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The paper industry is a high-carbon emission and energy-intensive industry. From the perspective of low-carbon trade and carbon neutrality, its energy conservation and emission reduction are worthy of attention. This study used the input-output model to calculate the embodied carbon emissions of China’s paper industry’s export trade to the United States from 2006 to 2020 and used the logarithmic mean division index (LMDI) method to analyze influencing factors of the change of embodied carbon emissions. The study found that the embodied carbon emissions of China’s paper industry’s export trade to the United States generally shows a stable downward trend after reaching the peak with the increase of export trade scale; scale effect is the main factor that causes the embodied carbon emissions, while technological progress, policy support, and environmental regulations are important driving forces to promote carbon emission reduction. The research results of this paper not only can test and guide China’s paper industry trade policies and industrial policies, but they can also provide decision-making reference for China and the United States to promote the carbon emission reduction of the paper industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Adoption of energy efficient technologies is considered a key sustainability strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in global industries. This article aims to assess costs of energy savings and carbon reduction from applying energy efficiency technologies in the US pulp and paper sector. Applicable efficiency measures were identified and their cost effectiveness was evaluated in two historical years – 1994 and 2006. Potential savings of final energy use resulting from applicable sustainability options were estimated as 707 PJ in 1994 and 1064 PJ in 2006, respectively, corresponding to approximately 32% of the sector''s annual final energy use in 1994 and 62% in 2006. The associated carbon-emission reduction was 8.1 million ton of carbon (MtC) in 1994 and 11.8MtC in 2006, corresponding to 26% and 45% of sector''s total energy-related carbon emissions in 1994 and 2006, respectively. Using the concepts of cost of conserved energy and cost of carbon reduction, we estimated that cost effective sustainability options contributed to final energy savings in the range of 15–25% of the annual energy use, and carbon-emission reduction from 14% to 20% of annual carbon emissions from the sector. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Information technology (IT) is regarded globally as a voracious consumer of energy. According to a 2007 research paper issued by the United Kingdom's Global Action Plan, IT accounts for 10 percent of the electrical usage in the U.K. In the United States, Stanford University estimates that IT accounts for 15 percent of its overall electrical use. Although IT adds to the problem of energy consumption on campus, it can also be a partner in the sustainability solution--by contributing to overall energy reduction and by enabling sustainable practices in other areas across the university. In fact, according to a 2007 NetworkWorld story, Gartner Group named "green IT" number one in its "Top 10 Strategic Technologies 2008." Interestingly, several of the other top 10 technologies in Gartner's list play roles in sustainable computing across the enterprise, including virtualization, unified communications, and the web as a platform. Sustainability is no longer a fringe project in IT organizations. At Indiana University (IU), University Information Technology Services (UITS) plays a large and growing role in IU's sustainability initiatives. That wasn't always the case, however. IT's role grew organically and will continue to evolve over time. This article describes the story of how IT got engaged at IU, and some of the payoffs of that engagement, which might have relevance for other institutions considering a similar role for IT. (Contains 5 figures and 7 endnotes.)

The article comments on a paper published within the issue, "Capital Formation and the Recent Productivity Slowdown," by Peter Clark. The author also discusses results from his own research in "Accounting for United States Economic Growth, 1929-1969," and applies it to Clark's paper. It is suggested that an abrupt rise in energy prices may have affected growth rates during the mid-1970s. The author also looks at a similar analysis made by John Kendrick, who focuses on the U.S. postwar period of 1948-1966.

The article provides energy saving tips from energy industries in the U.S. AC variable speed pumps replacing constant speed pumps with throttling valves make good economic sense in many applications. Examine auxiliary systems on mill site owned and operated by others who may be getting a free or discounted ride in energy if they were developed in times of relatively inexpensive energy. It is important to assure that all gauges, meters and monitoring devices related to your energy consumption are working and are accurate.

