ship pms

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

1/11

Future energy efficiency improvements within the US department of defense:

Incentives and barriers$

Ryan J. Umstattd

National Laboratories Technologies Fellow, Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, AL, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:

Received 6 August 2008

Accepted 3 March 2009Available online 21 April 2009

Keywords:

Energy efficiency

Military

Financing

a b s t r a c t

The present work describes the military impact of improved efficiency and then highlights existing

technological, political, and financial barriers for improving overall energy efficiency. As the largest user

of energy within the US government, the Department of Defense (DOD) is rightly concerned that anydisruption to the nation’s energy supply may have an extremely adverse impact on its military

capabilities. The total solution to providing energy security will be multi-faceted with progress required

on many fronts. Increasing the use of renewable energy sources and improving energy storage

capabilities are gradually creating a positive impact, but investing in improving the overall efficiency of

the military effort provides both immediate and long-lasting payback. One might suppose that a

decrease in the energy used by the DOD should lead to a decrease in military capability, but historical

data proves otherwise. It is shown that the military has additional impetus, compared to civilian

consumers, to pursue energy-efficiency improvements. Many tools are available to help the DOD along

this path, yet there remain obstacles which must first be identified and analyzed as discussed herein.

Published by Elsevier Ltd.

1. Introduction

In Fiscal Year 2006 (FY06), the Department of Defense (DOD)

was responsible for 80% of the energy used by the US government

and almost 1% of the nation’s total energy use (EIA, 2007). Thus,

the DOD has a large vested interest in maintaining a stable and

secure supply of the energy it needs to accomplish its mission.

This notable market share also translates into a unique ability to

help shape the future of how the US generates, transports, stores,

and uses various energy sources. Given the current volatility and

uncertainty in the fossil-fuel market, it is imperative that the DOD

find ways to insulate its mission-effectiveness from these energy

price fluctuations. The scale of the problem is mind-boggling

when one considers that the DOD used 844 trillion British thermal

units (Btu’s; 1 Btu¼ 1055 J) of energy in FY06 (EIA, 2007) which is

roughly equivalent to the usage of a country such as Bulgaria,Denmark, or New Zealand (BP, 2007). It is therefore useful to

examine potential energy security solutions on a more manage-

able scale. Solutions can be classified as follows: (1) develop and

field new primary energy sources that do not rely on petroleum

and are preferably renewable, (2) reduce consumption through

conservation, and (3) improve the efficiency of energy use so that

more mission is accomplished per unit of energy input.

Efforts are currently underway within the DOD in all three of

these categories. Finding new energy sources is a significantresearch and development task that is beginning to return on

investment through successes such as flying military aircraft

including B-52s and C-17s on a 50/50 blend of JP-8 and synthetic

fuel which can be made from coal or natural gas (Drinnon, 2007).

Such research will continue and is expected to change the face

of how the DOD meets its energy needs in the long run. In

contrast, conservation efforts yield a more immediate payback.

Conservation is encouraged as an important part of the mindset of

all DOD employees (DUSD(I&E), 2008), but it can only be taken so

far before it begins to have a negative impact on accomplishing

the mission; while reducing the number of training hours flown

by military pilots does indeed save fuel, it does so at the cost of

the readiness and skill of those same pilots. Finally, improving

energy efficiency provides both immediate and long-term pay-back. If a building’s heating, cooling, and lighting can be renovated

such that the building now uses half as much energy as before, the

saved energy can be either used immediately to power a second

building or placed in the bank as savings to be expended at a later

date. Best of all, these savings continue to accrue year after year

following such a renovation.

This study focuses on improving energy efficiency as part of

the total energy solution for the DOD. Over time, the energy

intensity of the US economy has improved from using 18kBtu

while generating a chained 2000 dollar of gross domestic product

(GDP) in 1970 to using less than 9 kBtu to do the same in 2006

(EIA, 2007, p. xix). While this energy-intensity improvement by

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

journal homepage: w ww.elsevier.com/locate/enpol

Energy Policy

0301-4215/$- see front matter Published by Elsevier Ltd.

doi:10.1016/j.enpol.2009.03.003

$Disclaimer : The views expressed in this paper are those of the author and do

not reflect the official policy or position of the US government or the Department

of Defense.

E-mail address: [email protected]

Energy Policy 37 (2009) 2870–2880

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/jepohttp://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpolhttp://localhost/var/www/apps/conversion/tmp/scratch_2/dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2009.03.003mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://localhost/var/www/apps/conversion/tmp/scratch_2/dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2009.03.003http://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpolhttp://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/jepo

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

2/11

itself does not provide insight into possible sectoral or environ-

mental considerations, it can be stated that the economy is

literally doing more with less by increasing the energy efficiency

of doing business. This factor of two improvement serves as a role

model for potential DOD advances in energy efficiency. Of course,

the DOD is not in the business of making wealth or even a

product, so its overall efficiency is more difficult to define much

less calculate. The DOD has many tasks that require large amounts

of energy such as transporting an entire infantry division acrossthe Atlantic Ocean over the span of several days. Such energy-

intensive tasks can still be considered efficient as long as the

desired task is accomplished with only minimal waste. To further

refine this study, the scope is limited to the energy used to keep

facilities running. In FY07, buildings and infrastructure accounted

for 26% of the energy used by the DOD at a total cost of $3.4B

(DUSD(I&E), 2007). For this significant portion of the energy

budget, the calculation of efficiency becomes more straightfor-

ward: how much energy per square foot of facility space is needed

to stay in operation? The desired end state is to maximize the

productivity of the people while minimizing the energy required

to sustain their working environment.

At present, there exist many energy-efficient building technol-

ogies that when combined using a holistic system approach, have

resulted in buildings with near-zero net energy use averaged over

a calendar year (ORNL Review, 2007, pp. 2–5). By combining

technologies such as solar panels, geothermal energy, consoli-

dated utility walls, structural insulated panels, controlled ventila-

tion, and advanced exterior finishes (ORNL Review, 2007, pp. 6–7),

both office buildings and residential homes can lower their energy

needs such that they are capable of generating much of their

required energy input on-site. As the DOD looks at its current

infrastructure and plans for future facilities, how can it best take

advantage of these potential improvements in energy efficiency?

The method of the present study is to contrast a survey of DOD

energy use data and DOD energy policy documents against the

backdrop of commercial/industrial energy use and government

energy policy as presented and studied in the both the open and

technical literature. By identifying the overlaps and disparities

between the energy perspective of the DOD and other large

organizations, the aim of the study is to provide new insights that

may be of use to future military energy policy. These insights are

limited in scope to those that apply to improving energy efficiency

within DOD facilities. The paper begins in Section 2 by first

examining historical trends in DOD energy usage and looking for

relevant comparisons. Section 3 then presents the energy problem

from the particular DOD perspective and describes several key

military benefits of improved energy efficiency in areas such as

logistics and overall force effectiveness. Because of the size and

complexity of the issue, Section 4 is devoted to an examination of

the barriers that obstruct the adoption of existing energy-

efficiency improvements specifically within DOD facilities. Iden-

tifying these current impediments is a first step towards findingways to overcome them. As described herein, the development of

sustainable DOD facilities will not only reduce energy use and

external dependence, but will also diminish the total logistics tail

thereby improving military capability. Thus, sustainability

through improved energy efficiency is a force multiplier that can

enhance military effectiveness in the face of shrinking access to

conventional energy resources.

