Getting the same results, or better ones, from less energy.
Using less by doing less. Turning off the lights when you leave a room. Turning the thermostat down and reaching for a sweater. Driving fewer miles, or combining three errands into one trip.
It works. But conservation asks something of you every single time.
Using less to do the same thing, and more. The same light from a bulb that draws a quarter of the power. The same hot shower from a water heater that uses far less energy. The same comfortable house from a well-sealed building and equipment that runs on a fraction of the energy.
Energy efficiency is an upgrade that usually asks nothing of you after the day it’s installed. That’s why it can scale to an entire country.
Electricity demand in the United States is rising faster than it has in decades. New data centers, more manufacturing, and more electric equipment in homes and vehicles all pull on the same grid, and extreme weather tests it harder than it used to.
The country is building new power plants and power lines to keep up. That takes years, and the cost often lands on utility bills.
Efficiency closes the gap faster and at a lower cost. Energy that is never used does not have to be generated, delivered, or paid for. Every efficient water heater, every sealed duct, and every well-designed utility program takes a little pressure off the grid and a little off the bill.
Energy efficiency is not a nice-to-have: it is the first thing to reach for.
A month. What the average U.S. household paid for electricity in 2024, before any heating fuel.
EIA, Average Monthly Bill, Residential, 2024. $142.26 / 863 kWh.
Of income, what low-income households spend on energy. A typical household spends about 6%.
ACEEE energy burden research.
What a typical household would have paid extra on utility bills over the last decade without national appliance standards.
ASAP, Appliance Efficiency Standards Lower Utility Bills, Jan 2026
Burning less fuel means breathing less pollution. The same ACEEE analysis found that cutting energy waste through 2050 would reduce small-particle and other air pollution enough to avert roughly 280,000 early deaths.
Those benefits are not spread evenly. They have the greatest impact in the communities closest to power plants, highways, and freight corridors, which are often the same places that carry the highest energy burdens.
Energy efficiency is not a single technology or a single policy.
It works everywhere energy gets used: the insulation and heat pumps that keep a home comfortable, the transit line and the freight route that move people and goods smoothly, the equipment that captures heat a factory would otherwise throw away, and the utility program that helps a whole city use less. The tools change from sector to sector. The idea does not, and neither does the payoff.
Buildings account for roughly 40% of U.S. energy use. ACEEE advances the policies, codes, and programs that make homes and commercial buildings more efficient, from stronger building codes and appliance standards to weatherization programs that reduce energy costs for the households that need it most.
Transportation is the largest source of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. ACEEE works to reduce those emissions through stronger vehicle standards, equitable EV charging infrastructure, smarter freight systems, and support for transit and communities that reduce vehicle miles traveled.
U.S. industry consumes roughly a quarter of the nation’s energy. ACEEE advances efficiency in industrial processes, supports electrification technologies like industrial heat pumps, and works to reduce the embodied carbon in the materials and chemicals that build our economy.
Utilities are on the front lines of rising electricity demand. ACEEE works with utilities, regulators, and policymakers to design programs and rate structures that treat efficiency and demand flexibility as central to a reliable, affordable, and clean grid.
Low-income households spend three times more of their income on energy than other families. ACEEE works to ensure that efficiency’s benefits reach renters, frontline communities, and households carrying the highest energy burdens, because that’s where the need and the impact are greatest.
National standards quietly make every new refrigerator, water heater, and air conditioner cheaper to run, and state and local rules set a floor for new construction. ACEEE researches which policies actually deliver savings and helps federal, state, and local governments put them into practice.
The benefits of efficiency have not reached everyone equally, and that is the part of this work ACEEE takes most seriously.
The share of a household’s income that goes to energy is its energy burden. About a quarter of U.S. households spend at least 6% of their income on energy. Low-income households spend about 15%, and in some metro areas much more. Same grid, same weather, a bill that takes two to three times the bite. At 15%, a lower bill is not a pleasant surprise at the end of the month. It is groceries.
The households that would gain the most are often the least able to act. A renter pays the heating bill but does not own the furnace, the windows, or the walls, so the person with the reason to fix the problem is not the person with the power to fix it. Neighborhoods that went decades without investment tend to have the oldest, leakiest housing and the fewest programs reaching them.
Closing that gap is not a side project at ACEEE. It is the test of whether efficiency is working.
ACEEE’s independent research and advocacy depend on the support of foundations, businesses, and individuals committed to cutting energy bills, waste, and climate pollution.