Emerging Technologies Activities
The Emerging Technologies team focuses on the development and testing of next-generation technologies that can increase the energy efficiency of existing technologies and help support the goal of reducing energy consumption by at least 50%.
By partnering with industry, researchers, and other stakeholders, the Department of Energy (DOE) acts as a catalyst in driving research in energy efficient technologies, including:
- Refrigerators, washers, dryers, and other appliances
- Parts of the building envelope, including insulation, roofing and attics, foundations, and walls
- Window, skylight, and door technologies, such as highly-insulating windows, glazings and films, window frames, and daylighting and shading technologies
- Heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC), heat exchangers, working fluids, geothermal heat pumps, and other space heating and cooling technologies
- Water heating technologies including heat pump water heaters and solar water heaters
- Solid State Lighting, including Light Emitting Diode (LED) and Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) technologies
- Sensors and controls designed to measure building performance
- Building energy modeling software, including Energy Plus and OpenStudio.
Energy Efficient Buildings Hub
The DOE has also created an Energy Efficient Buildings Hub, headquartered at the Navy Yard in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Hub has the unique dual mission of improving energy efficiency in buildings and promoting regional economic growth and job creation. The goal is to enable the nation to cut energy use in the commercial buildings sector by 20% by 2020, and to concentrate its technical output on affordable tools for design, construction, commissioning, and operation of energy efficient buildings, and economically viable, proven energy saving technologies for whole building system solutions.