Energy efficiency: PNNL partners up to help commercial buildings cut power use

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QuickTake: PNNL has one of the country's top building efficiency research programs. Now it's going to put all that research and theory into practice, in an exciting program that should really push the state of the art. What's more, my sources at PNNL say the lab is working hard to improve the connection between smart buildings and the smart grid. – Jesse Berst

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is teaming up in a public/private partnership to dramatically reduce energy consumption in commercial buildings by retrofitting existing structures or designing new ones. The Commercial Buildings Partnership is a novel collaboration with Home Depot in California; Michigan's Grand Valley State University; the U.S. Army at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; the U.S. General Services Administration in New England, the Job Corps in Reno, Nevada, and the Smart Grid Development in Kingstown, Rhode Island. The goal is to surpass current energy efficiency codes by at least 50% for new buildings and 30% for existing structures. Some of the buildings are shooting for using enough renewable energy and energy efficiency measures to generate as much power as they use on an annual basis. The projects will be test beds and training centers for innovative building-related research — and are intended to encourage widespread of energy efficient building practices. The three-year program is funded through the DOE's Building Technologies Program.

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