Providing an Incentive for Businesses to Reduce Energy Costs – Part 3 in a Series

In his five-part energy plan, Al Gore recommends new tax incentives for participating businesses. Ironically, when I began my business in 1978, there were several government incentives to encourage businesses to reduce energy use. One was a 10 percent Investment Tax Credit (ITC), and another was an additional 10 percent Energy Tax Credit, along with the standard depreciation. For some unfathomable reason, both were allowed to expire (the Energy Tax Credit in 1981 and the ITC a little while later).

Since then, a limited number of rebate programs offered by individual utility companies have come and gone. These programs had limitations that kept them from succeeding: They were usually short-lived and targeted at specific devices, such as energy saving ballasts, or energy efficient motors and chillers – certainly nothing that would encourage conservation on a universal scale. I believe that if these tax credits were reenacted and not confined to just a handful of specific products (no doubt inspired by special interests) organizations would gain near overnight relief from the energy worries that plague our economy at a cost much lower than that required to build new generating plants, expand the national grid system and develop alternative fuels.

Think about it. If energy savings systems like ours were installed in every business in America, reducing overall electrical consumption by 20 percent:

• The cost of all goods would go down,
• There would be no need for additional generating capacity,
• We would free up 20 percent of the capacity of our existing electrical grid,
• We would reduce the amount of carbon-based fuels being used to generate electricity,
• Carbon emissions would go down overnight,
• Our dependence on foreign oil would ease and
• We would buy ourselves the time to develop alternative energy sources and make them commercially feasible.

With or without government incentives, energy conservation is, without doubt, our best and most immediate hope in solving our energy problem. In addition, the business benefits would be myriad. The good news is that this can be done with no change in our lifestyle or in business practices. Visit the EASI Web site for an overview of our energy saving plans.