An overview of the energy efficiency potential

•Economy-wide energy efficiency for the U.S. is no more than 14%.•Cost-effective energy efficiency options are sufficient to cut total energy needs of the U.S. in half.•Capturing this energy efficiency resource could generate from 1.3 to 1.9 million jobs.•It would save residential and business consumers $400 billion annually, equivalent to $2600 per household (2010 dollars).

The global economy is not particularly energy-efficient. At current levels of consumption the U.S. economy, for example, is an anemic 14% efficient – which means that the United States wastes about 86% of the energy now burned to maintain its economy. Most recently, Laitner et al. (2012) documented an array of untapped cost-effective energy efficiency resources roughly equivalent to 250 billion barrels of oil. That is a sufficient scale that would enable the U.S. to cut total energy needs in half compared to business-as-usual projections for the year 2050, and still maintain a robust economy.