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At least 253 records · Page 14

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DOE OSTI2024

Driving the Shift to Energy-Efficient and Climate-Responsible Commercial Refrigeration Equipment in Chile

This report provides an overview of global and Chile-specific market trends, technological advancements, and policy developments related to commercial refrigeration equipment, with an emphasis on refrigerated display cabinets. Section 2 examines CRE market trends at the global and Chilean levels. Section 3 presents CRE energy consumption and the latest technological options for improving energy performance. It also discusses low global warming potential (GWP)1 refrigerant options for CRE. Section 4 provides a cost-effectiveness analysis. Section 5 reviews other regional energy efficiency standards and labeling programs and offers potential standard requirements for Chile. Section 6 concludes the report by summarizing key findings and conclusions. Finally, Appendix A provides detailed guidelines intended as a starting point to inform policies and programmes.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2021

Research and Development of a Ventilation-Integrated Comfort System

From an indoor air quality perspective, the best residential ventilation strategies include filtering outdoor air and distributing that air to all occupied parts of a home. From an energy standpoint, it is desirable that energy be transferred from the exhaust air to the incoming outdoor air to limit heating and cooling impacts. Heat or energy recovery ventilators (HRVs or ERVs) can provide these functions, but researchers have seen many poor installations related to design, installation, and operation and maintenance. More robust ventilation systems may involve an ERV with a dedicated duct distribution system and controls. Such a duct system can be costly to install, and many builders reduce these costs by connecting an ERV to a central heating and cooling duct system. Although this can sometimes be done effectively, researchers have seen consistent challenges with low, inconsistent, or imbalanced flow rates; high electricity consumption; and—of greatest concern—outdoor air short-circuiting or not being delivered to occupied spaces at all. Most ERVs are designed to operate with their own duct system; they are not designed as an add-on to much larger heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems. The ventilation-integrated comfort system (VICS) is expressly designed to integrate with low-capacity, efficient, ducted heating and cooling systems. Overall, the latest VICS prototype consumed 40–75 watts (W), including the air handler power, to deliver 50–120 cfm of whole-dwelling ventilation. The large, cross-flow ERV core performed to match manufacturer values (73% winter sensible effectiveness, 64% summer total effectiveness), but further improvements are possible. The VICS system researched and tested during this project will provide efficient, controllable, balanced energy recovery ventilation that is integrated with heating and cooling systems. The integration reduces space and ductwork needed for separate ventilation systems, and there are no compromises to heating, cooling, or ventilation performance. The integrated nature of the device also reduces risks for improper installation and commissioning. Even when using the air handler blower to distribute outdoor air, the total power consumption is lower than that of most available ERV products in the same airflow range. This system has the potential to offer very high-performance ventilation with much smoother and simpler installation than conventional systems.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2020

Nitrate Radical Facilitates Indirect Benzyl Alcohol Oxidation on Bismuth(III) Vanadate Photoelectrodes

Bismuth(III) vanadate (BiVO 4 ) films show activity for direct benzyl alcohol (PhCH 2 OH) oxidation to benzaldehyde (PhCHO) in acetonitrile solvent. Introducing tetrabutylammonium nitrate (Bu 4 NNO 3 ) drastically reduces the overpotential required to generate the PhCHO product while maintaining a high faradaic efficiency (FE) >90%. BiVO 4 corrosion accompanies PhCH 2 OH oxidation. However, the presence of nitrate ions (NO 3 - ) results in significantly less bismuth- and vanadium-ion leaching (determined by ICP-MS analysis), as well as reduced surface roughening (determined by SEM imaging). In this reaction, it is proposed that rate-determining NO 3 - oxidation generates a highly reactive nitrate radical (NO 3 ∙) that reacts with PhCH 2 OH by hydrogen-atom abstraction (HAT). NO 3 - is stoichiometrically consumed by the irreversible formation of electrochemically inert HNO 3 , characterized by an EC i mechanism, rather than a catalytic EC' mechanism. In the presence of PhCH 2 OH, NO 3 - oxidation on BiVO 4 becomes more facile; every order of magnitude increase in PhCH 2 OH concentration shifts the NO 3 - / NO 3 ∙ equilibrium potential negatively by 200 mV. The shift results from the introduction of a consumption pathway for the nitrate radical intermediate via a coupled chemical step with benzyl alcohol. This report is the first example of photoelectrochemical NO 3 ∙ generation to initiate indirect PhCH 2 OH oxidation.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

