Policies Promoting Improved Energy Efficiency

Abstract

In this chapter, we discuss public policy as a way for governments to achieve energy-related targets. Policy seeks to influence people’s behavior, so that they will act in accordance with policy maker wishes. We introduce research into public policy and discuss various policy instruments applicable to industrial SMEs. We also introduce the ecological modernization concept that, in policy analysis, captures the belief that economic and ecological values can be combined symbi- otically. In this chapter, we discuss the rebound effect. This chapter also describes the EU’s energy end-use efficiency and energy services directive (ESD), which came into force in 2006 and addresses several policy areas, as well as the EU emissions trading scheme. We problematize the fact that an EU policy, for example, may influence one part of the EU but not another, and that policy formulation is not the same as policy implementation—energy efficiency policy goals often being much higher than the results achieved. We also review earlier research into energy audit programs and discuss how an industrial energy program should be designed to facilitate program success.