Washington, D.C., October 19, 2009 – The Alliance to Save Energy today commended the new federal home energy retrofit initiative as a critical plan for unleashing the potential of energy efficiency by tackling the market distortions that are preventing homeowners from saving energy and money.

The report, released today by the White House Council on Environmental Quality, clearly identifies the market barriers — lack of information; lack of capital; and lack of skilled workers — that are seriously impeding our nation's ability to realize the full economic, environmental and security benefits that accrue through large-scale deployment of energy efficiency in the built environment.

The Alliance to Save Energy and efficiency advocates everywhere have long called for government policies and programs that would help to overcome the commonly-understood but heretofore unaddressed challenges to widespread market adoption of energy efficiency.

“Today, the Obama team has responded to our collective calls by issuing recommendations that can overcome these market distortions, allowing energy efficiency to form the foundation for the new, clean energy economy we hope to build,” said Alliance President Kateri Callahan. She added: “And, we have confidence that the recommendations can and will be acted on, as the administration has created an interagency work group to develop an implementation plan within 30 days, and thereafter to be accountable for full and successful execution of the plan.

“Following the significant investment in energy efficiency included in the stimulus bill and coming on the heels of the recent Executive Order directing the federal government to address its own need for increased energy efficiency, today's initiative demonstrates clearly that the Obama Administration views energy efficiency as an essential and core building block for a sound economy and a sustainable energy future,” Callahan concluded.

The Alliance also noted that the potential for meaningful results are enormous. As noted in the Recovery Through Retrofit report, existing energy efficiency retrofitting techniques and technologies can reduce home energy use by up to 40 percent per home; lower associated greenhouse gas emissions by up to 160 million metric tons annually by the year 2020; and potentially reduce home energy bills by $21 billion annually.