DOE OSTI2022

Optimization-based technoeconomic comparison of multi-stage membrane distillation configurations for hypersaline produced water desalination

Unconventional oil and gas production raises concerns regarding sustainable management of high salinity wastewaters generated in this process. Membrane distillation (MD) is a thermal desalination process capable of treating hypersaline brines such as produced water. The low single pass recovery in MD systems operated in a single stage requires a large recycle stream to achieve the desired recovery, resulting in high energy consumption and operating cost. Multistage configurations in continuous recirculation operation mode offer the potential to reduce the energy intensity of MD systems. However, rigorous analysis is needed to assess the performance of MD configurations when operating in multi-stage mode. Here, we present an optimization-based comparison of economic and energetic performance for five configurations of MD (including DCMD, AGMD, PGMD, CGMD, and VMD) operating in multi-stage continuous recirculation mode. Our findings demonstrate that multistage operation reduces the treatment cost and energy intensity of all MD configurations compared to single stage MD, with the greatest benefit for VMD and PGMD. AGMD with five stages outperforms other configurations with 3.58 $/m 3 feed treatment cost, followed by VMD, CGMD, DCMD, and PGMD with 3.8, 4.2, 5.4, and 9.06$/m 3 feed treatment costs corresponding to twelve, eight, eight, and sixteen stages, respectively.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

DOE OSTI2025

Shedding light on U.S. small and midsize data centers: Exploring insights from the CBECS survey

As demand for digital services accelerates, the energy and environmental footprint of data centers faces increasing scrutiny. While hyperscale cloud facilities have driven efficiency gains, small and midsize U.S. data centers remain a critical yet underexamined segment with significant untapped potential for energy savings. This study leverages data from the Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS) to analyze trends in server stocks, computing customers, cooling system adoption and efficiency, and geospatial distribution from 2012 to 2018. Findings reveal a sharp decline in small and midsize data centers, from 1.764 million to 1.398 million, with server counts dropping from 5.177 million to 4.262 million—aligning with the broader shift toward cloud computing. More than 40 % of servers in small data centers and 55 % in midsize data centers are housed in office buildings, and over half of all servers are concentrated in climate zones 5A (cold), 3A (mixed-humid), and 4A (mixed-humid), with the highest densities in metropolitan hubs. While direct expansion units remain the dominant cooling system, a clear transition toward more energy-efficient solutions, particularly air economizers, is evident. By integrating server and cooling system distributions, we estimate Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) and Water Usage Effectiveness (WUE) for U.S. data centers by size and year. Results show that midsize data centers are more energy-efficient but more water-intensive due to the widespread use of water-cooled chillers. These findings highlight the trade-offs in cooling system selection and provide a critical foundation for policies aimed at enhancing efficiency in an evolving data center landscape.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2021

Grid-Integrated Electric Mobility Model (GEM) v1.0

Transportation is the fastest-growing source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and energy consumption globally. The convergence of shared mobility, vehicle automation, and electrification has the potential to drastically reduce transportation impacts, but requires careful integration with rapidly evolving electricity systems. We have developed the GEM Model (Grid-Integrated Electric Mobility) to examine these interactions with a U.S.-wide simulation framework encompassing private electric vehicles (EVs); shared automated EVs (SAEVs); charging infrastructure; controlled EV charging; and a grid economic dispatch model to simulate mobility futures exclusively using EVs. We find that an SAEV fleet 9% the size of today's active vehicles can satisfy trip demand with only 2.6 million chargers (0.2 per EV). Controlled EV charging can also reduce electricity demand variability, significantly reducing GHG emissions and decreasing solar curtailment by about one-third. While private EVs with uncontrolled charging would reduce GHG emissions by 53% compared to gasoline vehicles, SAEVs could achieve a 70% reduction.

Sheppard, Colin↗

DOE OSTI2022

Robust Combined Heat and Hybrid Power (CHHP) for High Electrical Efficiency Cogeneration

According to the U.S. Department of Energy Combined Heat and Power Installation Database, approximately 80 GW of electrical power is produced in the United States using combined heat and power (CHP) systems. Studies have also shown that a potential market for CHP applications is larger than the existing market. Since fuel consumption is the most significant part of the operating cost for a CHP plant, higher efficiency translates to increased power output for the same quantity of fuel.

