Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Archives - Page 2 of 4

How to Determine Smart Building Benefits, Costs, ROI

November 21, 2014November 20, 2014 by Ken Jennison

Smart building technology can be expensive, so building owners should look at several areas to achieve the best benefits and highest return on their investment, according to HPAC Engineering. In smart buildings, energy savings are tied to energy information systems, which are used to store, analyze and display building energy ... Read more »

On-Bill Energy Financing Boasts Low Default Rates

May 30, 2014 by Linda Hardesty

As of January 2014, on-bill energy financing programs are operating or preparing to launch in the United States in at least 25 states, according to a new report “Financing Energy Improvements on Utility Bills: Market Updates and Key Program Design Considerations for Policymakers and Administrators.” The report, prepared by Lawrence ... Read more »

Streaming Videos’ Carbon Footprint Lower Than DVDs

May 29, 2014 by Jessica Lyons Hardcastle

Streaming videos online has a lower carbon footprint than using DVDs, according to research published in Environmental Research Letters. Shifting all DVD viewing in the US in 2011 to video streaming would have saved about 30 petajoules of energy and avoided 2 billion kg of CO2 emissions. In total, DVD ... Read more »

Berkeley Lab Leads Off-Grid Lighting Community

May 6, 2014August 2, 2019 by Linda Hardesty

Evan Mills, founder of the Lumina Project at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has created LuminaNET, a social network for the global off-grid lighting community. Mills started the Lumina Project at Berkeley Lab in 1994 to cultivate technologies and markets for affordable low-carbon alternatives to fuel-based lighting in the developing world, ... Read more »

EnergyIQ Plays Nice with Portfolio Manager

April 29, 2014 by Linda Hardesty

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory updated its free, web-based benchmarking tool for non-residential buildings – EnergyIQ – to make it easy to import building data from Portfolio Manager. Berkeley Lab wants to make it easier for those already inputting data into Energy Star’s Portfolio Manager to also access EnergyIQ’s deeper benchmarking ... Read more »

Berkeley Lab Opens ‘Rotating’ Testbed

April 11, 2014August 2, 2019 by Linda Hardesty

Next week, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory will celebrate the opening of four newly constructed outdoor testbeds, which have been added to its Flexlab facility. Webcor Builders and its subcontractors will be the first to conduct experiments in Flexlab’s new rotating testbed, which rotates up to 270° for different orientations with ... Read more »

Berkeley Lab Troubleshoots Vehicle-to-Grid Scenarios

April 10, 2014 by Linda Hardesty

As the number of plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) increases, a potentially valuable energy storage resource is also growing – the battery packs of these vehicles, according to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. When PEVs are plugged in, they can contribute electricity to the grid during peak times, provide extra storage capacity ... Read more »

ISO 50001, SEP Certification Costs $319,000 per Facility on Average

March 12, 2014 by Linda Hardesty

The Department of Energy (DOE) and the US Council for Energy-Efficient Manufacturing (CEEM) are implementing the Superior Energy Performance (SEP) Program to increase the energy efficiency of industrial facilities through the ISO 50001 energy management system standard. The SEP program was opened to widespread participation in December 2013 and has ... Read more »

How Efficient Can Solar Photovoltaics Become?

February 7, 2014 by William Opalka

Costs for some solar photovoltaics (PV) have dropped sharply over the past few years, but efficiency has not necessarily followed suit. The search for PV modules that are both low-cost and highly efficient continues at government research labs. Plasmonic energy conversion, which generates “hot” (highly energetic) electrons in plasmonic nanostructures through the ... Read more »

Environmental Executive Moves: Steven Chu, Skanska USA, Seven Seas Water

December 26, 2013 by Kirsten Korosec

Here’s the latest news on hirings, promotions and departures among environmental leaders. Inventys Thermal Technologies: The carbon capturing company has named Steven Chu to its board of directors. Chu was previously energy secretary in President Barack Obama’s first administration. Prior to that post, Chu was director of the Lawrence Berkeley National ... Read more »

Lithium-Sulfur to Dominate EV Battery Market?

December 20, 2013 by Leon Walker

Higher specific energy rates and lower costs may help lithium-sulfur cells replace their lithium-ion equivalents in such applications as electric vehicles, reports Power Electronics. The energy storage capacities for EVs need to be significantly improved to increase their driving range. But to provide a 300-mile range, almost double the cell-level ... Read more »

Scientists Demo Long Cycle-Life Lithium-Sulfur Battery

November 21, 2013 by William Opalka

Department of Energy researchers have demonstrated in the laboratory a battery that has twice the specific energy of lithium-ion batteries. The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has demonstrated a lithium-sulfur (Li/S) battery that lasts for more than 1,500 cycles of charge-discharge with minimal decay of the battery’s capacity. This is longest cycle ... Read more »

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