2. DOD energy use and concerns

In recent years, the DOD has become increasingly concerned

with energy security, for modern US warfare relies heavily upon

the force multiplier of being able to access and deliver vast

quantities of energy. This concern is demonstrated through a

Defense Science Board (2001) report on reducing the DOD’s fuel

consumption, through a variety of service-level studies on energy

topics (Air Force Science Advisory Board, 2006; Navy Research

Advisory Council, 2005; Army Corps of Engineers, 2005), through

several individual studies by various service members (Amidon,

2005; Blackwell, 2007; Hornitschek, 2006; Kuntz, 2007; Lengyel,

2007), and, most recently, by the Defense Science Board (2008)

report on DOD Energy Strategy. This subject has also beenexamined in the technical literature (Hadder et al., 1989; Hall,

1992; Vallentin, 2008). The purpose of these studies, as with the

present study, is to illuminate the path forward for a secure

energy future. Before looking to this future, let us first examine

how historical DOD energy use and budget compare to the

traditional concept of economic energy intensity.

In personnel, budget, and energy use, the DOD is equivalent to

a small nation. In 2006, the DOD employed over 2 million people,

executed a budget of $499B, and used 840 TBtu of energy

(Historical Tables, 2008; EIA, 2007, p. 25). Thus, one might expect

to see a correlation between DOD energy use and DOD budget

that is similar to the correlation often observed between a nation’s

energy use and GDP. If such a correlation exists, then perhaps a

causality relationship can be determined to help shape future

DOD policy. Mozumder and Marathe (2007) summarized over 25

different studies from around the world of the causal relationship

between energy usage and economic growth and found no

consistent result that could be applied across countries, so

causality must still be investigated on a case-by-case basis.

We look for this possible correlation in Fig. 1 which shows DOD

budget (labeled according to the president that submitted that

year’s budget request) and total energy use.

The story told by Fig. 1 is more complicated than the linear

relationship often observed when examining a nation’s GDP and

energy usage. For the DOD, energy use and income do not appear

to be correlated. It is encouraging to see that total energy use has

generally been declining since 1990, but the reduction is not

directly in response to a declining budget. Since the energy use

per person was relatively flat, the decrease in total energy use is

attributed to the sharp drawdown in the number of DOD

personnel that occurred in the 1990s following the end of the

cold war. While both budget and energy use increased dramati-

cally following September 2001, the energy use per person has

recently returned to a more typical value near 400 MBtu per

person (average US citizen energy use is approximately 340 MBtu

per person (EIA, 2007, p. xix)). Since energy use and income do not

share the same correlation seen at the national level, one must

scrutinize carefully any models, strategies, or policies designed to

improve national economic energy intensity before applying them

to the DOD. Fig. 1 also serves to point out another key difficulty in

analyzing the DOD’s energy efficiency: what is the appropriate

metric? For a nation, it seems reasonable to expect a relationship

between wealth generation and energy use. For the DOD, onewould like instead to tie mission accomplishment to energy use.

Ideally, there would be a straightforward measurement of military

effectiveness per unit of energy used, but no such metric exists. In

spite of this difficulty, we can still use the data that we do have to

take a closer look at DOD energy use and search for potential

efficiencies to reap.

In FY07, the DOD used 865 TBtu of energy at a total cost of

$13.2B (DUSD(I&E), 2007). Given the $530B DOD budget that year

(Historical Tables, 2008), the energy cost equates to roughly 2.5%

of the total budget. Over the last 30 years, US national energy

expenditures averaged 8% of the GDP (EIA, 2007, p. 13), so the DOD

fraction of income that is spent on energy costs is significantly less

than the national average. In this aspect, the DOD looks more like

an average US household where residents spent roughly 2.4–4.0%

ARTICLE IN PRESS

R.J. Umstattd / Energy Policy 37 (2009) 2870–2880 2871

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

3/11

of their household income on energy during the years between

1987 and 2004 (Buildings Energy Data Book, 2006). This

comparison is flawed, however, considering that a typical house-

hold does not have multi-million dollar acquisition programs as

line items on the budget—the DOD makes such purchases

routinely without incurring the energy usage that is required for

the contractors to build the systems.

To draw a comparison between the DOD and the US business

sector, let us compare energy use in facility space (transportation

fuel costs are excluded). While commercial office space averaged

$1.80 in 2004 for energy expenditures per square foot (Buildings

Energy Data Book, 2006), the DOD spent $1.75 per square foot inFY07 for its 2B square feet of floor space (DUSD(I&E), 2007). Thus,

in facility space energy use, the DOD compares favorably to the

commercial US market. Credit for this standing is largely due to a

federally mandated program that led to a 30% improvement in

government facility energy efficiency between 1985 and 2005. As

a follow-on to this program, President Bush issued Executive

Order (EO) 13,423 in January 2007. This EO requires that every

federal agency, including the DOD, improve their facility energy

efficiency by 3% annually or by 30% total by 2015 (relative to a

2005 baseline). This goal attempts to accelerate by a factor of two

the improvements seen in the previous 20-year program. To

encourage development of additional renewable energy resources,

this EO also requires that at least 50% of renewable energy

purchases be from sources commissioned after 1 January 1999.

Thus, the DOD has incentive to improve facility energy efficiency

not just to potentially save money but also to comply with federal

mandate. As will be discussed further below, there are other

reasons, even more significant, for the DOD to pursue energy

efficiency.

Many past and on-going efforts seek a long-term solution to

assured fuel (see references at the beginning of this section), so

the present study has elected to focus instead on the $3.4B spent

powering DOD facilities. This facility space is spread across more

than 400 sites throughout the US in over 500,000 separate

buildings; almost one third of these buildings are greater than

50-years old (Environmental Security Technology CertificationProgram, 2008). We examine the energy supply and relative cost

mix to power these DOD facilities in Fig. 2.

The energy usage mix in DOD facility space is not notably

different from the mix within the US commercial building sector.

While electricity accounted for 47% of the energy needed by DOD

facilities, it accounted for 63% of the expenditures—electricity

is a ‘high fidelity’ energy source that provides on-demand

versatility at a premium price. Conversely, natural gas accounted

for 32% of facility energy needs, but accounted for only 18% of the

expenditures—a relative bargain that is leveraged mostly for

heating facility space. Electricity and natural gas combined

account for roughly 80% of both DOD energy needs and

expenditures, so these are the two most attractive source targets

for improving overall facility energy efficiency.

ARTICLE IN PRESS

DOD Budget & Energy Use vs Time

250

300

350

400

450

500

1970

B u

d g e

t ( F Y

2 0 0 0 $ B )

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1

1.1

1.2

1.3

1.4

1.5

E n e r g y

U s

e d ( Q B t u )

$B

QBtu

~ 3.1 Million

~ 2.1 Million

# of DODPersonnel

Gulf War IRecovery /Reconstitution

DOD per capita Budget & Energy Use vs Time

50

70

90

110

130

150

170

190

210

230

B u

d g e

t ( F Y 2 0 0 0 $ k / p e r s o n

)

300

320

340

360

380

400

420

440

460

480

E n e r g y

U s e

d ( M B t u / p e r s o n

)

Budget

Energy

Ford ClintonCarter

1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

BushReagan Bush

Ford ClintonCarter BushReagan Bush

Fig. 1. (a) Total and (b) per capita DOD Energy Use & Budget (chained 2000 $). Sources: data from EIA (2007, p. 25); Historical Tables (2007); conversion to chained 2000

dollars from the consumer price index, available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics at http://www.bls.gov/cpi/.

