[Greenbuilding] Energy Star Clothes Dryers Program Launch

Reuben Deumling 9watts at gmail.com
Mon Jul 30 18:51:30 CDT 2012


On Mon, Jul 30, 2012 at 4:33 PM, David Bergman <bergman at cyberg.com> wrote:

> ... would people have shifted to buying larger TV's and frig's had the
> technology not also become more energy-efficient? I tend to think the
> answer is yes
>

Well, except that the whole thing is and has always mostly been driven by
the manufacturers. No one asked for auto defrost in 1950. In fact there was
huge resistance to it for decades after it was introduced, including a
twenty-year long antipathy from none other than Consumer Reports. The
association of big with desirable, status, wealth was invented and heavily
promoted by the (appliance) manufacturers. If everyone really wanted bigger
anyway, why did ads always show, encourage, assert that bigger fridges were
better? Why were sales staff trained to hide the small models in the
shadows, make it difficult for customers to order them and push the top of
the line?

All of this of course pre-dates the overlay of energy efficiency. But what
makes energy efficiency as practiced so 'successful' is that is fits neatly
onto this established semiotic landscape. It does not upset but actually
reinforces established rankings.

energy has never been the driving force behind choosing these types of
> appliances, but that's only a guess/opinion.
>

Energy isn't the driving force, I'd agree. But since appliance
manufacturers have carefully carved up the landscape such that the
'desirable' features are always bundled with 'large,' and now, more
recently, with 'responsible,' i.e., energy efficient you get the result
that middle class consumers who go for this stuff are flattered that they
can have their cake and get an endorsement label, too. No more negative
attributes for the de-luxe options.
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