Errr, the numbers on the graph don&#x27;t match the headline, at all.<p>This is partially because they compare two very different percentages, and expect them to cancel each other out, but they don&#x27;t ;)<p>Let&#x27;s take <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cdn3.vox-cdn.com&#x2F;thumbor&#x2F;Nal5V8NG4BaEYnFL2lbcskLtaUE=&#x2F;1600x0&#x2F;filters:no_upscale()&#x2F;cdn0.vox-cdn.com&#x2F;uploads&#x2F;chorus_asset&#x2F;file&#x2F;4251055&#x2F;FT_15.11.04_residentialEnergyIntensity_310px2.png" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cdn3.vox-cdn.com&#x2F;thumbor&#x2F;Nal5V8NG4BaEYnFL2lbcskLtaUE...</a><p>In 1970, we have 150 btu&#x2F;sq ft and let&#x27;s be generous and say 1500 sq ft.<p>So we have a home using 225000 BTU.<p>Now, we have 101.8 btu&#x2F;sq ft, and 1864 sq ft.
That&#x27;s 188264 BTU.<p>17% is not nothing, nor is it &quot;offsetting the gains&quot;.<p>Note, you can&#x27;t  use the 101.8 number for the new housing graph, since it&#x27;s an average over all homes.<p>(In fact, you can&#x27;t really just multiply any of these numbers and have sensible results, but hey, it&#x27;s a news story!)<p>You&#x27;d have to find an average new housing btu&#x2F;sq ft, which they don&#x27;t provide.<p>Also note: Greater energy efficiency is entirely possible.  You can easily halve the heating energy requirement, for example, by using ground source heat pumps in most places (my GSHP was a 46 SEER , 5.3 COP unit).<p>But this has high monetary cost to retrofit (When done during construction, and factored into the price of a house, it basically costs &quot;not a lot more&quot;).<p>Or you could use per-room mini-splits, or whatever.<p>It&#x27;s just that people don&#x27;t care, and so  the only thing that forces higher energy efficiency in most cases is building code changes, not consumer demand.