R.J. Umstattd / Energy Policy 37 (2009) 2870–28802872

http://www.bls.gov/cpi/http://www.bls.gov/cpi/

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

4/11

3. Motivation for improved efficiency within the DOD

Since both homeowners and commercial companies are

heavily influenced by financial bottom-lines, energy-efficiency

investments often require a fairly rapid net positive return. The

DOD, however, is in the business of delivering military effective-

ness. While cost savings from energy efficiency are beneficial, the

true driver for DOD efficiency improvements should be the

enhanced ability to meet the objectives of the National Defense

Strategy including defending the external physical security of the

US While measuring total military effectiveness may not bestraightforward, there are several key enhancements to military

effectiveness that result from improving energy efficiency as

shown in Table 1.

It should be noted that all of these enhancements are possible

without sacrificing other militarily-prized attributes such as

speed, stealth, or precision. Each of these characteristics may

require a financial investment, but with a clear benefit to military

effectiveness. Thus, the DOD, unlike residential or commercial

energy consumers, has strong motivation to pursue increased

energy efficiency even if there are additional costs involved. Recall

that the entire DOD energy bill was only 2.5% of the DOD budget

in FY07, so the dollars at stake in the energy portion of the DOD

budget should not be the most significant factor in efficiency

decisions. While efficiency improvements may lead to returning

some portion of this 2.5% as savings, the true enormous potential

for savings is apparent when one looks beyond the energy portion

of the DOD budget as in the following example.

In 1944, the 1 million US troops in the fields of WWII

consumed an average of 1.8 million gallons of fuel per day. Sixty

years later in Gulf War II, 150,000 US troops used 4.1 million

gallons per day (DiPetto, 2008). Not only has the total fuel usage

grown by over a factor of two, but the fuel use per soldier has

skyrocketed from 1.8 gallons per day to 27 gallons per day! In

supporting a deployed Army unit today, 70% of the resupply

tonnage is fuel (Defense Science Board, 2001, p. 13). This fuelpowers not only the vehicles and weapons systems in the field,

but also much of the electronics at the most forward-deployed

locations via fuel-driven generators. To reliably deliver this fuel,

the DOD has developed an extensive and expensive infrastructure.

As of late 2007, approximately 80 military-guarded convoys were

continuously on the road between destinations in Iraq and Kuwait

(Defense Science Board, 2008, p. 15). From the thousands of troops

trained specifically for the petroleum, oils, and lubricants (POL)

career fields, to fleets of air and ground fuel tankers, to the force

protection, care, and feeding of these assets, secure fuel delivery is

an expensive undertaking. Estimates for the true cost of fuel

in the field range from 10 times greater than the purchase

price (for air tanker delivered fuel) to over 100 times greater

than the purchase price (for fuel delivered to deep forward

ARTICLE IN PRESS

FY2007 DOD Facility Energy Use

32%

10%

3%7%

47%

1%

Electricity

Natural Gas

Fuel Oil

Purch.Steam

Coal

LPG/Propane

As a percentage of 220 TBtu

FY2007 DOD Facility Energy Expenditures

18%

10%6% 2%

63%1%

Electricity

Natural Gas

Fuel Oil

Purch.Steam

Coal

LPG/Propane

As a percentage of $3.4B

Fig. 2. (a) Energy usage and (b) cost by source for DOD facilities in FY 2007. Source: data from DUSD(I&E) (2007).

Table 1

Military benefits of improved energy efficiency.

Benefit Impact

Simplicity (Defense Science Board, 2001, p. 10) Decreased complexity and frequency of resupply and logistics planning.

Surprise (Defense Science Board, 2001, p. 10) I mpr oved s tealth th ro ugh r educed h eat s igna tu re (les s waste he at).

Reduced logistics tail Reduced vulnerability; frees combat forces from force protection mission.

Force mu ltiplication E ach syste m/so ldier is more effective (e .g. c arryin g mo re ammu nition rathe r tha n res erve en erg y) .

Increased resilience (Defense Science Board, 2008, p. 35) Total force is resistant to energy catastrophe and able to recover rapidly.Increased endurance (Defense Science Board, 2008, p. 35) Ability to provide sustained operations between fewer replenishments.


8/19/2019 Ship PMS

5/11

operating bases) (Defense Science Board, 2001, p. ES-3). When

the system as a whole is considered, the potential financial

gains at stake through reduced fuel use become significantly

more than just the 2.5% of the DOD budget that goes towards

energy.

The total forecast savings from improving energy efficiency is

thus much more than simply the reduction in the energy

purchased. Over time, significant savings accumulate through

reductions in required infrastructure. While using less energy mayalso help extend the life of limited fossil-fuel-based energy

reserves, the greater impact will be the improvement to military

effectiveness through enhanced endurance, a reduced logistics

tail, force multiplication, and increased resilience. In his analysis

of military energy efficiency, Hornitschek (2006, p. 44) noted,

‘‘The military has always valued capabilities and effective-

ness (such as speed, mass, stealth, and so forth) over efficiency

for good reason—restraint when national survival is at risk is

illogical. However, this is a short-term perspective and in an

energy-constrained environment, efficiency becomes its own effect ,

enabling the sustained application of other desired military

effects.’’ [Emphasis added] For the DOD, improvements in energy

efficiency should be pursued not simply because they make

defense cheaper or because they are mandated by Executive

Order, but because they make for a more effective fighting force.

Rather than evaluate potential efficiency investments based only

upon near-term cost savings, the DOD should recognize and be

willing to pay for these military benefits of improved energy

efficiency.

4. Impediments: classification and analysis

While improving energy efficiency can very often quickly

become a winning financial investment in the commercial and

residential sectors, we have seen that the DOD has an even

stronger impetus to pursue efficiency as a path to increased

military effectiveness. A variety of technological, political, and

financial tools are currently available to help improve energy

efficiency, and yet there still remains much inefficiency within

DOD facilities. An important first step towards progress is to first

identify and understand the barriers that presently prevent the

DOD from rapidly adopting such tools.

As energy efficiency has been receiving increasing attention as

one of the cornerstones of energy security; many studies by

authors of very different backgrounds have provided a variety of

perspectives on what prevents us from becoming more efficient

(Brown, 2001; Gan et al., 2007; Lovins, 2005; Rohdin et al., 2007;

Sola and Xavier, 2007; Wilbanks, 1994). These studies have

identified barriers in all sectors (commercial, residential, and

industrial) and at all scales from national economies down to

individual household members. In addition to the studies of

specific barriers above, significant theories on the benefits andlimitations of performing barrier analyses are also available ( Jaffe

and Stavins, 1994; Sorrell et al., 2000; Sorrell et al., 2004; Weber,

1997). It should be recognized that barrier models alone do not

successfully determine an optimal level of efficiency ( Jaffe and

Stavins, 1994), but they can nevertheless illuminate areas that

may warrant intervention via public policy (Sorrell et al., 2000).

The categorization of these barriers differs somewhat from author

to author and includes areas such as financial, behavioral,

organizational, policy, awareness, institutional, market imperfec-

tions, cultural, technological, and regulatory issues. While the

overlap and dividing lines amongst these categories are nearly

impossible to prescribe definitively, let us here attempt to refine a

list for the DOD through consolidation. Regulation or policy can

influence many institutional, organizational, or awareness bar-

riers, so these considerations are here addressed in a single

political category. Individual behavior and cultural barriers can be

significant challenges when attempting to reduce energy use

through conservation. The goal of this study, however, is to

improve energy efficiency rather than increase conservation

efforts. For the purposes of improving energy efficiency, wasteful

individual behavior and group culture often change or may be

nullified when presented with new technologies that come along

at the right time and right price. As an example, since its inceptionin 1992 in the US, over 2B ENERGY STAR qualified products across

more than 50 different product categories have been purchased

resulting in an estimated $14B in energy cost savings in 2006

(ENERGY STAR, 2006). Thus, these behavioral and cultural

impediments may be treated in the technological category. For

the present study then, the barriers have been focused into three

main groupings: technological, political, and financial. In some

cases, a particular barrier bleeds over into more than one of

these categories, which is a characteristic of barriers noted

previously by Weber (1997) and Sorrell et al. (2000). In addition,

because improving facility energy efficiency is such a large-scale

problem, many of these barriers and potential solutions reach

beyond the normal realm of DOD responsibility—the DOD will

need the assistance of other federal offices, organizations and US

industry if they are to truly maximize their energy efficiency. Let

us now examine several impediments in each of these three

categories.

