A story in the USA Today (I know, right?) nevertheless has a good story about how energy efficiency appliances can make people more comfortable with wasting power. The prime example is a man who claims that his wife will sometimes wash/dry just one piece of clothing because of her high efficiency washer/drier. Lord, those stupid wives, right men?
There is a good point being made, though - we can't just rely on mandates from on high. That was fine with the ozone layer - it was a more simple problem with a simpler solution. The government could say "This chemical bad!" and people could say "Well, guess that chemical is bad and we can't really buy it anymore anyway. Wonder what's on TV?"
Climate change, though, is going to need a little bit more; both the problem and the solution encompass our entire way of life. So instead of just giving people a high-efficiency light bulb, they need to understand what the importance of using less power - or we won't be successful.
Then again, I may be reading too much into this research. The story below that one in this morning's USA Today was a study that measures how free each state is - the primary determinant that catapulted New Hampshire to "Most Free State in the Union" was lack of a seat-belt law. Gah.
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