The Institute is preparing a series of recommendations on non-technological research and development needs in the energy field under a grant from Resources for the Future (RFF), Washington, D.C. The Institute's proposals, together with those generated by RFF, will be submitted to the National Science Foundation (NSF). The study is being conducted in conjunction with the Federal Power Commission's Power Survey, and the research suggestions will be given to the Power Commission for consideration. It is also expected that many of the research needs identified by the ELI/RFF study will be considered for funding by NSF, private foundations, and other research organizations.

There has been considerable research—although certainly not enough—concerning the technological developments needed to solve the nation's energy problems. Likewise, there have been a number of strong policy positions taken by advocates of differing viewpoints. The Institute's study is not designed to treat either category. Instead, the Institute, speaking from the environmental viewpoint, will identify problem areas in which well conceived research or development studies might isolate the actual costs of policy alternatives, or might demonstrate and evaluate alternate implementation strategies for achieving stated goals, or might produce suitable institutional structures for decisionmaking. Examples of the type of problems that ELI's study will suggest for further research might include studies of incentive mechanisms for lowering energy consumption, suggestions for redesigning state regulatory agencies to improve their responsiveness to non-economic factors, or new mechanisms for reflecting heretofor unquantified environmental costs in energy prices.