Honeywell, for instance, does the remodeling work to maximize the energy efficiency of another company's building and then charges that company only the difference in its energy bills for a certain number of years. It's a win, win, win situation. This move would save far more oil than we'd get from the Arctic Refuge and also slash global-warming pollution. Another prong in the Club's approach to a national energy plan is to replace older, dirty power plants with new operations that use state of the art technology that simultaneously maximizes efficiency and minimizes pollution. Though the Club is often painted as opposing new power plants, that's not the case when new-technology natural gas plants go on line and replace dirtier ones.
Natural gas is still a fossil fuel, but it's cleaner than oil and coal.
For example, during the '90s, wind became the world's fastest-growing renewable energy resource, expanding at average annual rates ranging from 22 to 30 percent. In North Dakota now it's actually cheaper to generate electricity from a new wind plant than a new gas plant. And that's just one non-fossil fuel source of energy. That way the public isn't beholden to the whims of the fossil-fuel industries. Plus, renewables are simply less polluting.