4.1. Technological

4.1.1. Insufficient energy storage

Lack of affordable, efficient energy storage hinders our ability

to decouple real-time energy supply from real-time energy

demand. To take full advantage of solar, wind, or other localized

distributed energy systems, we must be able to store excess

energy whenever instantaneous input exceeds instantaneous

demand so that it can be used later. Greater energy storage

capacity also improves the ability of an energy supply network to

respond to fluctuations in supply or demand. Fig. 3 is an

illustration of the dichotomy faced when selecting among many

presently available energy storage options.

Our man-made attempts to create energy storage media such

as batteries, flywheels, compressed air, or pumped hydro are

orders of magnitude more heavy and costly compared to the fossil

fuels that nature has provided; a notable exception is the candy

bar which has an energy density and energy cost near that of

hydrogen. We also see that delivered electricity is over 1000 times

cheaper than the cost to store this energy for later use. One might

pay only half a cent for the electricity needed to power a computer

for 4 h, but if one wants this computer to be a portable laptop, one

must pay $100 for the luxury of having a battery that makes this

amount of energy available where and when it is needed. Withsuch a large disparity between the cost of generating versus

storing electrical energy, it will be extremely difficult for

intermittent renewable energy sources such as solar and wind

power to realize their full potential. An increasing ability to

manufacture biofuel may help displace some of the need for fossil

fuels, but generating electricity from biofuel will likely suffer the

same dismal 30–35% delivery efficiency typically seen when

burning fossil fuels. Hydrogen is a promising energy storage

option—it can be used both as a combustion fuel (generating only

water vapor as exhaust) or as a source for electricity (if feeding a

fuel cell). However, significant hurdles still face a potential

hydrogen economy including improving the affordability and

efficiency of hydrogen production, transport, and storage (Sims

et al., 2007).

ARTICLE IN PRESS


8/19/2019 Ship PMS

6/11

4.1.2. Tunnel vision

When applying technological solutions to improve energy

efficiency, one always receives the most benefit by stepping back

to view the larger system rather than just the specific gadget. Bypursuing an overall system-level perspective, we can minimize

the chance that we will implement an incremental improvement

while overlooking a revolutionary one. Lovins (2005, p. 16) uses

his home in Colorado as an example:

In outdoor temperatures down to 44 1C, it is feasible to grow

bananas at 2200 m elevationy with no heating system, yet

with reduced construction cost, because the superwindows,

superinsulation, air-to-air heat exchangers, and other invest-

ments needed to eliminate the heating system cost less to

install than the heating system would have cost to instally

optimizing a house as a system rather than optimizing a

component in isolation, and optimizing for lifecycle costy can

make a superefficient house cheaper to build, not just to run,by eliminating costly heating and cooling systems.

One can apply this same principle to the efficiency of a

facility’s electricity supply system. At present, nearly all electricity

generation occurs at massive generation plants. Fuel is shipped in

and expended, then waste heat and electricity are sent out.

Centralized generation makes sense because the economy of scale

reduces the cost of the fuel delivery and helps safely manage any

hazardous wastes or otherwise dangerous parts of the process.

When fuel supply and environmental safety can be otherwise

ensured, then distributed electricity generation can be employed

instead with huge potential efficiency gains. A combined cooling,

heating and power system is an example of how incoming natural

gas can be used to locally generate the desired comforts whilepreventing the losses associated with waste heat at a central

power plant or electricity transmission losses. Overall system

efficiencies can reach 70–80% compared to the present 30%

delivery efficiency of the US electrical grid (EIA, 2007, p. 221).

Finally, the principle of taking a systems-level view should be

used when it appears the efficiency ceiling has been hit. If the

science and engineering will not allow the efficiency of a part or

process to increase, can the waste of the system be put to good

use? Combined cooling, heating and power systems and com-

bined solar photovoltaic/thermal panels both take advantage of

what would otherwise be waste heat in order to boost their

overall efficiency. As a further example, when organic waste

decomposes at a landfill, the biogas that is generated can either be

released into the atmosphere or processed rather simply yielding

fuel equivalent to natural gas—by looking at the landfill as a

whole system, one can take what was a greenhouse gas emission

and transform it into a renewable energy solution. There are

doubtless many DOD facilities (and systems within these facil-ities) that could benefit from this sort of analysis. Getting this

analysis, however, will not be easy:

Such system design requires a diverse background, deep

curiosity, often a transdisciplinary design team, and meticu-

lous attention to detail. Whole-system design is not what any

engineering school appears to be teaching, nor what most

customers currently expect, request, reward, or receive. But it

represents a key part of the ‘overhang’ of practical, profitable,

unbought energy efficiency that so far remains missing from

virtually all official studies. (Lovins, 2005, p. 19)

4.1.3. Missing data

In management, you pay attention to what you measure.

Conversely, it becomes quite difficult to focus useful attention on

an issue if you cannot measure its features. Remarkably, many of

the buildings within the federal government do not even have an

electricity meter! To remedy this problem, Section 103 of the

Energy Policy Act of 2005 requires that all federal buildings have

metered electricity by 1 October 2012. At the end of FY07, only

34% of the DOD’s electricity was metered at the building level

(DUSD(I&E), 2007). As the DOD closes this gap, they have an

opportunity to leap forward by installing advanced metering that

can provide daily updates and break out hourly consumption. If

preparing for future on-site electricity generation, installed

meters should not be simply two-way (i.e., rolling backwards or

forwards depending on net electricity flow), but rather the meters

should measure gross electricity consumption and productionseparately and simultaneously. Such data may be critical in a

future where more utility companies may charge separately for

the delivered electricity and for the ability to transport energy

over their network.

Individual metering of buildings is critical not just to achieving

better facility efficiencies but also to maintaining this perfor-

mance. The Air Force and Department of Energy have recently

collaborated on energy audits geared at improving the energy

efficiency at various Air Force facilities (Lalley, 2007). To receive

the largest possible benefit from an energy-efficiency expert

evaluation, one must have accurate building-by-building data.

This data becomes even more important when building occu-

pancy or function changes and energy use creeps up, at which

point a ‘re-commissioning’ may be in order. Another data tool that

ARTICLE IN PRESS

1000000

100000

10000

1000

100

10

1

E n e r g y

D e n s i t y ( k J / k g )

0.1 1 10 100 1000 10000 100000

Energy Cost (kJ / $)

more affordable

m o r e p o r t a b l e

petroleum fuels, hydrogen,biofuels, candy bars

batteries, flywheels,

compressed air,pumped hydro

c o s t o f e l e c r i c i t y

a t $ 0 . 1 0 p e r

k W / h r

Fig. 3. Energy density versus cost for various energy storage options. Source: numbers are approximates averaged from several vendor web sites.


