Berkeley Lab Hosts Summit to Help Increase Adoption of Efficient Window Technology

Berkeley Lab recently hosted a summit to showcase the benefits of vacuum insulated glazing — a type of highly insulated window glazing that uses a vacuum as an insulating layer between window panes — and the likely challenges preventing its widespread adoption on the market. A wide cross-section of stakeholders attended the summit, consisting of industry, building professionals, practitioners, academia, researchers, and decision makers.

Berkeley Lab researcher Charlie Curcija helped organize the event, and he participated in a panel presentation and group discussion on current industry standards and the state of the art in development. Other presentations included highlights of the Department of Energy (DOE)-funded activities; updates on ongoing research featuring researchers from several national laboratories including Berkeley Lab, National Renewable Energy Lab, and American and Australian universities; and perspectives from manufacturers and industry practitioners.

Read the full report detailing the discussions here.

New UN Report: Limiting Global Warming to 1.5 Degrees Celsius Requires Deep Decarbonization Across All Sectors

Limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels will require severely cutting greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 50% by 2030, according to the Sixth Assessment Report” recently released by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Doing so calls for the immediate, large-scale adoption of energy efficiency, renewable energy, electrified transportation, high-performance batteries, low-carbon grids, and carbon capture and storage technologies across all sectors globally.

“It will be challenging to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius without drastically changing how we consume energy across all sectors and switching to renewable or cleaner low-carbon technologies soon,” said Nan Zhou, a senior scientist at Berkeley Lab.

Read the full details here.

Disseminating New Solutions to Improve Building Analytics and Control

Equipment faults and control problems drive up greenhouse gas emissions and energy bills to the tune of $17 billion and 90 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent annually. These problems compromise occupant comfort and productivity, as well as equipment life, and they make it difficult to coordinate building power use with a clean energy grid. The National Laboratories and DOE are working with the industry to change the status quo, delivering new technologies and interoperability standards to enable automated configuration and self-correcting smart buildings. The latest developments for these solutions were presented at the 2023 Haystack Connect Conference, an annual event for professionals in building automation control and the internet of things to exchange new approaches for intelligent buildings. Berkeley Lab’s Jessica Granderson shared new technologies and open-source specifications for automated fault correction and optimal control, the DOE’s Amir Roth presented The Department of Energy’s View of Semantic Modeling and the Haystack/Brick/223P Relationship, and Avijit Saha and Gabe Fierro of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory shared an Open-Source Tool for Haystack Model Validation and Harmonization with RDF-based Schemas.   

Net Zero World Climate Smart Women Energy Leaders Program Kicked Off at Berkeley Lab in May

Berkeley Lab proudly hosted the formal launch of the Climate Smart Women Energy Leaders program (CS-WEL) as part of the Net Zero World (NZW) Initiative launched by DOE Secretary Jennifer Granholm at the 27th Conference of the Parties (COP27). The program empowers women leaders in the energy sector from partner countries through intensive training, peer learning, and ongoing coaching. Leaders from seven partner countries joined the program. 

The launch featured panel discussions on clean energy transitions and included leaders from DOE, Berkeley Lab, NZW, and CS-WEL. Women leaders also visited Berkeley Lab's facilities, received training and mentoring, and later met with Granholm at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Check out Granholm's tweet about the program here.

The American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Recognizes Tianzhen Hong with Distinguished Service Award

Tianzhen Hong has received the Distinguished Service Award from ASHRAE. This award salutes members of any grade who have served the Society faithfully and with distinction and who have given freely of their time and talent in chapter, regional and Society activities.

"We are thrilled to recognize and celebrate the exceptional achievements of this year's ASHRAE Honors and Awards recipients." said 2022-23 ASHRAE President Farooq Mehboob.

See the full list of award recipients here.