Ideas to Be Hashed Out

So my energy policy class requires a research project, and I'm casting about for a worthwhile topic. Some ideas:

• The effectiveness of renewable portfolio standards;
• The relationship between liberalized electricity markets and things like renewable energy use and energy efficiency;
• Barriers to moving to a distributed generation system of electricity;
• Which states are the most energy efficient and why.

Basically, I want to do something with a heavy statistical analysis component; I'm teaching myself how to use R, a really awesome statistics program, and this project would a great opportunity to make use of it. I suppose my motivations are a little out of whack.