8/19/2019 Ship PMS

7/11

has proven useful during facility-efficiency evaluations has been

the thermal imaging camera. Commercially available relatively

affordable cameras now allow inspectors to clearly see even very

small temperature differences that may indicate improper seals or

interior insulation.

By gathering the right data, one may even come to surprising

conclusions regarding energy efficiency that can help guide future

actions. In a Netherlands study of energy use versus personal

values, Vringer et al. (2007) found that households sorted byextremely different value patterns (categorized as caring faithful,

conservatives, hedonists, balanced, materialists, professionals,

broad minded, and social minded) all used nearly the same

amount of energy—to within75%! A much better discriminator

for energy use was found to be the household income—high-

income households on an average used twice as much energy as

low-income households. Thorough analysis empowered by being

able to ask and answer the right questions may yet lead to further

facility-efficiency improvements.

4.2. Political

4.2.1. Wrong driver

Near-term energy cost savings is the wrong basis for making

most DOD efficiency improvement decisions. Any policy to use

18–36 month projected energy cost savings as the primary driver

for such decisions severely limits the scope of what can be

accomplished through efficiency improvements. Recall that the

entire DOD energy bill in FY07 was only 2.5% of the total DOD

budget, so even if energy efficiency magically improved and cut

energy use in half, the total energy cost savings would amount to

only 1.25% of the DOD budget. This miniscule potential savings

tends to reduce the priority of improving DOD energy efficiency

during the decision-making process. The calculation of the true

benefit of energy-efficiency improvements must also include cost

savings in other arenas such as logistics, transportation, person-

nel, etc. With fuel being 70% of the resupply tonnage to deployed

Army units (Defense Science Board, 2001, p. 13), the cost savings

reaped by cutting this tonnage in half is orders of magnitude

greater than the cost of the saved fuel. DOD policy is starting to

move in the right direction to correct this oversight; the Under

secretary of Defense for Acquisition, technology and logistics

initiated a pilot program in April 2007 that will develop the best

business practices to enable acquisition programs to account for

the fully burdened cost of fuel in their program calculations and

decisions (Krieg, 2007). While burdened calculations will not have

a large direct impact on the cost of fuel figures for DOD facilities

within the continental US, the lesson learned is valuable and

applicable nonetheless: one must look further than simple 18–36

month energy cost savings for accurate assessments of potential

energy-efficiency savings.

Ideally, the calculation of the benefits of improving energyefficiency would also take into account the benefits of force

multiplication, increased resilience, and increased endurance.

While these attributes may be difficult to observe or calculate

when looking at a single system, their effects quickly become

apparent during large-scale exercises. Many war games and other

simulation packages do incorporate system efficiencies during

their execution, but they would be of higher utility if they also

allowed the user to easily adjust efficiency numbers to perform

quick trade-off studies, particularly in support of acquisition

program decisions. Along a similar vein, the Joint Requirements

Oversight Council has agreed to ‘‘selectively apply an Energy

Efficiency Key Performance Parameter as necessary’’ for some

acquisition programs (Giambastiani, 2006). It is certainly a step in

the right direction, but it is doubtful that this policy alone can

fully capture the benefits that improved energy efficiency can

bring to military effectiveness.

4.2.2. Inadequate metrics

The DOD does not have a metric that measures military

effectiveness per unit of input energy. Lacking such a metric, they

cannot establish a clear goal and then measure their progress

towards that goal. Lacking such a metric, they cannot determine

when they have cut too deeply and started to actually reducemilitary effectiveness. Perhaps such a metric is an impossibility,

but there certainly remains progress to be made towards that

ideal.

With regards to facilities, what is done at present is measure

energy usage per square foot. This energy-intensity metric is

common within the commercial industry and is used by federal

agencies to track their progress towards meeting facility efficiency

goals such as the 30% energy-intensity reduction required

between 2005 and 2015 according to Executive Order 13,423. In

delivered energy per square foot, the DOD and US commercial

sector are quite comparable: the DOD used 112kBtu per square

foot averaged over their 2B square feet of facility space in FY07

(DUSD(I&E), 2007), while the US commercial sector used 110kBtu

per square foot averaged over their 75B square feet of space in2004 (Buildings Energy Data Book, 2006, Summary Sheet 9). Since

much of the DOD facility space is office space identical to the

commercial sector, the energy source (electricity, natural gas, etc.)

and end-use (lighting, heating, cooling, etc.) breakouts are also

quite comparable. Thus, looking for best practices from the

commercial industry is an excellent strategy for improving DOD

facility energy efficiency. The Air Force is actively pursuing this

strategy through events such as the expert panel discussion that

took place at the USAF Energy Forum II; panel members included

facility energy executives from CB Richard Ellis, IBM Corporation,

Biswanger Advisory Services, Inc., General Motors, Jones Lang

LaSalle, and the Air Force (Energy Forum II, 2008).

Even this seemingly appropriate metric of energy use per

square foot must be used with some caution, however. Whatpeople truly desire is to have a space that is comfortable in terms

of temperature, humidity, lighting, and ability to power our

appliances and electronics. Thus, arbitrarily continuing to reduce

the target for energy use per square foot will eventually have a

deleterious effect on occupants’ ability to perform normal duties

unless we find innovative ways to supply these same comforts

using less energy per square foot. As the DOD continues to

improve its facility efficiency, it will become necessary to

reevaluate the goals and the metrics used to measure progress

towards those goals. They must design and select metrics that

measure progress towards the truly desired end state.

4.2.3. Inconsistent backing

Political support for various paths towards improved energyefficiency has suffered from spotty, and sometimes nonexistent,

backing from the federal government and DOD. As this support is

often in the form of financial incentives, we see here an example

of a barrier that is both political and financial in nature. Adding

wind or solar renewable energy sources to the power grid is an

effective efficiency gain because this energy reduces the amount

of electrical energy and waste heat that would otherwise be

produced at a conventional fossil-fuel-burning plant. Yet two

critical US incentives to develop more wind and solar energy

are presently being allowed to expire at the end of 2008: the

Production Tax Credit (PTC) and the Investment Tax Credit. The

Production Tax Credit stimulates the creation of new wind energy

plants by supplying utility companies with a 2 cent credit for

every kilowatt-hour of wind energy produced during a facility’s

ARTICLE IN PRESS


8/19/2019 Ship PMS

8/11

first 10 years of operation. Since it is inception in 1992, the PTC

has been provided off-and-on via various 1 and 2 year extensions.

In fact, it has even been allowed to lapse during three separate

years. The catastrophic effect of these lapses is seen clearly in

Fig. 4.

Installation of new wind energy nearly came to a stand still in

2000, 2002, and 2004 because of these lapses. Conversely, the

consistent incentive available from 2005 through 2007 is almost

certainly a key ingredient in the explosive growth seen in 2007.

The expiration of the PTC due to occur at the end of this year is

likely already resulting in reduced wind investment as these

projects often take many months to become operational. The

Investment Tax Credit (ITC) provides for up to a $2000 credit on

residential installation of solar energy and will expire at the same

time. One current proposal on the table is to extend both credits

for 8 years, double the ITC credit, and make the ITC credit

available also to utility companies. At the time of this writing, it

remains to be seen whether or not Congress will find a way to

make the commitment to long-term support for these renewable

energy sources. [Post-submission update: On 3 October, 2008,

Congress extended the PTC by only 1 year but the ITC by 8 years.

In addition, the $2000 cap for residential installation credit has

been lifted on the ITC so that it will provide a true 30% tax credit,

and utility companies are no longer prohibited from benefiting

from the credit.]

