Endependence just got back from the West Coast Green event in San Francisco, and there were lots of great new products that could help us achieve energy independence and end dependence on polluting fuel.

This is a short description of the products that caught our eye.  We’ll give more detailed descriptions of each one in separate posts.

Our Home Spaces - Total Energy Management Solutions (TEMS)

With iPhone Apps, Mac and PC Dashboard Widgets and In Home Digital Displays, Our Home Spaces lets you monitor and control your Heating and Air Conditioning System remotely.  You can also view cameras remotely and receive alerts for things like furnace filter replacement.

www.ourhomespaces.com 415.884.8051

Serious Materials -Serious Windows and Serious Materials Commercial Glass

These windows are triple-paned and offer amazing R Values (insulation rating).  Commercial windows up to R20 and Residential Windows up to R 11.1.  In most instances, these windows insulate better than the walls in which they are installed.

www.seriousmaterials.com 800.797.8159

GreenRay Technology - advanced led lighting solutions

LED lights are established in the market as a strong energy saving technology for commercial and government building applications.  GreenRay will soon be manufacturing their lights in the United States.

www.greenraytechnology.com 707.544.2662

K-tect - Sustainable Building Systems

Cradle to cradle wall, floor and roof building systems with high R Values (insulation rating) that can contribute to  commercial, institutional and residential building LEED points (rating system from the U. S. Green Building Council).

www.kama-eebs.com 702.451.7155

Atmospheric Water Systems - creating pure water out of thin air

An advanced water purification system that produces up to 8.4 gallons of pure, renewable drinking water every day from humidity in the air.

www.aws-h2o.com 805.858.9280

Parducci Sustainable Wines -Sustainable Red and Sustainable White Wine

Delicious wines from “America’s Greenest Winery”  per Forbes.com

www.parducci.com 800.362.9463

There is agreement among all of the energy experts that energy efficiency is by far the cheapest way to reduce energy costs.  Much cheaper than a new coal fired or natural gas power plant, a nuclear reactor or a wind or solar farm.

Here is another way to look at efficiency, the amount of GDP generated by the amount of electricity used in a state.

http://ert.rmi.org/cgu/index.html

Source: Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI)

The researchers took pains to normalize as much as possible expenditures on heating and cooling based on a given state’s climate.  What emerges is a snapshot of the economic productivity of the energy used by each state ($GDP/kWh = Dollars of Gross Domestic Product per Kilowatt hour of electricity).

The difference between any given state and the top ten states in the study is the productivity gap. RMI estimates that if all states closed their productivity gap, the U.S. would save 1.2 million Gigawatt hours per year.  That is a lot of energy, and a tremendous amount of money to be saved.

Maybe this is tangential, but I found it interesting that three of the four states whose Republican governors are considering “refusing” stimulus funds from the federal government (at least as of February 20, 2009) are ranked as follows:

Louisiana = Governor Bobby Jindal               Ranks #34

South Carolina = Governor Mark Sanford     Ranks #47

Mississippi = Governor Haley Barbour          Ranks #50

A large part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is for “energy” expenditures ($65 billion in tax incentives and expenditures).  Maybe these governors dislike saving energy as much as they dislike taking money that will help their citizens.

http://www.recovery.gov/?q=content/investments

In something that will come as no shock to anyone, the State of Alaska is an outlier.  Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is also thinking about saying “thanks, but no thanks” to the stimulus money.  Alaska ranks #2 on the productivity list.

In summary, no matter how you measure it - electric or gas bill, carbon footprint, $GDP/kWh - energy efficiency makes sense and saves dollars.