It is said that progress that is not sustainable is not progress, and neither is technology that is under-deployed. One of the often-cited barriers against the deployment of proven, energy-efficient solutions is a lack of funding or funding mechanisms. But there are, in fact, funding vehicles that have proven very successful — if we make them a priority and a key component of progress.
At the core, financing energy efficiency should start with a market-driven approach. Markets have proven to be very powerful drivers of energy efficiency in some areas of the world. Countries as different as Denmark and Japan have in common a high price of energy, and, as a result, high-efficiency solutions have been broadly deployed and accepted in both countries. In Japan, for example, virtually 100 percent of home air conditioning systems are variable speed, which cuts energy use by about 30 percent compared to fixed-speed systems.