It is a 720p model, not 1080. We looked at all the models they had going in the warehouse. Finally decided that the picture looked best on this one among TVs of comparable size and price. IIRC, it was the only plasma model there and it came with a $200 rebate.
The other choices for the price were a ~30" 1080 LCD or a ~40" 720 LCD. The saturation on the LCDs didn't look right. Of course, it's unknown what settings they were running under but the Viera appeared to have been running at its default settings.
I didn't even know about the difference in power consumption between plasma and LCD until after we got it. I did do some research on the pros/cons of each, but somehow that didn't come up.