What's New
2000 Archives
Contents
October 2000
July 2000
April 2000
- Special Open House Showing Of "Me & Isaac Newton"
- Saving Energy with Rebuild America and Christmas in April
March 2000
February 2000
January 2000
October 2000
ENERGY STAR® Launches Home Improvement Toolbox
ENERGY STAR® has just launched their new Home Improvement Toolbox. The centerpiece is a calculator developed by the End-Use Forecasting Group and the Home Energy Saver Team at LBNL. The tool is powered by HES and uses the same underlaying data, with a simplified user interface. It features customized upgrade recommendations, a new interactive module on cost-effectiveness, and content pertaining to non-energy benefits of efficiency improvements This project provides an example of how a web-based energy calculators can utilize the basic HES engine. The site was sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Partnership for Advancing Technology in Housing (PATH).
[ Top ]
July 2000
FEMP Delegation Visits the Lab
Beth Shearer, director of the Department of Energy's Federal Energy Management Program (right) and Tatiana Strainic Muessel, also of FEMP, get a demonstration of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division's energy-efficient fume hood from Geoffrey Bell, who is the co-leader of the development team. A FEMP delegation visited the Lab on July 17.
Christmas in April Energy Teams Get Results
On April 29, volunteers from throughout the Bay area visited 110 homes and public buildings such as schools and community centers, installing energy efficiency measures as part Christmas in April's National Rebuilding Day. Twelve Berkeley Lab employees were among the volunteers, with four serving as Energy Team captains. The lifetime savings of all these efficiency measures works out to more than $78,000. The annual savings in all homes amount to 53,000 kWh, more than 11,000 therms of natural gas, and 500,000 gallons of water per year.
[ Top ]
April 2000
Special Open House Showing Of "Me & Isaac Newton"
Features Berkeley Lab Scientist Ashok Gadgil
Me & Isaac Newton,a feature-length documentary by award-winning filmmaker Michael Apted, will screen at Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's Open House on Saturday, May 6 at 2 p.m. The film features seven scientists, including Berkeley Lab's Ashok Gadgil, inventor of a device that provides inexpensive, energy-efficient drinking water in developing nations. Following the film, Dr. Gadgil will be available to answer questions.
Saving Energy with Rebuild America and Christmas in April
Lisa Gartland, a former post-doctoral scholar in EETD, and now a consultant to the Department of Energy's Rebuild America program, has been busy organizing energy efficiency teams for the charitable organization Christmas in April. Under the group's umbrella, volunteers from local communities band together every April to make improvements to the homes of low-income, elderly or otherwise disadvantaged neighbors, with the help of donations of materials from businesses and corporations. Gartland has been organizing teams of volunteers to install energy efficiency measures in San Francisco Bay area homes.
[ Top ]
March 2000
Berkeley Lab Open House Coming in May
Berkeley Lab will hold an Open House for the general public on Saturday, May 6, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Many of the day's programs are intended especially for kids, grades K through 12 and their teachers.
One of the four theme areas of this year's Open House will be "Home and Environment: Protecting Our Planet." Demonstrations and activities will include energy-efficient lights and windows, sealing ducts to save energy, reducing urban heat islands, research in climate modeling and bioremediation.
[ Top ]
February 2000
New Web Site Helps Homeowners Reduce Cancer Risk Posed by Radon Gas
Radioactive radon gas, seeping into houses from the soil below, poses a health risk to humans in certain parts of the United States. A new web site developed jointly by scientists at Berkeley Lab's Environmental Energy Technologies Division and Columbia University uses advanced mathematical methods, research on radon gas infiltration, and geologic data, to help homeowners determine when and how to take action to reduce health risk from radon exposure.
The Radon Project Web site was developed by EETD's Phil Price, and Andrew Gelman and others at Columbia University's Department of Statistics.
For more information, contact Phil Price, (510) 486-7875 or read the full article.
EETD Researchers Develop Energy-Efficient Laboratory Fume Hood
An advanced, energy-efficient laboratory fume hood that uses only 30 percent of the airflow of standard laboratory fume hood installations has been developed by scientists at Berkeley Lab's Environmental Energy Technologies Division. The hood has passed standard tests for fume hoods and is now ready for field-testing at an advanced lab facility planned for Montana State University at Bozeman.
For more information, contact Dale Sartor, (510) 486-5988 or Geoffrey Bell, (510) 486-4626 or read the full article.
[ Top ]
January 2000
Ashok Gadgil Named Inventor of the Week
Ashok Gadgil, of EETD's Indoor Environment Department, has been named inventor of the week by the Lemelson-MIT Program. Read a short profile of his work on their Invention Dimension Web site.
[ Top ]
