Cambrigdge, Mass. company produces energy audit software

One of the chief components of the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant application through the state was the energy audit. Cities and counties were required to find energy efficiency opportunities to spend the Stimulus money. This meant targeting outdated lighting, air conditioning and electrical motors in pumps, among other things.

Engineers went building to building in most of the 33 cities and three counties in the San Joaquin Valley Clean Energy Partnership and took stock of lighting wattage, AC tonnage and pump horsepower. Then they calculated the savings retrofits would provide.

Cambridge, Mass.-based kWhOURS Inc. hopes to simplify that process with energy audit software it is due to release in the next several days.

"We firmly believe that a skilled energy auditor should focus on the engineering challenges that require his/her expertise, rather than attending to time-sinking and repetitive data migration and calculation tasks," the company said on its Web site.

kWhOURS describes the product as an easy-to-navigate program that "organizes your work as you go, making it simpler to collect and analyze data." The company said the software offers guidance throughout the auditing process and allows the user to improvise.

"kWhOURS' potential customers are interested in its technology because of the lengthy, expensive and archaic process through which most energy audits are currently conducted," wrote Yoni Cohen of Greentechmedia.com. Cohen said a number of companies, most notably San Francisco-based Recurve, which focuses on residential audits, are developing similar products.

UC Merced sets the sustainable bar way, way up

The newest campus in the University of California system is quietly becoming a sustainable model and developing a reputation as a center for world-class research.

The University of California, Merced just had its seventh building certified gold by the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, program.

Its long-range plan, which embraces economic, social and environmental sustainability in campus facilities, was named to the American Institute of Architects' Committee on the Environment Top 10 Green Projects program.

And physics professor Sayantani Ghosh, along with Richard Inman, Georgiy Shcherbatyuk, Dmitri Medvedko and Ajay Gopinathan recently won recogntion of their research in renewable energy in the clean energy press.

Renewable research leader

Zachary Shahan of cleantechnica.com explains the research breakthrough as an effort "to redesign luminescent solar concentrators in order to make them more efficient at sending sunlight to solar cells."

Trend to slash high-rise electric bills sweeps industry

King Kong immortalized the Empire State Building -- more than once.

And while its status as the biggest and tallest has been eclipsed a number of times since Pres. Herbert Hoover turned on the lights May 1, 1931, the iconic skyscraper continues to lead the nation. However, now it's gaining fame as perhaps the best known energy efficient high-rise.

Others have followed, drawn by the prospect of saving money in a turbulent economy through relatively simple and cost-effective upgrades that can pay off in a matter of years. The U.S. Green Building Council says green commercial building retrofits actually exceeded new construction some months in 2011.

"Deep energy savings (30 percent to 40 percent) can be mined from existing buildings," says a July 2011 study by Vancouver, Wash.-based New Buildings Institute.

Energy Star fast tracks

A barometer of the trend has been the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's list of cities with the most buildings qualifying for Energy Star status. Energy Star certified buildings use an average of 35 percent less energy and are responsible for 35 percent less carbon dioxide emissions than typical buildings. Buildings are responsible for about 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions, while commercial buildings make up half that.

Bottlemaker, building owners embrace efficiencies & save big

Greg Rhames has been studying energy efficiency like Humphrey Bogart on the case of the Maltese Falcon.

Any clue, no matter how tiny, can yield a break in the case. And in Rhames' Madera manufacturing plant, it's the little things that add up big. Real big.

Rhames, energy manager for Verallia, a subsidiary of winemaker Saint Gobain, rattles off the upgrades and system refinements at his facility like only somebody intimately familiar with their complex industrial workings can. His fixes havve resulted in energy cost savings of about 20 percent.

Put another way: Utility bills have gone from $1 million a month some years back to about $800,000.

"A little savings can go a long way," Rhames says.

Less power, more cash

Energy efficiency continues to gain proponents across the corporate spectrum, especially as its value can be immedicately seen in reduced energy and operations costs. With recent federal encouragement through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, local governments have taken up the banner, installing myriad retrofits and sometimes preventing economic-related layoffs in the process.