I apologize for not getting back to folks sooner, I have been travelling and living like a mole person in windowless conference rooms -- unaware of the passage of time!

I have, as of two minutes ago, responded to those of your with specific queries or action items. I thank you ALL for taking time out of your day to comment on my post. A new one should be appearing in the next day or so. I hope it sparks as much commentary!

Dear Susan,

Read your intro blog - you're a busy person! On the subject of vehicle efficiency you might like my recent blog post, especially being an ex-Californian. http://ekwestrel.com/hypermiling/hypermiling

Also, I have a friend, Sue Harrison, who does the home energy efficiency game and has been doing it for some time. I realize the areas you mention are with public or commericial buildings, but there may be some synergism with residential technologies. Her company's website is: http://vision-design.us/site/Home.html .

Regards,
Randy Ferman

How sensible, how delightful, and how refreshing to see that ACEEE takes the Human/Behavioral dimensions of energy use seriously. How wonderful that the organization has "walked the talk" by bringing in someone (Susan) with real expertise. "Behavioral economics" is a term in high currency, but anthropologists, psychologists, and other non-economist social scientists have been doing this work, unnoticed, for years. I am confident that Susan's expertise, when combined with that of Ben Foster and John Laitner, will allow the organization to produce a rich mix of great ideas, great contributions to our knowledge base, and great solutions.

Sara Wedeman
http://www.behavioraleconomics.net

Susan, good luck in your new position; ACEEE is a great organization.

You're tasked with answering the $$billion question -- what can be done to create persistent, positive change in behavior around energy in our society? Many of us have been preaching to the masses for years, yet have been unable to get our families to turn off the lights (our daughter, for one!).

Regards,

Chuck

Chuck Sathrum, PEM
Director, Smart Grid Solutions
Elster Solutions, LLC
Raleigh, NC

Susan, I'm also an anthropologist. And I have been critical of the ACEEE's so called "Behavioral and Human Dimensions" work since it began. I presented a paper at the Society for Socioeconomics meeting in Madrid Summer of 2011 detailing my concerns about the whole phenomenon of "Human Dimensions" of this and that by Applied Sociologists, Anthropologists, etc. I am surprised that Anthropologists would involve themselves in such work. Anthropologists are well known in their ethnographic work for focusing on maintaining the integrity of the actors' worlds. In not substituting what the Anthropologists wants to see happen or what "should" or "ought to" explain and interpret the actors' worlds. Your description of your "applied" Anthropology work as seeking "to use the insights of our field to solve real-world problems, often in areas like healthcare and international development" disturbs me. Are you assuming that healthcare or international developments actors can't identify and solve their own problems? That they need Anthropologists to do that, in whole or part? Anthropologists can offer suggestions or help to those they spend time with in the field. But they cannot and must not substitute their categories, descriptions, and solutions for the areas of concerns of the actors actually living the lives Anthropologists (and social science in general) are merely observing. My concern -- where and how do you draw that line? It's easy sometimes to step over the line and begin taking over the lives of those we should be seeking to observe with respect and humility. Plus, as I said in my paper this summer, social engineering always works, just not in the ways or with the results intended. If you want to save the world, get out of Anthropology and into the priesthood. And we certainly have lots of examples of the many ways priests have helped and harmed those they wanted to serve. Anthropologists are not priests and should not aspire to be.
Ken Zimmerman; ken.zimmerman@state.or.us

Welcome to your new Director of Behavior and Human Dimensions post. Do come to Birmingham, Alabama on your ethnographic weatherization field trip. We would welcome ACEEE presence and would be glad to assist with contacts and any other ways we could be helpful.

joyce.lanning@gmail.com
Joyce A. Lanning
2102 Williamsburg Way
Birmingham, AL 35223
H: 205-870-0808 M: 205-936-4212

Susan:
Congratulations on your new assignmen6t. ACEEE is a great organization that produces excellent work - your contributions will be most welcome.
I thought I would write and let you know that TVA in conjunction with UC Davis will be working on a project to develop a Technology and Behavior Energy Efficiency Center. Plans are still sketchy at this point, but I would invite and welcome any suggestions/involvement you might wish to contribute.
Bill Jackson
Senior Program Manager, Emerging Technologies
Tennessee Valley Authority
P.O. Box 292-409 OCP 2G-NST
Nashville, TN 37229-2409
615.232.6112 Office
wgjackson0@tva.gov Email

I'm pleased to see ACEEE expand along lines of "behavior and human dimensions" and is appears you bring solid tools to the task! I edit www.terutalk.com, focused on clean conversion of waste and biomass the energy (heat and power), fuels and other commodities. I will look forward to working with you as a collaborative researcher and to providing additional media coverage whenever you care to explore the "seemingly intractable conundrums in human behavior" dictating that we throw our resources into holes in the ground, rather than converting the materials back into beneficial uses. Feel free to contact me directly at any time. Michael Theroux, Editor.

