The OurEnergyLibrary aggregates and indexes publicly available fact sheets, journal articles, reports, studies, and other publications on U.S. energy topics. It is updated every week to include the most recent energy resources from academia, government, industry, non-profits, think tanks, and trade associations. Suggest a resource by emailing us at info@ourenergypolicy.org.
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The power sector must play a central role in the decarbonization of the U.S. economy. Other sectors such as buildings, industry, and transportation will be electrifying to reduce their emissions, which means the power sector over the next few decades not only has to be 100 percent non-emitting, but also much larger. It will need to accommodate massive deployments of variable renewable energy resources such as solar and wind, as well as burgeoning numbers of electric vehicles, distributed energy resources, and energy storage technologies. This will require a significant buildout of power system infrastructure, including additional generation, distribution, and transmission …
View Full ResourceEnergy utilities are challenged to reduce their GHG footprint to do their part in mitigating the impacts of climate change. This paper looks at two key end-use sectors utilities serve: buildings and transportation. Both are carbon-intensive—making them ripe for low-carbon solutions, including electrification.
But these two sectors are very different. While buildings consume most of the nation’s current energy supply, the transportation sector is poised to shift energy use from the oil industry to the electricity industry through the rise of electric vehicles (EV) and related infrastructure. This paper takes a closer look at the strategies that can make the …
View Full ResourceTo combat climate change while capturing health and economic benefits, the City of Los Angeles has set ambitious goals to transform its electricity supply, aiming for a 100% renewable energy power system by 2045, along with a push to electrify the buildings and transportation sectors. To reach these goals, and assess the implications for jobs, electricity rates, the environment, and environmental justice, the Los Angeles City Council passed a series of motions in 2016 and 2017 directing the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) to determine the technical feasibility and investment pathways of a 100% renewable energy …
View Full ResourceOffshore wind has the technical capacity to power the country with clean energy. The United States has the technical potential to produce more than 7,200 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity from offshore wind, which is almost two times the amount of electricity the U.S. consumed in 2019 and about 90% of the amount of electricity the nation would consume in 2050 if we electrified our buildings, transportation system and industry and transitioned them to run on electricity instead of fossil fuels.
Offshore wind can help repower the U.S. with clean energy – but taking advantage of the opportunity will require support …
View Full ResourceIt is not an exaggeration to suggest that eliminating real estate’s 40% share (EIA Outlook 2017) of global emissions will spawn the most significant technological shift in the history of modern buildings. And yet, this fact is gravely underappreciated by both traditional real estate investors as well as prop-tech investors, the two pools of financial capital that not only have the greatest power to directly catalyze the inevitable transition to net zero buildings, but also to most directly profit from its realization.
And it is not just the investment community that is under-indexing climate tech for buildings in their portfolio …
View Full ResourceReducing the heating and cooling sector’s emissions is critical to mitigating the effects of climate change and reducing air pollution. District heating and cooling systems can assist in scaling up renewable energy use, decreasing the utilization of fossil fuels in the heating and cooling sector, and improving urban air quality.
District heating systems have been built to run at high temperatures to meet the demands of poorly insulated buildings. In most cases, this necessitates the use of fossil fuels. However, technology innovation, digitalization and current trends towards more energy-efficient buildings may enable the broader deployment of clean energy technologies – …
View Full ResourceThe Advanced Water Heating Initiative (AWHI) Playbook and 2020 Progress Report summarizes the activities of AWHI through the end of 2020. The West Coast AWHI has made tremendous progress in the two years it has been underway. The Initiative includes four dedicated working groups, each of whom is identifying and addressing policy, market, and technical barriers for different heat pump water heater (HPWH) applications. The working groups are coordinating research efforts, developing technology road maps, engaging manufacturers, educating and advocating to policy makers and program administrators.
In this report we’ve documented progress organized by the three strategic focus areas, followed …
View Full ResourceTraditionally, a building acts as a relatively unsophisticated consumer of power from the electrical grid, paying a particular price for the electricity it uses (kWh) and a charge for its peak power (kW). A building consumes energy whenever needed, without regard to potential generation costs or emissions.
Emerging demand flexibility strategies enable buildings to manage their electric demand to provide grid services. Grid services could include capacity reduction (similar to demand response efforts), avoiding renewable curtailment, avoiding high-cost generation resources, or reducing emissions.
Laws setting building performance targets exist across the country, but Local Law 97 (LL97) in New York …
View Full ResourceMany states, local governments, public school districts, and other institutions—often referred to as the MUSH (municipalities, universities, schools, and hospitals) market—seek greater energy savings from their facilities to save money as well as to meet emissions and other objectives. However, other energy management value streams offer additional rewards to building owners.
This report discusses demand flexibility (DF) as a way to tap value from peak demand management, time-differentiated electricity rates, demand response (DR) programs, and nascent grid-service markets. Beyond offering financial benefits, DF can help improve building performance while also supporting resilience, environmental, and other policy and organizational goals.…
View Full ResourceNew research using the Minnesota Energy Policy Simulator developed by Energy Innovation and RMI evaluates the state’s climate policies, finding they could reduce emissions 8 percent, but fall short of achieving the Minnesota’s Next Generation Economy Act’s goals. A proposed 100 percent clean energy goal could cut statewide emissions 20 percent by 2050, but a broader set of climate policies is needed to put Minnesota on the IPCC’s recommended pathway to limit warming to 1.5° Celsius. Implementing additional policies across the transportation, buildings, industrial, land, and agricultural sectors can transition the state to a low-carbon economy while generating significant economic …
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