In all the talk about green energy, most of the attention gets sucked up by power generation technologies — the photovoltaic panels and concentrating towers and wind turbines and such. It's exciting, it's sexy, and it looks like the future.
But even looking a decade into that future, it doesn't seem likely that the typical electrical distributor will be involved in solar and wind projects in any significant way as a percentage of revenues. Energy efficiency, on the other hand, is in most distributors' sweet spot and always will be, though the challenge of making the case for investing in new higher-efficiency technologies will continue to depend on skillful selling and a sure grasp of the technology as well as local codes and incentives.
According to a 2009 study by the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the National Research Council, however, it's not the leading-edge technologies that make the difference.
“A review of the best-performing new buildings in the country suggests that buildings that achieve energy use reductions of 50 percent or more below standard practice do not typically incorporate ‘cutting edge’ technologies, but rather they successfully integrate multiple ‘state-of-the-shelf’ technologies to achieve these performance levels. This represents a huge opportunity for improved energy performance using existing, available technologies.”
That study, titled “Real Prospects for Energy Efficiency,” points to the importance of increasing the energy efficiency of buildings: “The full deployment of cost-effective, energy-efficient technologies in buildings alone could eliminate the need to add to U.S. electricity generation capacity.”
To push U.S. commercial buildings toward that full deployment, there are quite a few efforts underway to revise building codes and promote changes in the way buildings are designed, constructed and operated. Here's a roundup of some of the more interesting recent developments in efforts to drive further efficiency in “the built environment.”
Commercial Building Codes
The International Code Council, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that develops commercial and residential building codes and standards used by many state and local governments, has been working hard on integrating energy-efficiency principles into its model codes and announced significant progress over the past couple of months.
The group (made up primarily of local and state building code officials) adopted revisions to its 2012 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) in late October that will raise the bar for energy efficiency in commercial buildings. The revised code cuts energy use by 30 percent compared to the technologies specified in the 2006 IECC. The changes were proposed by a coalition led by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the New Buildings Institute (NBI) and the American Institute of Architects (AIA).
Most of that 30 percent in savings comes from new requirements on heating, ventilation and cooling (HVAC) and building-envelope specifications, but there is some electrical impact that distributors and reps in cities where the code is used will want to be aware of. The changes include requirements that commercial buildings with a window-to-wall ratio over 30 percent must have daylight zone controls, and requirements for skylights or other daylight sources in spaces greater than 10,000 square feet for certain types of buildings. The revisions also include a new compliance option allowing the builder to choose between high-performance lighting, high-performance HVAC equipment or onsite renewable power generation in meeting the code's requirements for energy conservation.
These changes are in addition to the electrical requirements of the existing code (the 2009 IECC), which cover everything from lighting system controls to the connection of ballasts, maximum lighting for interior applications and minimum lighting for exterior applications. For example, the 2009 IECC requires dimming systems in any areas with walls or floor-to-ceiling partions. Each area that is 