Nuclear physicist Arthur Rosenfeld retires this week.

[bananas]

A nice article. He's shown us the way out of our energy problems and into a brighter future.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-rosenfeld11-2010jan11,0,6662806.story

You can thank Arthur Rosenfeld for energy savings
He has been a driving force in making the state a global leader in efficiency. This week, the 83-year-old nuclear physicist will leave his post on the California Energy Commission.

By Marc Lifsher
January 11, 2010

Reporting from Sacramento - When octogenarian Arthur H. Rosenfeld vacates his utilitarian office at the California Energy Commission this week, one of his final tasks might seem of little consequence: He'll turn off the lights.

But that simple act -- some would say compulsion -- has transformed California into a world leader in energy efficiency.

California homes are loaded with personal computers, widescreen TVs, iPods, PlayStations, air conditioners, massive refrigerators, hot tubs and swimming pool pumps. Despite that, Golden State residents today use about the same amount of electricity per capita that they did 30 years ago.

For that, they can largely thank Rosenfeld, a slight, bespectacled nuclear physicist fueled by a passion to wring the most out of every kilowatt. Polite and affable, with a knack for making science understandable to people who couldn't screw in a lightbulb, Rosenfeld, starting in the 1970s, provided California energy regulators the data they needed to enact some of the toughest efficiency standards in the world.

<snip>

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who appeared on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" last year, told host Jon Stewart that Rosenfeld was "one of my local heroes" for his work on promoting the use of reflective white roofs to combat climate change. Such roofs have been mandatory on new commercial buildings in California since 2005.

"Here's a very distinguished physicist, who said the energy problem is so huge that I have to change my career," Chu said in an interview with The Times. "He set an example for me as later in life I got concerned about the energy problem."

<snip>

"He shows cheerfulness at a time when everyone is warning that the sky is falling by saying that we can do this if we just put our minds to work," said V. John White, executive director of the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies in Sacramento. "He's influenced . . . utilities and policy managers around the world. . . . He's lived to see his ideas go from the fanciful to the mainstream. He's a prophet in his own time."

<snip>

[kristopher]

1. Energy use trends in California are a great example

For everyone who rejects the idea that state planned management of energy pays off.

Kudos to Albert Rosenfeld.