If global warming is truly a problem, then there would seem to be some relatively simple ways to substantially address it.
First, put a higher price on energy. The market may not solve everything, but in this case the market would serve the purpose effectively. Nothing else would as broadly incentivize people to use less energy than by having to pay more for it. While this may be the simplest way to reduce energy use, it also requires the most political will.
Aside from using market incentives, there is so much waste in the current system that could easily be reduced with improved designs or constructs that substantial reductions in energy use could be achieved even without changing energy prices. The major areas for energy use improvement are in dwellings and transportation (the other major category is industrial, though reductions in this area are more varied).
For dwellings (houses and offices), the vast majority of energy is used for heating and cooling, yet the design of our system is such that a large portion of the energy is vented as waste heat at the point of combustion. The simple answer is to use a clean burning fuel with in dwelling generators (or high efficiency thermal transport system) such that heat produced at the point of combustion can be used for useful heating purposes (heating, hot water, drying, etc). Another relatively simple option is to increase the number of temperature zones in dwellings so that only occupied areas need to be climate controlled. Another somewhat simple option (especially for new builds) is to increase the insulation.
For transportation, the simplest change that can occur is telecommuting. With the exception of certain trade and services work, most work these days can be done remotely. If telecommuting to work were to become broadly socially accepted, the need for people to commute long distances every day into an office or take flights would be substantially reduced. Even with telecommuting, there would still be a substantial amount of transportation needed or desired. One easy solution for this is to have efficient individual transport options. A substantial of trips is and will be a single person and a bag or two going places, yet our current transport system is ill equipped for this. An efficient single person vehicle would also substantially reduce energy consumption. Another relatively easy option is to increase the efficiency of the drive system by using electric motors or other (and thus again reducing the waste heat of internal combustion engines).
The industrial sector is far more varied, and therefore may not hold as many simple solutions. In general, as the material needs of a society are met, the amount of industrial output should naturally decline over time (unless new products are developed that are generally desired by a society). The major exception to this may be the large scale (industrial) production of food, the output of which is likely to hold constant or grow. In general, many industrial process need heat, so any pairing of that need with electricity generation may allow for substantial efficiency gains. For food, the reduced use of fertilizer (by use of natural fertilizer) and use of perennial crops could help to reduce energy use. While the industrial sector may be the hardest to tackle, it is also a smaller portion of our energy use, thus making it less necessary to address immediately.
More details for each topic is provided in the pages below [in draft].
Market Based
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Dwellings
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Transportation
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Industrial
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