Eric Wesoff of GTM Research has a guest blog post on GE’s Ecomagination site titled “Will efficiency lead to more power consumption?” It touches on the idea, first proposed by economist William Stanley Jevons in 1885, that technologies designed to make our use of energy more efficient work to increase, not decrease, overall power consumption. This Jevons paradox, or energy rebound effect,  is often used by folks who want to undermine policy efforts aimed at promoting energy efficiency. Wesoff, it should be pointed out, is simply posing the question to encourage discussion.

 Does the introduction of new energy-efficient technologies make us use more of something we might not otherwise use, thereby negating efficiency gains? There certainly is evidence that, for example, people drive more when they’re in more fuel-efficient vehicles. But beyond The Breakthrough Institute, it’s generally believed the rebound effect is in the area of 10 per cent and that there is still a healthy net benefit to introducing more efficiency into vehicles. Certainly, there are specific examples we can find that show the rebound effect is higher, but there are far more examples — in my view — where it’s likely to be far lower. I don’t buy, for example, that introducing more efficient lighting technologies will lead us to leave the lights on more. Yes, communities and cities will grow and that will increase electricity demand for lighting, but on a per-capita basis will we use more? Maybe, for some, if the price of power stays the same or falls, but that’s not the case. The fact is, the widespread introduction of LED lighting will lead to a dramatic overall reduction in energy use on a per capita basis, and we can’t blame energy efficiency on growth that is likely to happen anyway.

If I insulate my home am I going to use more electricity or natural gas to heat it? No. If a company automates lighting and other functions in a building to reduce energy costs why would it revert back to using more energy in that building? Am I going to wash more laundry because my laundry machine is more efficient? No.

Some point to efficiency as making products cheaper for people in developing countries, such as India and China. So what’s the solution — make products as inefficient as possible to keep these products out of these markets? Besides, consumption in India and China is largely driven by increases in personal wealth, not advancements in energy efficiency.

Anyway, there’s no shortage of articles and blog posts debunking the impact of the Jevons paradox, yet it continues to get raised as some sort of achilles heal to energy efficiency programs. It’s all getting a bit tiring. The fact is, where the rebound effect is seen as a potential problem, there are many policy options available to keep it in check. Carbon taxes. Program that encourage a culture of conservation. Time-of-use pricing. Electricity pricing threshold.

This is a non-problem.