The Energy and Efficiency Institute at UC Davis is developing the Empower Procurement Product Evaluation Hub to evaluate selected DER products in a rigorous and transparent manner, and to disseminate widely evaluation results to large commercial and institutional customers that use a formal procurement process
Advanced Thermostat Evaluation (Cal-EPE HUB Project)Read More »
This project aims to assist operators during challenging and rare grid events through novel decision support tools and improved, data-driven training. This project will build advanced, machine learning based tools to fit into an adaptive human-machine system and improve existing training simulators to incorporate such tools and more data.
Advancing Cognitive Performance for Power Grid ResiliencyRead More »
This national initiative focused on the creation of good-paying middle-class jobs in advanced energy-economic clusters. For the project, student researchers at Berkeley in public policy, engineering, business and law worked with university partners and industry allies in twenty-four states. The research teams identified bottom-up solutions for local and state governments to build their clean energy economies.
This project developed a new low-cost air-flow sensor, or anemometer, to identify the actual flow of air in rooms and in ducts. These anemometers can assist in early detection of operational issues and can help optimize the performance to improve comfort and reduce energy. If successfully commercialized and installed, these anemometers have the potential to reduce the energy use of almost all commercial HVAC systems in California.
CIEE and partners Power Standards Lab and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab developed a new instrument called a micro-phasor measurement unit (μPMU) to make ultra-precise, time-synchronized measurements in electric power distribution systems. These synchrophasor data provide unique information about power flows and stability of the grid, by revealing magnitudes and phase angles (i.e, subtle time shifts between the measurements at different locations) of voltage and current. The project also created a powerful and extremely fast new tool called the Berkeley Tree Database (BTrDB), to enable users to actually consume and analyze rich data streams like those from μPMUs, which report measurements 120 times per second.
ARPA-E Micro-Synchrophasors for Distribution SystemsRead More »
This project aims to develop a nascent open-source common data model, Brick, into a demonstrated and tested tool that, through the implementation of advanced algorithms and analysis, can enable the scaling of major energy savings, improved building performance, and grid responsiveness across commercial buildings at low cost.
Brick: Portable Analytics, Modeling & Controls in BuildingsRead More »
This national collaborative promotes state-of-the-art building technician education in managing building systems and energy use. The Center provides model curricula, professional development for instructors, career pathways for students & career-changers, and dissemination of research to advance building technician education for sustainable building performance.
Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow (BEST) CenterRead More »
Leveraging diverse expertise throughout the state, the Fifth Assessment will contribute to the scientific foundation for understanding climate-related vulnerability throughout California. It will support on-the-ground implementation and decision-making at the local, regional, tribal, and state levels, focusing on the needs of communities most vulnerable to climate change impacts. CIEE is assisting the state with the selection, project management and administration of the core climate research studies.
California’s Fifth Climate Change Assessment – Core Climate ResearchRead More »
CIEE managed two expansive studies of California’s vulnerability to climate change involving dozens of principal investigators at multiple UC campuses and other institutions. The goal was to give planners, public-health officials, land-use managers, and others the research-backed basis they need to develop strategies to adapt to the impacts of climate change.
California’s Third and Fourth Climate Change AssessmentsRead More »
This multi-disciplinary UC Berkeley-led research collaboration is Changing the Rules focusing on building occupants rather than rigid engineering of building environments to be consistent with comfort “norms”. The research project aims to integrate new information technologies into innovative, occupant-responsive control systems building heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) controls, employing improved sensing and new capabilities for information feedback among the building, its operators, and its occupants.
Changing the Rules: Innovative Low-Energy Occupant-Responsive HVAC Controls & SystemsRead More »
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