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rojected Annual Electricity Use and Electricity Expenditures for U.S. Office Equipment Figure 10 shows the results for six scenarios that account for the significant uncertainties in the estimation of savings from the Energy Star program:   (I) Business-as-Usual case­this scenario assumes that Energy Star and related Federal procurement policies for office equipment do not exist. In this case, annual electricity consumption grows by about 30% over 1990 levels by 2010.     (II) Energy Star Current Practice Continues case­This scenario assesses the effect if current levels of enabling of Energy Star equipment is unchanged in the future (see Table 7 for the enabling assumptions by equipment type). The annual savings in 2000 relative to the Business-as-Usual case are about 6 TWh and grow to about 10 TWh by 2010. These annual savings are worth $500 to $800 million per year (1995 $) at current commercial sector electricity prices.

(III) Energy Star Worst case­This case assumes that enabling of Energy Star compliant equipment improves somewhat over the Current Practice Continues case (see Table 7) but that two additional factors increase energy use. First, we add the assumption of Minimum Energy Star Compliance, in which the suspend power levels of PCs, monitors, and printers are 30W instead of the lower values that manufacturers have achieved to date. Second, we assume that ownership of Energy Star equipment lulls many users into believing that they do not need to turn their equipment off when they leave the office. We model this situation by assuming that twice the number of Energy Star PC CPUs, monitors, and printers are left on at night and on the weekend than currently are. This case results in savings of 6 TWh/year in 2000 and about 10 TWh/year in 2010, which is about the same as for the Current Practice Continues case.

 

(IV) Energy Star Most-Likely case­This scenario is our main Energy Star case. About half of the Energy Star PC CPUs are assumed to be enabled, as are 70% of the monitors, 90% of the copiers, and 100% of the fax machines and laser printers (see Table 7). It results in annual savings of 11 TWh in 2000 and 17 TWh in 2010, savings that are worth 900 million 1995$/year and 1.4 billion 1995$/year for 2000 and 2010, respectively.

 

(V) Energy Star Best case­This Scenario assumes that 100% of Energy Star compliant equipment is enabled and that the program leads to behavioral changes that reinforce the energy savings attributable directly to the purchase of the more efficient equipment. It assumes that the Energy Star program raises the awareness of all consumers about energy use, and reduces nightime and weekend diversity by about 75% (the assumption implies that 75% of owners of Energy Star equipment who would not otherwise have done so turn off that equipment when they leave work). This case results in savings of 16 TWh/year in 2000 and about 23 TWh/year in 2010. The savings are worth about 1.3 billion 1995$/year and 1.8 billion 1995$/year for 2000 and 2010, respectively.

 

(VI) Advanced case­This case estimates office equipment electricity use assuming that best current technology is used regardless of economics. It results in savings beyond the Energy Star Most-Likely case of about 18 TWh/year by 2000 and 29 TWh/year by 2010. These savings are worth an additional 1.4 billion 1995$/year and 2.3 billion 1995$/year for 2000 and 2010, respectively.

These calculations do not count any savings that will accrue in office equipment used in residences or in the industrial sector, nor do they count the savings in other countries that copy the Energy Star regulations to harmonize their office equipment markets with that of the US. We also do not calculate the paper savings from the Energy Star copier program or the benefits from reduced pollutant emissions, but the existence of these "spillover benefits" in other sectors implies that our Worst case/Current Practice estimates represent an absolute lower bound on expected savings. Actual savings for the US and for the world are almost certain to be larger than this lower bound.  Last Updated On: 8/19/04