  In Housing, there are some remarkable technologies and an equally unrestrained range of prices.  For housing, maybe it is best to use a green standard already invented, such as a green certification (LEED, for example).  There is enough thought about housing "out there" to avoid reinventing the wheel.  For, say, Education it might be more of a new frontier in thinking.  Yes, we would encourage energy efficient computers, but do we want to examine the secondary implications of not using recycled paper?  What if it takes more energy to make recycled paper, and the benefit is in renewability and resource conservation and carbon trapping to counterbalance things?

These are some of the complex notions we'll be looking at over the course of the Summer and it will be fast-paced and ever-changing.  Hope you will catch some of the blogs, even if you are not on the Energy Team, and ponder these questions for yourself.  Would love to hear any comments about this.