Susan, as an engineer who has been struggling to increase the rate of adoption of energy efficiency in the business sector for over 30 years, I have learned that we don't understand many of the human and organizational barriers. I look forward to your work helping to identify the focal points and the processes for transforming the business perspective on efficiency both at the program and the project levels. Even when a business customer gets to "yes", they often end up failing to install the intended measures. We need to better understand the people and the business communities so that we can develop ways to effectively influence them and overcome the barriers to high levels of efficiency adoption. Welcome to our community and good luck! Jennifer

We would welcome a visit to our plant. We have three Ph.D.'s from UC Riverside here, including two in mathematics and one recently-minted in Mechanical Engineering, and we sponsor scholarships ("Brithinee Scholars") and support various research at UCR's Bourns College of Engineering.

We've worked a bit with ACEEE's Neal Elliott over the years, in industrial electric motor driven systems. That goes back to about 1990, when I had been appointed chairman of the Engineering Committee for our international trade association, EASA.

Oh, and we DO have friends (Dr. Peter Andrews and his wife, Sylvia Hixson) who DO study the same stuff that the Leakey's study, in Kenya and elsewhere. They are paleoanthropologists, living in England.
Wallace P. Brithinee, e-mail wallace_brithinee@mail.brithinee.com
Brithinee Electric
www.brithinee.com

We would welcome a visit to our plant. We have three Ph.D.'s from UC Riverside here, including two in mathematics and one recently-minted in Mechanical Engineering, and we sponsor scholarships ("Brithinee Scholars") and support various research at UCR's Bourns College of Engineering.

We've worked a bit with ACEEE's Neal Elliott over the years, in industrial electric motor driven systems. That goes back to about 1990, when I had been appointed chairman of the Engineering Committee for our international trade association, EASA.

Oh, and we DO have friends (Dr. Peter Andrews and his wife, Sylvia Hixson) who DO study the same stuff that the Leakey's study, in Kenya and elsewhere. They are paleoanthropologists, living in England.
Wallace P. Brithinee, e-mail wallace_brithinee@mail.brithinee.com
Brithinee Electric
www.brithinee.com

Hello Susan, Congratulations on your new position: Director of Behavior and Human Dimensions! This is fantastic to see the ACEEE organization paying close attention to human behavior and cultural backgrounds and how this can positively/negatively impact the success of energy efficiency programs.

My background is in Training & Organizational Development, so I know firsthand how challenging an organizational change can be on employees. Similarly, for the past two years, I have been conducting a green jobs awareness program in the Southern CA. area, and recently, I launched a "green economic council" and it is sometimes like pulling teeth trying to get people to attend these sessions. It will be very interesting to learn how ACEEE will engage utility customers and, get them to change their behaviors when it comes to energy efficiency!

I look forward to your work at ACEEE, Susan!

Respectfully,

Stella Ursua
Founder: Southern CA Green Economic Council
President: North American School of Green Technology
562.413-1749
stellarorgdevelopment@gmail.com

Hi Susan,
We've tried some things here at Raytheon to engage employees, most notably our "Energy Citizen" campaign. I was wondering if you know of any research done in regarding to improving employee engagement in energy conservation. While most folks flip the switch off at home since they pay the bill there, we often struggle with their behaviors here at work.

I look forward to hearing from you, and thanks for your interesting posts at the ACEEE web site.

Dave Chamberlain
Principal Energy Engineer
Raytheon Company
david_r_chamberlain@raytheon.com

Thanks so much for writing about yourself, about recent accomplishments of the ACEEE behavior work and about the potential research in the future. It is nice to hear about the great team working on behavior. I look forward to your blogs. All the best, Linda Schuck (California Institute for Energy and Environment at Univ. of California)