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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.
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The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in South Dakota. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2009 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in South Dakota.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Tennessee. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2006 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Tennessee.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Texas. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2009 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Texas.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in the District of Columbia. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2013 Washington DC Code base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in the District of Columbia.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Utah. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2012 Utah State Code base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Utah.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Vermont. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2012 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Vermont.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Virginia. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2012 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Virginia.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in West Virginia. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2009 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in West Virginia.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Wisconsin. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2006 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Wisconsin.
The 2015 IECC provides cost-effective savings for residential buildings in Wyoming. Moving to the 2015 IECC from the 2009 IECC base code is cost-effective for residential buildings in all climate zones in Wyoming.
The “Module Embedded Micro-inverter Smart Grid Ready Residential Solar Electric System” program is focused on developing innovative concepts for residential photovoltaic (PV) systems with the following objectives: to create an Innovative micro-inverter topology that reduces the cost from the best in class micro-inverter and provides high efficiency (>96% CEC - California Energy Commission), and 25+ year warranty, as well as reactive power support; integrate micro-inverter and PV module to reduce system price by at least $0.25/W through a) accentuating dual use of the module metal frame as a large area heat spreader reducing operating temperature, and b) eliminating redundant wiring and connectors; and create micro-inverter controller handles smart grid and safety functions to simplify implementation and reduce cost.
Although U.S. deployment of residential rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) systems has accelerated in recent years, PV is still installed on less than 1 percent of single-family homes. Most research on household PV adoption focuses on scaling initial markets and modeling predicted growth rather than considering more broadly why adoption occurs. Among the studies that have investigated the characteristics of PV adoption, most collected data from adopters, sometimes with additional non-adopter data, and rarely from people who considered but did not adopt PV. Yet the vast majority of Americans are non-adopters, and they are a diverse group - understanding their ways of evaluating PV adoption is important. Similarly, PV is a unique consumer product, which makes it difficult to apply findings from studies of other technologies to PV. In addition, little research addresses the experience of households after they install PV. This report helps fill some of these gaps in the existing literature. The results inform a more detailed understanding of residential PV adoption, while helping ensure that adoption is sufficiently beneficial to adopters and even non-adopters.
Monitoring of PV/DER site production is expensive to install and unreliable. Among third party systems providers, lost communications links are a growing concern. Nearly 20% of links are failing, provisioning is complex, recovery is expensive, production data is lost, and access is fragmented. FleetLink is a new concept in DER system communications, purpose built for lowering the cost of maintaining active contact with residential end user sites and ensuring that production data is reliably available to third party systems providers. Systems providers require accurate, secure system monitoring and reporting of production data and system faults while driving down overall costs to compete effectively. This plug and play, independently operating communications solution lowers the cost of fleet contact from typically .08 dollars-$.12/W down to .02 dollars -.03/W including installation and maintenance expenses. FleetLink establishes a breakthrough in simplicity that facilitates rapid expansion of residential solar by reducing initial capital outlay and lowering installation labor time and skill levels. The solution also facilitates higher DER installation growth rates by driving down maintenance costs and eliminating communications trouble calls. This is accomplished by the FleetLink’s unique network technology that enables dynamic network configuration for fast changes, and active, self-healing DER site contact for uptime assurance. Using an open source network framework with proprietary, application specific enhancements, FleetLink independently manages connectivity, security, recovery, grid control communications, and fleet expansion while presenting a compliant SunSpec interface to the third party operations centers. The net system cost savings of at least .05 dollars/W supports the SunShot cost goals and the flexibility and scalability of the solution accelerates the velocity and ubiquitous adoption of solar.
DOE's Building Technologies Office works with researchers and industry partners to develop and deploy technologies that can substantially reduce energy consumption in residential and commercial buildings. This report aims to advance BTO’s energy savings, emissions reduction, and other program goals by identifying research and development (R&D), demonstration and deployment, and other non-regulatory initiatives for improving the design and installation of residential central air conditioners (CAC) and central heat pumps (CHP). Improving the adoption of CAC/CHP design and installation best practices has significant potential to reduce equipment costs, improve indoor air quality and comfort, improve system performance, and most importantly, reduce household energy consumption and costs for heating and cooling by addressing a variety of common installation issues.
