The 2010 Energy Efficiency Global Forum and Exposition (EE Global 2010) kicks off Monday in Washington D.C., with participants calling for improving energy efficiency to conserve energy and combat climate change.

The forum, sponsored by the Alliance to Save Energy, is the only conference of its scope focused exclusively on energy efficiency.

Over 120 energy professionals and policy makers from nearly 20 countries will address the three-day conference. About 60 companies, including Panasonic, Exxon-Mobil will show their energy-saving solutions.

"At EE Global 2010, participants will discover the ideas, intersections and insights for growing energy-efficient economies," observed Alliance President Kateri Callahan. "EE Global brings together the most knowledgeable energy and environmental professionals working worldwide in all energy end-use sectors; elected officials and high-level government appointees; and noteworthy representatives of academia, foundations, industry associations, utilities, NGOs and labor. They will engage in extensive discussions on critical energy issues and forge partnerships and international alliances to jumpstart low-carbon economies. They also will contribute to the catalogue of best practices in energy efficiency."

"Consumers generally are becoming much more aware day and day out the importance of energy efficiency and energy conservation. As they watch the cost of energy rise around them, whether it's gasoline for the car or whether it's the cost of energy coming to their home." Peter Fannon, Vice President of Panasonic Corporation of North America, told Xinhua.

"That sensibility creates real opportunities for new energy system in home, both managing current energy better through conservation and careful installation of energy saving features or new devices which are more energy efficient as well as automatically shifting to new energy sources directly, such as solar panels, possibly fuel cells or even other sources."

The Alliance to Save Energy, founded in 1977, is a coalition of prominent business, government, environmental and consumer leaders in the United States who promote the efficient and clean use of energy worldwide to benefit consumers, the environment, the economy and national security.