CHHP, LHV, CHP↗

DOE OSTI2023

Ultra-Efficient CHP with High Power/Heat Ratio Using a Novel Argon Power Cycle

APC, CHP, RICE↗

DOE OSTI2026

Rewarding Grid-Friendly Behavior: Estimating the Potential Bill Reduction and Load Shifting Benefits of Dynamic Prices

Shifting electric load from times of peak demand can be a key strategy to slow price growth as reducing peak demand avoids the cost of upgrading generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure. Utilities are releasing time-varying prices, such as time of use rates or dynamic prices, to incentivize grid-friendly load shifting. New dynamic price programs provide insight into the true cost of operating electricity grids and the potential economic benefits of load shifting. Program developers and device manufacturers need to understand the economic opportunities in terms of 1) the variation in prices across hours, days, and seasons; 2) the change in utility bills for customers who don’t shift load; and 3) the potential load shifted and economic value of different technologies if manufacturers or aggregators deploy price-responsive controls. This paper estimates possible impacts of dynamic price adoption and load shifting controls if customers paid the dynamic rate from one pilot program. Statistical analysis of historical prices identified annual and seasonal metrics as well as representative price curves for each circuit in the pilot. Simulations for residential technologies with price-responsive controls including unitary heat pump water heaters, central multifamily heat pump water heaters, heating & cooling + storage systems, and pool pumps estimated the potential impacts of highly dynamic prices both with and without load shifting controls. Results showed the potential to reduce electricity costs on representative days by 42-94% and reduce consumption during times of high electricity prices by 63-100% compared to baseline operation for those flex-friendly devices.

Grant, Peter↗

DOE OSTI2020

Real-World Evaluation of National Energy Efficiency Potential of Cold Storage Evaporator Technology in the Context of Engine Start-Stop Systems

National concerns over energy consumption and emissions from the transportation sector have prompted regulatory agencies to implement aggressive fuel economy targets for light-duty vehicles through the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration/Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) program. Automotive manufacturers have responded by bringing competitive technologies to market that maximize efficiency while meeting or exceeding consumer performance and comfort expectations. In a collaborative effort among Toyota Motor Corporation, Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), the real-world savings of one such technology is evaluated. A commercially available Toyota Highlander equipped with two-phase cold storage technology was tested at ANL’s chassis dynamometer testing facility. The cold storage technology maintains the thermal state of air-conditioning evaporators to enable longer and more frequent engine-off operation in vehicles equipped with start-stop functionality. Test results were analyzed and provided to NREL where a novel simulation framework was developed and calibrated to the test data. The vehicle model was then exercised over a large set of real-world drive cycle and ambient condition data to estimate national-level fuel economy benefits. Results indicate that the cold storage evaporator provided national fuel consumption reductions of 0.113% relative to a conventional evaporator in the same vehicle. In addition, when the cold storage evaporator engine stop/start was enabled for any temperature and the baseline was limited to the EPA menu, Start and Stop credit assumption of 27°C, a national fuel savings of 0.497% was found. Fuel savings resulted from a combination of extended engine-off duration during idle events and increased frequency of deceleration fuel cutoff, both enabled by the ability of the cold storage evaporator to maintain thermal state in situations where air conditioning is active.

DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗

DOE OSTI2024

03.02.02.45: Energy Efficiency Improvement Approaches in Ice Related Processes

The primary objective of this project was to facilitate the dislocation of the interfacial ice layer by employing advanced materials and ultrasonic vibration to reduce ice adhesion strength. This work employed two technical approaches that were thoroughly investigated and previously reported. The effectiveness of these approaches, both individually and in combination, has been quantified, demonstrating notable energy savings. The projected payback period for these enhancements is approximately 2.2 years or less, contingent upon specific energy costs. Furthermore, these advancements hold significant promise for reducing carbon emissions across various equipment scales. This study particularly focused on the ultrasonic deicing technique for diverse structures, utilizing numerical simulations to evaluate performance and potential benefits.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2023

