Here’s a relatively minor but concrete silliness, but one that continues to do fundamental economic and political damage to Western economies – “negawatts.”

Proposed by Amory Lovins of “Soft Energy Paths” fame, it posits that saving energy is more valuable than making energy and our financial systems should reward the “producers” of negawatts with real cash. This concept fuels large cash transfers from taxpayers and utility ratepayers to subsidize energy conservation implementation.

The problem is that negawats have no accounting constraint. Negawatts are purely intention and of that, there is an infinite supply. Hence, it is ripe for rip-off. Even the National Academy of Sciences admits that there is no reliable way to measure negawatts and hence any rewards are without firm basis. Enron pulled a few good negawatt plays off Californians during their 2001 electricity crisis and picked up a few million in return, all from strictly paper plays.