Energy efficiency policies require the implementation of strategies to reduce energy use during the operation of integrated urban water systems. In Italy, the overall amount of electrical energy consumption for water systems is close to 2.3% of the total national consumption, thus efforts to minimize costs are crucial. This paper analyzes a case study of urban water systems in a specific area in the Piedmont Region, Italy; the case study includes the data collection methodology and the analysis of the energy consumption of seven large water providers. The discussion includes the quantification of the energy consumption reduction, achievable with the replacement of existing transformers with high-efficiency transformers, power factor correction, and the use of variable-frequency drives for the centrifugal pumps. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

During the last one and a half decades, wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have witnessed significant growth and tremendous development. While enjoying the wide variety of applications, the sensors in WSN have constrained resources, affecting their living lives, working times, assigned tasks, etc. Though a large number of efforts have been devoted into designing protocols that save energy as much as possible, they are still a passive solution. In this paper, we propose a novel approach called policy-based assistance system (PAS) that addresses the issue of resource limitation in a proactive manner. Complementary to existing works which focus on saving energy in individual nodes, our proposed approach further allows sensors with limited resources to make requests to other sensors to help complete the tasks. In this way, the resources in the whole WSN are better utilized and more tasks can be completed with little communication overhead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Energy consumption is the primary source of greenhouse gases and carbon emissions, so reduction of energy consumption in any sector of the economy can be used as a tool to fight against global warming. However, to do that satisfactorily, it is necessary to know the degree of persistence of sectoral energy consumption. In fact, the degree of persistence shows how much of impact of shocks carries over to the following periods. Therefore, in this paper, we analyze the persistence and stationarity of sectoral energy consumption in the United States during 1952–2016 using bootstrap and subsampling confidence intervals. These confidence intervals provide more information compared to the unit root tests. Not only they provide evidence about the stationarity or non-stationarity of the variables, but also they show the degree of persistence. In addition, they require fewer assumptions on the nature of data. The findings show that the energy consumption in the residential and commercial sectors appears to be stationary but persistent. On the contrary, the energy consumption in the industrial and transportation sectors is non-stationary. Therefore, the industrial and transportation sectors are the best candidates to implement energy conservation and economic or environmental-oriented policies, because the effect of these policies will be permanent. Similar policies can be applied in the residential and commercial sectors as well; however, the effects of shocks to these sectors will diminish eventually. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • A large-scale of 15,488 EnergyPlus simulations for commercial buildings in the U.S. • Nationwide energy savings for a single and combinations of multiple ECMs. • Nationwide energy savings for the ECM of fault detection and diagnostics. Abstract Buildings consumed 40% of the energy in the United States, which is more than any other sectors of the U.S. economy, including transportation and industry. The majority of this energy was used for lighting, space heating, cooling, ventilation, and water heating in the buildings. It is well known that the carbon emission is proportional to the energy consumption. Enhancing building efficiency becomes one of the easiest, most immediate and most cost-effective ways to reduce carbon emissions. This paper focuses on the simulation-based nationwide energy savings analysis of different energy conservation measures (ECMs) to enhance building energy performance. The study includes 44 different ECMs, which were simulated in 16 different climate zones for 11 different commercial building types in the U.S. Simulations were conducted using a whole building simulation program, EnergyPlus. Commercial prototype building models from the U.S. Department of Energy [1] were used as the baselines. Model input files were automatically modified to incorporate with 44 different ECMs using scripts. The baselines were based on American Society of Heating, Refrigeration, and Air-conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) [2] Standard 90.1 and International Energy Conservation Code (IECC). A total of 15,488 simulations were conducted to study the nationwide energy savings potentials. The details of these 44 proposed ECMs and their corresponding nationwide saving potentials are presented and discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract In order to assess how seasonality affects disparities in natural gas consumption among sectors, this paper aims to study the pattern of convergence in natural gas consumption in a sample of 11 sectors in the United States between January 1973 and February 2017. In addition to the full sample, the existence of convergence is also examined in five subsets of sectors: residential, commercial, industrial, transport and electric power. By using various types of unit root tests, empirical results provide significant support for the convergence of disaggregated natural gas consumption across sectors in the United States. Another important finding of this