Response to Cullenward and Koomey critique of 'historical evidence for energy efficiency rebound in 30 US sectors'

- The Cullenward/Koomey critique (2016) of Saunders (2013) is shown to be unfounded.
- Extreme sensitivity tests addressing this critique show rebound effects remain high.
- Tests encompass marginal/average price differences and regional price variations.
- The Jorgenson et al. data set (2007) remains valid and useful for rebound analysis.
- The results confirm sobering consequences for energy and climate policy alike.

This article responds to a recent critique in these pages by Danny Cullenward and Jonathan Koomey of a prior article reporting measured historical rebound magnitudes on the productive side of the US economy. They argue that the data quality objections they raise are serious enough to warrant outright dismissal of the reported rebound magnitudes. In particular, they cite unaccounted for regional energy price differences as fatal to the credibility of the results.The present analysis instead shows, via various extreme sensitivities around the energy price trajectory, that historical rebound magnitudes in 30 productive sectors of the US economy are sensitive but robust to energy price differences - both magnitude and variability differences - and remain large and thereby policy-relevant (commonly > 50%, with the overall average varying from 15% to over 200% (“backfire”) at the extremes). Along the way, the analysis provides further evidence of the reliability of the widely-used Jorgenson et al. econometric data set and methodology, and of the multitude of articles that have followed there from.