Within the DOD, there are also fluctuations regarding support

for efficiency improvement tools. Several financial vehicles have

been available to federal agencies now for more than two decades.

As with the tax credits above, though, there have been occasional

lapses in the federal authority to use some of these tools. Perhaps

the most powerful of these tools, the Energy Savings Performance

Contract (ESPC) is presently authorized for initiation through

2016 by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. In an ESPC, efficiencyimprovements implemented by the contractor are paid for using

the majority of the energy cost savings, a process which can take

10–25 years to complete the payback. Since 1998, several Super

ESPCs, designed to serve either a large geographic region or a

specific-energy technology, have been in place to help streamline

the challenging contracting process. In addition, the Federal

Energy Management Program offers assistance to all federal

agencies in utilizing these Super ESPCs to accomplish their energy

use goals and upgrade their energy infrastructure. According to

the Department of Energy’s Federal Energy Management Program,

as of 2007 over 400 ESPC projects had been awarded in 46 states

by 19 different federal agencies resulting in a total savings of

16TBtu per year—enough energy to supply city of 450,000 for one

year. While the DOD has regularly taken advantage of this

program (10 new ESPC tasks were awarded in FY07 (DUSD(I&E),

2007), in October of 2007 the Air Force increased the burden of

the ESPC approval process and centralized the oversight (Eulberg,

2007). In fact, across the DOD in 2007, the use of ESPCs declined

enough that the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Installations

and Environment) issued a policy memo in January 2008

requiring the services to include ESPCs in their plans for reducing

energy consumption (DUSD(I&E), 2008). In response, the Decem-

ber 2008 Air Force Energy Program Policy Memorandum requiresthat each ESPC be evaluated ‘‘to ensure it provides the best return

on investment for the Air Force’’ (Donley, 2008). Thus, while the

DOD is encouraging the use of ESPCs as part of an energy savings

strategy, the Air Force instead is emphasizing cost savings in their

selection of ESPCs, thereby limiting the application of these long-

term investment tools.

Another missing piece of energy-efficiency policy is the

stimulation that would be provided by federal legislation that

enables a cap and trade market for carbon dioxide emissions.

While the present study does not address reducing greenhouse

gas emissions, it should be noted that any serious effort to reduce

greenhouse gas emissions will include a large component

dedicated to energy-efficiency improvement. Though the US

withdrew from the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change in

March of 2001, other countries around the world embarked on

their efforts to meet the terms of the Protocol. In fact, Europe has

had carbon caps in place since 2005 and is well on their way to

establishing a well regulated and profitable carbon trading

market. The lethargy of the US is even more puzzling in the face

of the enormously successful role that the sulfur dioxide emission

market has played herein eliminating the problem of acid rain

ever since this market was born out of the emission restrictions

imposed by the Clean Air Act of 1990. According to Richard Sandor

(2008), the Chicago Climate Exchanges chairman and CEO, the

idea of a sulfur dioxide exchange market ‘‘attracted a surprising

number of environmentalists, because it called for large and

specific reductions; conservatives who usually oppose regulation

approved of the market-driven solution.’’ Through the use of the

sulfur dioxide exchange market, emissions have successfully been

reduced from 18 million tons to 9 million tons and are expected to

be below 5 million tons by 2010. This was accomplished because

there was money to be made while addressing the mandatory

emission reductions; when there is real money at stake,

innovative solutions have a way of surfacing. Sandor (2008)

continues: ‘‘The lesson is important: price stimulates inventive

activity. Even if you think the price is too low or ridiculous. Carbon

has to be rationed, like water and clean air. But I absolutely

promise that if you design a law and a trading scheme properly

you are going to find everyone from professors at M.I.T. to the guys

in Silicon Valley coming out of the woodwork. That is what we

need, and we need it now.’’ Legislated carbon dioxide emission

caps and the money at stake in the subsequent trade market

would almost certainly stimulate energy-efficiency improve-ments, thereby potentially killing two birds with one stone.

4.2.4. Fragmentation

One further notable hurdle facing facility energy-efficiency

improvements is the extreme fragmentation of the US building

industry. When a new technology is demonstrated to be both

energy efficient and affordable, it still remains extremely difficult

to achieve market penetration because there is no short list of

major players in construction. Instead, new technologies are

adopted painfully slowly, if at all, in one small pocket after

another. This fragmentation is not unique to the US as it has also

been observed in the UK (Sorrell, 2003). The residential building

sector is even more fragmented than the commercial sector; in

ARTICLE IN PRESS

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

U . S . A n

n u a

l W i n d C a p a c

i t y

I n s

t a l l e

d ( M W )

1999

Years with no Production Tax Credit

9 3 %

d e c r e a s e

7 3

% d e c r e a s e

7 7

% d e c r e a s e

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

Fig. 4. Impact of lapses in the production tax credit for wind energy. Source: data

from American Wind Energy Association, http://www.awea.org/legislative/ac-

cessed 20 March, 2008.


http://www.awea.org/legislative/http://www.awea.org/legislative/

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

9/11

2005, the top 5 residential homebuilders together accounted for

only 15% of homes built, and the top 100 together accounted for

only 37% (Buildings Energy Data Book, 2006, Summary Sheet 22).

A solution to this fragmentation problem perhaps lies in the

efforts of groups like the National Institute of Building Sciences,

the American Institute of Architects, the National Association of

Home Builders, and the Alliance to Save Energy—organizations

that can rally the critical mass needed to adopt a new technology

or policy by bringing people together, recognizing best practicesalongside outstanding performers, and spreading the word.

4.3. Financial

4.3.1. Disincentives

Perhaps the most insidious barriers to improving facility

energy efficiencies are the financial disincentives that are

intertwined with the way we presently do business. Let us borrow

a simple illustration from Lovins (2005, p. 19): ‘‘In a typical US

office, using one-size-fatter wire to power overhead lights would

pay for itself within 20 weeks. Why wasn’t that done? Because:

(1) The wire size was specified by the low-bid electrician, who

was told to ‘meet code,’ and the wire-size table in the [US]

National Electrical Code is meant to prevent fires, not to save

money. Saving money by optimizing resistive losses takes wire

about twice as fat. (2) The office owner or occupant will buy the

electricity, but the electrician bought the wire. An electrician

altruistic enough to buy fatter wire is not the low bidder and

won’t win the job.’’ Similarly, the owner versus tenant disin-

centive plays a crucial role in many commercial and residential

buildings. An owner who leases or rents the property has no

incentive to install energy-efficient features because they typi-

cally cost more; likewise, a tenant lacks incentive because short-

term energy cost savings will not likely repay the investment.

A related disincentive lurks in the way most US utility

companies supply energy. With most commodities, the profits

increase with sales volume—if you sell less product, you will reap

less profit. Why would utility companies want to help their

customers improve their energy efficiency if the improvements

result in reduced profits? To address this issue, several states have

started decoupling utility company profits from sales volumes.

One way to accomplish this decoupling is to charge separately for

energy usage versus energy transmission—if customer energy

usage falls such that the utility company does not recoup its costs

for maintaining or upgrading the transmission infrastructure,

then the transmission fees can be raised. Utility company profits

are thus protected even if energy usage falls, and while customers

see little if any cost savings from their reduced energy usage, they

benefit indirectly by not having to pay for the increased energy

infrastructure that would otherwise be needed if overall usage

increased. Led by California, which decoupled profits from sales

volume in 1982, many other states have taken similar stepsincluding Oregon, Maryland, Idaho, New York, and Minnesota,

but the vast majority of utilities across the nation have yet

to be decoupled. There are several variations on how to

accomplish this decoupling; in each market, the implementation

must be tailored carefully to avoid unintended consequences. To

encourage the growth of efficient distributed energy systems,

such decoupling should be designed to allow utility companies to

charge transmission fees for energy either downloaded from or

uploaded to the grid. Under such a model, utility companies can

encourage the growth of point-of-use, small-scale electricity

generation without suffering a severe profit loss. Both the utility

company and customers then benefit from a more robust energy

source network enhanced by additional generation and storage

capacity.

