The Building Technologies Office’s JUMP initiative, hosted at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), now has three open calls for innovation and invites you to share your ideas. JUMP—which stands for Join in the discussion, Unveil innovation, Motivate transformation and Promote technology-to-market—is an online crowdsourcing platform for innovators, particularly small entrepreneurs, to present ideas for new technologies to lead to research and development. The top-selected technology submission for each call may be eligible for a cash award sponsored by the industry partner host. All organizations submitting ideas will also be invited to discuss future collaboration with the industry partner and ORNL technical experts; and depending on the needs identified, ORNL may provide in-kind technical support. Explore these calls below.
In 2016, more than 40% of U.S. primary energy and 75% of electricity was consumed in residential and commercial buildings, resulting in annual energy costs of around $380 billion. Approximately 35% of this energy consumption is used to maintain a comfortable indoor environment. The envelope of the building—which encompasses the external walls, windows, and the roof and floor—is the thermal and mass barrier between the indoor and outdoor environments and a primary determinant of the energy use required to maintain indoor comfort.
Cost-effective solutions that greatly improve the performance and durability of building envelopes are currently being researched to enable high-performing, sustainable buildings. The challenge is to develop a new material or an installation method that uses readily available products to improve the thermal performance and airtightness of a wall assembly, without compromising the durability of the wall assembly.
The idea submission period ends on Sunday, July 2, 2017.
The National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) 2014-2015 Market Survey indicates that concrete decks represent about 14% of the new and retrofit low-slope construction market. In recent years, the roofing industry has become increasingly aware of the problems caused by moisture in concrete roof decks that migrates into the roofing system. While the primary function of a roofing system is to prevent water from passing into the building below, water or water vapor that collects within the roofing system can also be detrimental, both to the roofing system’s immediate performance and its long-term durability.
The DOE Market Calculator lists the 2030 envelope-generated heating and cooling loads in commercial building roofs as 545 TBtu. With about 14% of roofing installed over concrete decks, significant energy savings could be achieved by eliminating the energy penalties associated with high material moisture contents. The challenge is to develop new materials or installation methods that can be employed with a concrete deck so that the likelihood of having moisture-related problems is significantly reduced.
The idea submission period ends on Sunday, August 27, 2017.
Developing energy-efficient, effective, low-cost comfort systems enables contractors and builders to provide customers with high-performing, sustainable buildings. One existing technology that could help provide these benefits is thermal storage. However, even though energy storage costs are trending down and thermal storage systems in general are approximately a quarter the cost of electric battery systems, thermal storage has not gained global adoption at the scale that would support the greatest benefit to the power grid and cost advantages to consumers.
To meet peak power demand, many utilities apply additional “demand” charges to commercial building customers to recover the capital costs associated with maintaining sufficient generation capacity to satisfy peak demand. Energy storage can reduce these demand charges by storing energy during off-peak periods, and then discharging this energy to reduce the magnitude of peak building demand. Because a significant portion of commercial building peak demand is driven by air conditioning, thermal storage can be used in lieu of battery storage to reduce demand charges. When utilizing thermal storage as part of building comfort systems, equipment is used to produce chilled water at times when electricity demand is low; this pre-chilled water is them used to cool the building during peak demand hours without any loss of climate control or occupant comfort. Although very efficient, thermal storage usually requires a significant footprint, oftentimes limiting technology adoption. The challenge is to develop a new way to heat and cool commercial buildings using thermal storage, specifically by conceptualizing ways in which thermal storage can better complement the design of a structure or facility.
The idea submission period ends on Sunday, September 10, 2017.