Interest in the direct use of biomass for thermal applications as a renewable technology is increasing as is also focus on air pollutant emissions from these sources and methods to minimize the impact. This work has focused on wood pellet-fired residential boilers, which are the cleanest fuel in this category. In the residential application the load varies strongly over the course of a year and a high fraction of the load is typically under 15% of the maximum boiler capacity. Thermal storage can be used even with boilers which have modulation capacity typically to 30% of the boiler maximum. One common pellet boiler was tested at full load and also at the minimum load used in the U.S. certification testing (15%). In these tests the load was steady over the test period. Testing was also done with an emulated load profile for a home in Albany, N.Y. on a typical January, March, and April day. In this case the load imposed on the boiler varied hourly under computer control, based on the modeled load for the example case used. The boiler used has a nominal output of 25 kW and a common mixed hardwood/softwood commercial pellet was used. Moisture content was 3.77%. A dilution tunnel approach was used for the measurement of particulate emissions, in accordance with U.S. certification testing requirements. The test results showed that the use of storage strongly reduces cycling rates under part load conditions. The transients which occur as these boilers cycle contribute to increased particulate emissions and reduced efficiency. The time period of a full cycle at a given load condition can be increased by increasing the storage tank volume and/or increasing the control differential range. It was shown that increasing the period strongly increased the measured efficiency and reduced the particulate emission (relative to the no storage case). The impact was most significant at the low load levels. Storage tank heat loss is shown to be a significant factor in thermal efficiency, particularly at low load. Different methods to measure this heat loss were explored. For one of the tanks evaluated the efficiency loss at the 15% load point was found to be as high as 7.9%. Where storage is used good insulation on the tank, insulation on the piping, and attention to fittings are recommended.
Though rooftop photovoltaic (PV) systems are the fastest growing source of distributed generation, detailed information about where they are located and who their owners are is often known only to installers and utility companies. This lack of detailed information is a barrier to policy and financial assessment of solar energy generation and use. To bridge the described data gap, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) was sponsored by the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Policy and Systems Analysis (EPSA) to create an automated approach for detecting and characterizing buildings with installed solar panels using high-resolution overhead imagery. Additionally, ORNL was tasked with using machine learning techniques to classify parcels on which solar panels were automatically detected in the Washington, DC, and Boston areas as commercial or residential, and then providing a list of recommended variables and modeling techniques that could be combined with these results to identify attributes that motivate the installation of residential solar panels. This technical report describes the methodology, results, and recommendations in greater detail, including lessons learned and future work.
This document presents a methodology for assessing baseline energy efficiency in new single-family residential buildings and quantifying related savings potential. The approach was developed by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Building Energy Codes Program with the objective of assisting states as they assess energy efficiency in residential buildings and implementation of their building energy codes, as well as to target areas for improvement through energy codes and broader energy-efficiency programs. It is also intended to facilitate a consistent and replicable approach to research studies of this type and establish a transparent data set to represent baseline construction practices across U.S. states.
Because the power required to recharge a PEV can be a significant additional electrical load for the charging site host and can contribute to overall load on the electric grid, a frequently asked question related to adoption of PEVs is, “What is the impact of PEV charging on the electrical grid?” This question can be directed at the big picture of total utility system load or at the impact to the local business hosting the EVSE. The local effects to the business owner for clustering of non-residential charging PEVs were addressed in Characterize Clustering of Commercial Alternating Current Level 2 Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment ,1 and the effects on utility demand charges were addressed in What is the Impact of Utility Demand Charges on the Alternating Current Level 2 Host? .2 The focus of this paper is on the impact of PEV charging on total system load and identification of the distinguishing features of a typical non-residential AC Level 2 EVSE charge, including its charge profile (i.e., load duration curve).