What is the Role of EIA in Economy-Wide Efficiency Analysis?
Workshop participants provided many diverse roles for EIA. Among the suggested roles were that: • EIA Needs to Maintain its Primary Role–that as a Data Gatherer. EIA needs to place greater emphasis on data gathering, which is its traditional role. EIA is a data engine first and foremost, and analysis of trends may not really be its role. • EIA Could Provide the Tools for Analysis. EIA can and should provide the necessary data and even simple tools to facilitate external analysis. It is potentially within EIA’s intended role to offer simple ratios of existing data. EIA could provide the components, such as energy use levels or use rates, since different customers would want different indices for their particular circumstances. Given budget constraints, EIA should publish the basic tools on its CD ROM to reach these potential users, rather than doing the analysis itself. Also, EIA could consider a publication analogous to the Bureau of Labor Statistics chart books on productivity. • EIA