paper is that natural gas consumption, despite being convergent, is very persistent. Highlights • This study is to test the hypothesis of the convergence in disaggregated natural gas consumption for the United States. • We use various types of unit root tests. • The energy conservation policies oriented towards the reduction of the seasonal effects of natural gas consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a substantial body of literature linking energy efficiency to occupant behavior. This paper extends that literature by developing a process for segmenting U.S. homeowners into profiles, on the basis of their (1) level of utility-bill botheredness and (2) household budgetary constraints. This process, using these two lenses to view homeowners, is hereafter called Decision-Ade. It builds on and contributes to theoretical knowledge in the areas of (1) residential energy decisions, (2) marketing science, (3) the psychology of behavior change, and (4) emotional response modeling. The motivation for developing Decision-Ade is to understand whether utility-bill botheredness and budgetary constraints can be used to segment U.S. homeowners into unique groups, which in this paper are referred to as profiles. The empirical analysis confirms that homeowner segmentation is not only made possible through this process, but that it enhances the understanding of how homeowners make decisions regarding upgrades to their homes. A compelling aspect of this study is that its sample comprises more than 1,000 U.S. homeowners, which is a sample size larger than nearly each of the studies reviewed for this paper. By using a sample of this size, this methodology can be applied to other fields as well, providing information that advances basic knowledge and capabilities across multiple disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data centers are a significant and growing component of electricity demand in the United States. This paper presents a bottom-up model that can be used to estimate total data center electricity demand within a region as well as the potential electricity savings associated with energy efficiency improvements. The model is applied to estimate 2008 U.S. data center electricity demand and the technical potential for electricity savings associated with major measures for IT devices and infrastructure equipment. Results suggest that 2008 demand was approximately 69 billion kilowatt hours (1.8% of 2008 total U.S. electricity sales) and that it may be technically feasible to reduce this demand by up to 80% (to 13 billion kilowatt hours) through aggressive pursuit of energy efficiency measures. Measure-level savings estimates are provided, which shed light on the relative importance of different measures at the national level. Measures applied to servers are found to have the greatest contribution to potential savings. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

global consumption of energy continues to increase at an exponential rate, the need to find technologies that can help reduce this rate of consumption, particularly in passenger vehicles, is imperative. This paper provides a progress report on the BSST-led US Department of Energy-sponsored automotive thermoelectric waste heat recovery project, which has transitioned from phase 3 and is completing phase 4. Thermoelectric generator (TEG) development will be discussed, including modeling and thermal cycling of subassemblies. The design includes the division of the TEG into different temperature zones, where the subassembly materials and aspect ratios are optimized to match the temperature gradients for the particular zone. Test results for a phase 3 quarter-scale device of the phase 4 high-temperature TEG will be discussed, where power outputs of up to 125 W were achieved on a 600°C hot-air test bench. The design of the TEG, which uses high-power-density segmented thermoelectric elements, has evolved from a planar design in phase 3 to a cylindrical design in phase 4. The culmination of phase 4 includes testing of the generator on a dynamometer at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory with a high-performance production engine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a preliminary insight into the status of the diffusion and maturity of 'Green IT' as well as some of the driving and inhibiting factors that influence it. The paper is largely descriptive and is based on a survey of 143 organisations from Australia, New Zealand and the USA. Overall, the findings indicate that organisations are developing the 'right mind-set', taking a number of 'softer actions', and investing in new technologies to use IT as part of the solution to pursue both eco-efficiency and eco-sustainability objectives. Nevertheless, the state of Green IT among the surveyed organisations can be considered at the early stage of maturity. In particular, the results indicate that the disposal of IT in an environmentally friendly manner is the most relevant organisational concern about Green IT. It is therefore not surprising that there is significantly more attention paid to the policy and practice in the end-of-IT-life management aspect of Green IT. On the other hand, attention to Green IT sourcing is the least adopted. The need for greater IT efficiency and the pursuit of tangible cost savings from IT operations are the primary drivers for adopting Green IT which have to be articulated in the strategy of an organisation. Likewise, the cost of greening IT and unclear business values from greening IT top the list of the factors that inhibit Green IT adoption. Limitation of the small sample size withstanding, the findings of this study hint at differences in Green IT initiatives among US, New Zealand and Australian organisations. In Australia and New Zealand, environmental consideration is the primary concern. In US the primary concern appears to be energy