Ridgefield residents talk about best ways to save energy

RIDGEFIELD -- Switch off the lights. Save the Earth.

This simple message has been so effectively drilled into the collective conscious of Americans that a recent survey found nearly 20 percent of Americans said this was the best approach to saving energy.

In reality, the action is close to ceremonial.

It signals a desire to save the Earth but barely affects household energy use, according to a study, which appears in last week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Few Americans cited actions that have a big impact on energy costs, such as buying energy-efficient cars and appliances, or weatherizing their homes, according to the study.

"The single most important thing to do for your house is to get it air sealed, but people are not even thinking that way," Dwayne Escola said. "That's how they lose the most energy. No. 2 is insulation."

Escola sits on Ridgefield Action Committee for the Environment, also known as RACE.

Ridgefield's Andrea Hutter said after energy auditors sealed the surfaces around her chimney and made other small changes, the energy escaping her home was reduced by 38 percent.

The audit normally costs $700 to $800, but she had it done for $50 with Connecticut Light & Power subsidies and discounts the auditors were offering to Ridgefield residents.

Scientists, government and environmental groups have done a poor job communicating what they know about potential investments in technology, Shahzeen Attari, a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia University's Earth Institute and lead author of the study, said in a news release.

Instead, they have funded recycling drives and encouraged actions like turning off lights, she added. As a result, most Americans practice "curtailment," or keeping the same behavior but doing less of it.

"But switching to efficient technologies allows you to maintain your behavior and save a great deal more energy," Attari said.

Ridgefield residents should be looking beyond changing behaviors, First Selectman Rudy Marconi said. For example, the attic of Town Hall will be insulated, he said, to retain the large amount of heat the building loses through the top.

Marconi's home, which was built in the 1890s, will be audited to increase public awareness, he said.

Changing Americans' minds will take some good marketing and a little friendly competition, Escola said.

Ridgefield is participating in the Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge, along with 14 other Connecticut towns. Using software from the company Efficiency 2.0 available on a website, residents have access hundreds of ideas on how to save energy, Escola said.

The website will include how much energy residents can save by switching to energy-efficient appliances. The site should be up and running by October.

"The 14 towns will be divided into four subgroups and will be competing against the others," Escola said. "They will compete for incentives like solar panels for their school. But the most important thing is to get all residents enthused about reducing energy."

People typically only take one or two actions to fix a perceived problem before their attention starts to fade, Attari said. Behavior researchers call the phenomenon the "single-action bias."

"Of course, we should do everything we can," she said. "But if we're going to do just one or two things, we should focus on big energy savers."

Besides energy-proofing their homes, one of the best things Connecticut residents can do is switch to clean energy, Andrea Hutter said.

Hutter founded We Green, a Ridgefield-based company, that can be thought of as the Costco of clean energy.

We Green purchases renewable energy credits in bulk, something that an individual homeowner cannot do. The company runs cost-benefit analyses for homeowners if they switch to 25 percent, 50 percent or 100 percent renewable energy.

"For the average Connecticut household, switching over to 25 percent renewable energy costs $3.70," she said. "For the price of a venti double latte, you can take steps toward being green."

We Green is trying to help people navigate what Hutter calls "the Wild West of energy supply" by organizing information about the 20 or so energy suppliers in Connecticut, so homeowners can make educated an educated decision about which energy supplier they choose.

The information will be available on WeGreenUs.com, a website she expects to be launched by the end of the month.