ABSTRACTThis discussion draws upon the author's experience with the US General Accounting Offices's Energy Planning Review Team, which analyzed the planning processes and procedures (as well as the products) used by the US Department of Energy. It suggests that the DOE's preoccupation with ‘rational’ planning techniques in the face of incremental political and organizational realities explains many of the recent energy policy failures. These failures, however, viewed through an ‘adaptive-learning’ perspective provide valuable clues to potentially more successful analytical activities, and eventually, perhaps, more rational and systematic energy policies.
Evaluation and recommendations for the Department of Energy-Farmers Home Administration small-town energy-planning grant program