4.3.2. Missing local rewards

When residential or commercial consumers manage to save

money through energy-efficiency improvements, they can enjoy

this savings by using it however they see fit. Within the DOD,

however, this same flexibility does not exist. In most cases, money

that is intended to pay for energy bills must pay for energy

only—if a base saves money by reducing their energy costs, the

base commander cannot use the savings to reward the commu-

nity. While commanders have been given the flexibility to locallyspend energy savings on other energy-related projects, it requires

extreme creativity to find ways to otherwise motivate people to

improve their energy efficiency.

Another unfortunate reality within the DOD is that money

not spent during the year often becomes money lost the next

year. Leaders are thus concerned that showing a cost savings

now will result in a reduced budget in the future. This effect

should not be a concern if the leader is convinced that the savings

are true and will continue year after year, but this effect

does inhibit energy-efficiency experiments that might work one

year because of a particular weather pattern or personnel

priorities. If energy costs rise the next year, the scramble to cover

the increase will likely result in having to cut other programs or

services.

4.3.3. Unfunded requirements

Unfunded requirements often become unaccomplished re-

quirements. When a requirement to improve energy efficiency is

levied without the identification of additional funding to support

the effort, success becomes an unlikely outcome. In the interest of

saving money, some leaders would like to accomplish such

efficiency improvement using organic resources, but which team

member has the expertise and time to devote to the project? And

how will any capital costs be paid? Within the US federal

government, several financial tools are available to help save the

project. Energy Savings Performance Contracts and Utility Energy

Service Contracts can provide the expertise, manpower, and

capital to accomplish efficiency improvements with little or no

investment from the federal agency. As the DOD struggles with

how to take the next steps to improve energy efficiency, there are

perhaps novel combinations or applications of these financial

tools that can be applied to maximize their impact. The Air Force

is currently examining options for offering Enhanced Use Leases

on base to companies willing to build, own, and operate solar and

nuclear energy plants; adding a Power Purchase Agreement

between the Air Force and the company can then help to ensure

the profitability of such a venture (Air Force Real Property Agency,

2008). Given the Air Force’s current interest in domestically

produced fuel, can an on-base nuclear plant be collocated with a

renewable fuels plant that utilizes the nuclear plant’s waste heat

for processing the fuel?

To address the manpower aspect of unfunded requirements,some bases have begun to employ resource-efficiency managers

(REMs). These contractors are energy experts who provide their

services by covering their salaries year-to-year using a portion of

the savings they generate. Taken to the limit, REMs should

eventually work themselves out of their jobs, leaving in their wake

a vast number of facility-efficiency improvements. In general, an

organization should have approximately $3M or more of annual

energy expenditures for the hiring of a dedicated REM to be cost

effective. Smaller facilities, though, can still benefit from a REM by

sharing the cost of the REM with other small facilities. As of July

2004, only 25 REMs were in place servicing approximately 40

federal facilities (Federal Energy Management Program, 2004).

Given that DOD facility energy costs were $3.4B in FY07, such

expenditure could justify employment of closer to 1000 REMs.

ARTICLE IN PRESS


8/19/2019 Ship PMS

10/11

This self-funding expert manpower has yet to be fully utilized to

improve DOD facility energy efficiency.

While the foundational pillars of technology, policy, and

financing must each be in place and strong for an energy-

efficiency improvement to take hold, within the DOD there is a

further requirement. As noted by the recently retired commander

of the Air Force’s Air Combat Command (Keys, 2008), ‘‘only

mission drives long-term commitment.’’ Thus, as the DOD moves

forward with removing or circumventing the efficiency barriers

described here, they must do so with the understanding that their

efforts are doomed to fail unless the end result improves their

ability to get the job done. Table 2 is a summary of the 10 key

obstacles identified in this study along with recommended action

agents that either are or could be pursuing remedies.

5. Conclusion

While improving efficiency saves energy, an even more

significant benefit of improved efficiency for the DOD is the

resulting increase in military effectiveness. Efficiency improve-

ments bring with them many military enhancements worthpaying for such as simplicity, surprise, a reduced logistics tail,

force multiplication, increased resilience, and increased endur-

ance. Thus, energy cost savings should not be a principle factor

when deliberating over proposed energy-efficiency improve-

ments. The true savings incurred through efficiency improve-

ments are often many times greater than the simple cost of the

energy, so there is much more at stake than the $3.4B of the DOD

budget that is presently consumed by facility energy costs. While

a plethora of tools exist to help the DOD on the path towards

improved energy efficiency within its facilities, there are still

many roadblocks that must be overcome. To assist in focusing

future efficiency improvement efforts, the 10 obstacles discussed

herein were assigned to 3 general barrier categories, and lead

agencies were proposed for resolving each of these impediments.

By addressing these technological, political, and financial barriers

that stand in the way of DOD facility energy-efficiency improve-

ments, the DOD can deliver a secure energy future while

simultaneously improving both their sustainability and military

effectiveness.

Acknowledgements

The author performed this study as a National Technologies

Laboratory Fellow supported by the US Air Force’s Air University

and the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Additional financial support was provided by the USAF Institute

for National Security Studies. The author gratefully acknowledges

the knowledge, guidance, and time of the following individuals:

T. Vane, K. Meidel, S. Thomas, R. Hawsey, P. Hughes, D. Stinton,

T. King, T. Wilbanks, D. Greene, and A. Desjarlais at the Oak Ridge

National Laboratory; S. Hearne, D. Sheets, and J. Fittipaldi at the

Army Environmental Policy Institute; G. Doddington and J. Snook

at the Air Force Civil Engineering Support Agency; J. Barnett

and J. Dominick at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory;

R. Rude at Minot AFB; G. Denslow at Dyess AFB; and W. Turner atFairchild AFB.

References

Air Force Real Property Agency, 2008. Enhanced Use Leasing Solicitation nos.AFRPA-08-R-0005, -0006 and -0007.

Air Force Science Advisory Board, 2006. Technology Options for Improved AirVehicle Fuel Efficiency.

Amidon, J.M., 2005. America’s Strategic Imperative: A National Energy PolicyManhattan Project. Air University, February 2005.

Army Corps of Engineers, 2005. Energy Trends and Their Implications for US ArmyInstallations.

Blackwell, K.E., 2007. Department of Defense and Energy Independence: OptimismMeets Reality. Air University, April 2007.

BP, 2007. BP Statistical Review of World Energy June 2007, p. 40.Brown, M.A., 2001. Market failures and barriers as a basis for clean energy policies.

Energy Policy 29, 1197–1207.Buildings Energy Data Book, 20 06. US Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency and

Renewable Energy, Tables 4.2.7, 4.3.2.Defense Science Board, 2001. Task Force on Improving Fuel Efficiency of Weapons

Platforms, More Capable Warfighting Through Reduced Fuel Burden (Wa-shington, D.C.: Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisitions,Technology and Logistics, January 2001).

Defense Science Board, 2008. Task Force on DOD Energy Strategy, More Fight–LessFuel (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisi-tions, Technology and Logistics, February 2008).