Comparing Regional Energy Consumption for Direct Drone and Truck Deliveries

Drone delivery, once thought of as fictitious, is becoming a reality with the efforts of both forward-looking enterprises and supportive government policies. This emerging mode of e-commerce delivery raises many concerns. One important concern is the energy efficiency of direct delivery drones compared with conventional delivery trucks at a regional systems level. Here, in this study, we develop and apply methods to quantify the regional energy impacts of drone delivery, then we assess these impacts and compare them with the impacts of truck delivery. To study this problem, we develop an optimization model that determines an optimal set of fulfillment centers (FCs) with variable service capacities that allow drones to make direct e-commerce deliveries. We adopt two drone delivery energy estimation models from the literature and use them as inputs to demonstrate the potential range of energy needs. We also develop another optimization model to account for the energy consumption of diesel trucks (DTs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs). We test the models using validated simulation data for the Chicago metropolitan area in the U.S. to quantify the energy implications of these three delivery modes. For drone delivery, we further extend our analyses by considering the impact of wind speed and flight patterns. Our results show that direct delivery drones require 15.8% more energy than BEVs on an average windy day, and they need 15% more energy than DTs on a very windy day. We provide essential parameter values for reproducibility and list relevant open problems.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2025

Development of an Energy-Efficient and High-Productivity Ammonia Recovery and Removal Process Using Resin-Wafer Electrodeionization

As efforts to develop various energy resources, ammonia energy is emerging as a promising carbon-free fuel alternative. Recovering high-concentration ammonia and ammonium from wastewater potentially offers significant environmental and economic benefits. However, research on recovery technologies for industries such as semiconductors remains limited. This study develops an efficient, energy-saving ammonia recovery technology using Resin Wafer Electrodeionization (RW-EDI), specifically for the semiconductor industry. RW-EDI shows promise for recovering ammonia from high-concentration wastewater. By optimizing parameters, such as voltage and initial concentration, a balance between productivity and energy consumption is achieved. Results indicate that ammonium and fluoride ion transport kinetics are similar, with minimal competition and selectivity values between 0.95 and 1.08. As the initial ammonia/ammonium concentration increases from 500 to 8000 ppm, reaction rate constants and the overall mass transfer coefficient decrease. Increasing the voltage can enhance mass transfer and eliminate barriers. Ion transport primarily occurs in the RW solid phase, accounting for 93.89% of the total current. Additionally, RW-EDI shows superior specific energy consumption within a concentration range of 500 ppm to 8000 ppm, outperforming technologies like electrodialysis by reducing specific energy consumption from 8−15 kWh/kg-NH 4 + to 1.2−2.5 kWh/kg-NH 4 + . This study highlights RW-EDI’s potential for ammonia recovery, providing valuable insights for future applications in wastewater treatment.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

DOE OSTI2021

Quantifying nitrogen loss hotspots and mitigation potential for individual fields in the US Corn Belt with a metamodeling approach

The high productivity in the US Corn Belt is largely enabled by the consumption of millions of tons of manufactured fertilizer. Excessive application of nitrogen (N) fertilizer has been pervasive in this region, and the unrecovered N eventually escaped from croplands in forms of nitrous oxide (N 2 O) emission and N leaching. Mitigating these negative impacts is hindered by a lack of practical information on where to focus and how much mitigation potential to expect. At a large scale, process-based crop models are the primary tools for predicting variables required by decision making, but their applications are prohibited by expensive computational and data storage costs. To overcome these challenges, we built a series of metamodels to learn the key mechanisms regarding the carbon (C) and N cycle from a well-validated process-based biogeochemical model, ecosys. The trained metamodel captures over 98% of the variability of the ecosys simulated outputs for 99 randomly selected counties in Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana. To identify hotspots with high mitigation potential, we introduce net societal benefit (NSB) as an indicator for synthesizing the loss in yield and social benefits through emissions and pollutants avoided. Our results show that reducing N fertilizer by 10% leads to 9.8% less N 2 O emissions and 9.6% less N leaching at the cost of 4.9% more SOC depletion and 0.6% yield reduction over the study region. The estimated total annual NSB is $\$395$ M (uncertainty ranges from $\$114$ M to $\$1271$ M), including $\$334$ from social benefits (uncertainty ranges from $\$46$ M to $\$1076$ M), $\$100$ M from saving fertilizer (uncertainty ranges from $\$13$ M to $\$455$ M), and –$\$40$ M due to yield changes (uncertainty ranges from –$\$261$ M to $\$69$ M). For the median scenario, we noted that 20% of the study area accounts for nearly 50% of the NSB, and thus represent hotspot locations for targeted mitigation. Although the uncertainty range suggests that developing such a high-resolution framework is not yet settled and the scenario based estimations are not appropriate to inform the management practices for individual farmers, our efforts shed light on the new generation of analytical tools for life cycle assessment.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2021