Donley, M., 2008. Air Force Energy Program Policy Memorandum, AFPM 10-1,Secretary of the Air Force, 19 December 2008.

DiPetto, C., 2008. Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on DOD EnergyStrategy. USAF Energy Forum II, Arlington, VA, 3 March 2008, p. 20.

Drinnon, R., 2007. C-17 uses synthetic fuel blend on transcontinental flight, AirForce Link. 18 December 2007.

DUSD(I&E) (Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment),2007. FY2007 Energy Management Data Report.

DUSD(I&E) (Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment),2008. Statement of Mr. Wayne Arny (DUSD(I&E)) before the Subcommittee onReadiness of the House Armed Services Committee, 13 March 2008.

EIA (Energy Information Administration), 2007. Energy Information Administra-tion/Annual Energy Review 2006, DOE/EIA-0384 (2006), p. 5, 25.

Energy Forum II, 2008. Session 1: Facility Energy Management for Competitive-ness: The Owner’s Equity, held during the United States Air Force EnergyForum II, Arlington, VA, 3 March 2008.

ENERGY STAR, 2006. ENERGY STAR Overview of 2006 Achievements, available at/http://www.energystar.govS.

Environmental Security Technology Certification Program, 2008. Program An-nouncement for FY2009 Non-DOD Federal Proposal Submission Instructions,10 January 2008, p. 14.

Eulberg, D., 2007. Energy Savings Performance and Utility Energy ServicesContracts (ESPC and UESC) Policy. Air Force Civil Engineer, HQ USAF/A7CMemorandum, 30 October 2007.

Federal Energy Management Program, 2004. Contracting for a Resource EfficiencyManager. DOE/EE-0299, 1.

Gan, L., Eskeland, G.S., Kolshus, H.H., 2007. Green electricity market development:

lessons from Europe and the US. Energy Policy 35, 144–155.

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Table 2

Ten key impediments.

Impediment Solution agents

Technological

Insufficient energy

storage

Public and private research and development

funding agents

Tunnel vision Systems and electrical engineers, university

curriculum directors, utility companies

Missing data Local building managers or energy managers

Political

Wrong driver Senior DOD leadership within installations and

energy as well as within acquisitions, technology

and logistics, energy managers, acquisition

program managers

Inadequate metrics Senior DOD leadership within installations and

energy as well as within acquisitions, technology

and logistics

Inconsistent backing Executive and legislative branches, senior DOD

leadership within installations and energy as

well as within acquisitions, technology, and

logistics

Fragmentation Professional organizations within the building

industry, efficiency-oriented political action

groups

FinancialDisincentives Federal, state and local governments, utility

companies

Missing local rewards Congress and senior DOD finance officials

Unfunded requirements Federal energy management program, senior

DOD leadership within installations and energy


http://www.energystar.gov/http://www.energystar.gov/

8/19/2019 Ship PMS

11/11

Giambastiani, E.P., 2006. Key Performance Parameter Study Recommendations andImplementation. Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Memorandum

JROCM 161-06, 17 August 2006.Hadder, G.R., Das, S., Lee, R., Davis, R.M., 1989. Navy jet fuel production: strategies

for a Persian Gulf crisis. Energy Policy 17, 235–243.Hall, D.C., 1992. Oil and national security. Energy Policy 20, 1089–1096.Historical Tables, 2007. From the Budget of the US Government, FY2008, p. 327,

329, 74–78.Historical Tables, 2008. From the Budget of the US Government, FY2009, p. 330,

335, 79.Hornitschek, M.J., 2006. War Without Oil: A Catalyst for True Transformation. Air

University, February 2006. Jaffe, A.B., Stavins, R.N., 1994. The energy-efficiency gap: what does it mean?

Energy Policy 22 (10), 804–810.Keys, R., 2008. Moving from rhetoric to projects. United States Air Force Energy

Forum II, Arlington, VA, 3 March, 2008.Krieg, K.J., 2007. Fully Burdened Cost of Fuel Pilot Program. Under Secretary of

Defense (Acquisition, Technology and Logistics) Memorandum, 10 April, 20 07.Kuntz, G.D., 2007. Use of Renewable Energy in Contingency Operations. Army

Environmental Policy Institute, March 2007.Lalley, B., 2007. Air Force and DoE Energy Audit Partnership. United States Air Force

Energy Forum, Washington, DC, 8 March 2007.Lengyel, G.J., 2007. Department of Defense Energy Strategy: Teaching an Old Dog

New Tricks. Air University, April 2007.Lovins, A.B., 2005. Energy end-use efficiency, in: Transitions to Sustainable Energy

Systems. InterAcademy Council 2005–2006 study, 19 September, 2005.Mozumder, P., Marathe, A., 2007. Causality relationship between electricity

consumption and GDP in Bangladesh. Energy Policy 35, 395–402.Navy Research Advisory Council, 2005. Study on Future Fuels.

ORNL (Oak Ridge National Laboratory) Review 2007. A glimpse of the energyfuture, and Components of a ‘‘zero-energy’’ house. ORNL Review 40(2), 2–7.Available at /http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReviewS.

Rohdin, P., Thollander, P., Solding, P., 2007. Barriers to and drivers for energyefficiency in the Swedish foundry industry. Energy Policy 35, 672–677.

Sandor, R., 2008. As quoted by Specter, M., in Big Foot. The New Yorker, 25 February2008.

Sims, R.E.H., Schock, R.N., Adegbululgbe, A., Fenhann, J., Konstantinaviciute, I.,Moomaw, W., Nimir, H.B., Schlamadinger, B., Torres-Martinez, J., Turner, C.,Uchiyama, Y., Vuori, S.J.V., Wamukonya, N., Zhang, X., 2007. Energy supply. In:Metz, B., Davidson, O.R., Bosch, P.R., Dave, R., Meyer, L.A. (Eds.), ClimateChange 2007: Mitigation. Contribution of Working Group III to the FourthAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, USA,

p. 283.Sola, A.V.H., Xavier, A.A.P., 2007. Organizational human factors as barriers to

energy efficiency in electrical motors systems in industry. Energy Policy 35,5784–5794.

Sorrell, S., 2003. Making the link: climate policy and the reform of the UKconstruction industry. Energy Policy 31, 865–878.

Sorrell, S., O’Malley, E., Schleich, J., Scott, S., 2004. The Economics of Energy Efficiency—Barriers to Cost-Effective Investment. Edward Elgar,Cheltenham.

Sorrell, S., Schleich, J., Scott, S., O’Malley, E., Trace, F., Boede, E., Ostertag, K., Radgen,P., 2000. Reducing Barriers to Energy Efficiency in Public and PrivateOrganizations. /http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/spru/publications/reports/barriers/final.htmlS.

Vallentin, D., 2008. Policy drivers and barriers for coal-to-liquids (CtL) technologiesin the United States. Energy Policy 36, 3198–3211.

Vringer, K., Aalbers, T., Blok, K., 2007. Household energy requirement and valuepatterns. Energy Policy 35, 553–566.

Weber, L., 1997. Some reflections on barriers to the efficient use of energy. Energy

Policy 25, 833–835.Wilbanks, T.J., 1994. Improving energy efficiency: making a ‘‘no-regrets’’ optionwork. Environment 36 (9), 16–20 (pp. 36–44).

ARTICLE IN PRESS

http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReviewhttp://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/spru/publications/reports/barriers/final.htmlhttp://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/spru/publications/reports/barriers/final.htmlhttp://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/spru/publications/reports/barriers/final.htmlhttp://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/spru/publications/reports/barriers/final.htmlhttp://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReview

ship pms

Documents