Effects of Production of Woody Pellets in the Southeastern United States on the Sustainable Development Goals

Wood-based pellets are produced in the southeastern United States (SE US) and shipped to Europe for the generation of heat and power. Effects of pellet production on selected Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) are evaluated using industry information, available energy consumption data, and published research findings. Challenges associated with identifying relevant SDG goals and targets for this particular bioenergy supply chain and potential deleterious impacts are also discussed. We find that production of woody pellets in the SE US and shipments to displace coal for energy in Europe generate positive effects on affordable and clean energy (SDG 7), decent work and economic growth (SDG 8), industry innovation and infrastructure (SDG 9), responsible consumption and production (SDG 12), and life on land (SDG 15). Primary strengths of the pellet supply chain in the SE US are the provisioning of employment in depressed rural areas and the displacement of fossil fuels. Weaknesses are associated with potential impacts on air, water, and biodiversity that arise if the resource base and harvest activities are improperly managed. The SE US pellet supply chain provides an opportunity for transition to low-carbon industries and innovations while incentivizing better resource management.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Performance Impact and Trade-Offs for Tuning Key Architectural Parameters on CPU+GPU Systems

In this work, we performed an initial design space exploration of an accelerated processing unit (APU)—a hybrid CPU+GPU architecture that integrates both compute units (CUs) and memory into a unified system. This integration aims to reduce data movement, enhance memory locality, and improve energy efficiency by enabling the CPU and GPU to share memory directly. This effort focused on the interplay of key design components—cache line size, the number of CUs, and main memory technology—and the trade-offs of each configuration were analyzed. This paper highlights the various configurations’ impact on memory accesses, data reuse, and power utilization. The results provide valuable insights that can be leveraged to optimize APU architectures for high-performance and energy-efficient computing and thus create a balanced architecture. This optimization can be achieved by adopting dynamic cache management, runtime CU scaling, and advanced memory integration, highlighting the potential of APUs to address critical challenges in compute, data movement, and memory power consumption.

Asifuzzaman, Kazi [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000240044791)↗

DOE OSTI2024

Abstract for CRADA between National Energy Technology Laboratory and American Institute of Chemical Engineers dba RAPID Manufacturing Institute

NETL and RAPID Manufacturing will develop advanced electromagnetic (EM) reactors and catalysts to produce light olefins from alternative feedstocks using CO2 soft oxidation. Light olefins are the building blocks for many plastic products, in addition to synthetic fibers, rubbers, and polymers. This project has the potential to produce high-value light olefins from alternative feedstocks with reduced energy consumption (50-70%), carbon intensity (50-70%), and production cost (15-25%) compared to the traditional olefin production processes.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

DOE OSTI2025

Total Recycling of Copper Cable Scrap and Production of Carbon Using Fast Microwave Technology

The recycling of cable scrap, particularly from discarded electrical wiring, is gaining significant attention due to the rising demand for copper and the need for sustainable management of electronic waste. Traditionally, mechanical and thermal processings have been used to recover copper and plastic from cables. However, these approaches are often energy-intensive, time-consuming, and costly in terms of equipment and labor. In this study, we present a simple and effective method for recovering materials from cable scrap using a domestic microwave oven. Cable pieces (2–2.5 cm long) were exposed to 700 W of microwave irradiation under rotation for 30 s, enabling the rapid and efficient separation of high-quality copper metal from the core wire, and activated carbon from the carbonized plastic sheath. Microwaves facilitate this process through Ohmic heating, which induces electrical resistance in the metal, generating heat that mechanically loosens the metal and carbonized plastic components. The process demonstrates high efficiency, achieving an 80% reduction in energy consumption compared to conventional processings. This fast and energy-efficient method shows strong potential for scaling up to industrial recycling, offering a cost-effective and environmentally friendly way to recover high-quality materials for further use or repurposing.

Bourlinos, Athanasios B. (ORCID:0000000256165993)↗