efficiency and cost reduction. Thus, while Australian and New Zealand organisations are leading the 'softer' side of Green IT policies and practices to reduce the environmental impact of IT, US organisations are far more advanced in the adoption of technologies and practices that reduce energy consumption and improve efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethanol production in the United States has been steadily growing and is expected to continue growing. Many politicians see increased ethanol use as a way to promote environmental goals, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and energy security goals. This paper provides a benefit-cost analysis of increasing ethanol use based on an analysis by the Environmental Protection Agency. We find that the cost of increasing ethanol production to almost ten billion gallons a year is likely to exceed the benefits by about three billion dollars annually. We also suggest that earlier attempts aimed at promoting ethanol would have likely failed a benefit-cost test, and that Congress should consider repealing ethanol incentive programs, such as the ethanol tariff and tax credit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on those policies that facilitate energy and environmental improvements in Sunbelt cities. Such policies ultimately provide a means of achieving the elusive goal of urban sustainability. Cities have common energy concerns that impact the urban environment. These concerns are manifested in urban policies and programs designed to achieve results such as reducing energy usage, improving the environment and facilitating interaction. This research deals with policies that impact urban sustainability in general and energy use in particular. Cities that are earnestly pursuing specific policies, such as energy management or sustainable development, often have an array of activities directed toward achieving these goals. The purpose of this paper includes: Providing a descriptive comparison of specific environmental and energy related policies in 25 selected Sunbelt cities based on the observed practices and activities; Identifying attributes for policy indicators across the selected cities that indicate how each city is pursuing or not pursuing goals and policies related to energy and sustainability; and Offering evidence that in many Sunbelt cities, policies are in effect to manage and reduce urban energy use, and providing a functional categorization. To this end, the author has selected a set of ten policies that indicate the application of sustainable policies at the urban level. The policies fall into a typology of categories that include locally supported energy policy indicators, local policy indicators, participation in membership based organizations and environmental policy indicators. This research explores the typology of policies that have been adopted. This research concludes by ranking each of the selected cities based on their rates of policy adoption The author concludes that there is wide variability in the implementation of policies that foster sustainability in Sunbelt cities. In addition, it was discovered that cities seeking to incorporate policies that lead to sustainability generally consider energy policy to be a critical component of their urban agendas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses how 10 localities in the USA and England, recognised as leaders in clean energy and climate action, have used collaborative approaches to develop local climate change plans and energy conservation, efficiency, and renewable energy initiatives. It examines these planning and policy-making processes in the context of Margerum's [2008. A typology of collaboration efforts in environmental management.Environmental Management, 41 (4), 487–500] typology of “action”, “organizational”, and “policy-level” collaborations, as well as Gray's [1989.Collaborating: finding common ground for multiparty problems. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass] classification of collaboration in the “problem-setting”, “direction-setting”, and “implementation” phases. We conducted interviews with local elected officials, municipal staff, energy professionals, and citizen volunteers in each community, supplemented with an analysis of their adopted energy, climate change, and land-use plans. We find that despite the different government structures and political contexts between the two countries, there was a surprising amount of commonality in how the case study localities used collaborative planning to develop local climate plans and clean energy initiatives. These processes were most often initiated by local elected officials and/or high-level staff members, and then carried out in collaboration with local third-sector organisations and other community stakeholders. In the USA, collaboration was strongest at the policy level and in the direction-setting phase, with the distinguishing feature that citizen advisory boards or stakeholder working groups often took a more active role in shaping local plans and policies. The English localities had some of those same types of collaborations, but were more likely to also employ action collaboration, in the implementation phase, in which third-sector organisations coordinated with the locality to directly provide clean energy services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential weatherization programs have become a major component of U.S. energy policy. Through these programs, households receive heavily subsidized energy efficiency upgrades as well as informational and behavioral treatments designed to encourage conservation. While previous work demonstrates that weatherization programs provide sizable energy savings, all have measured the composite effect of efficiency upgrades and behavioral treatments. In this paper, we present the first estimates which disentangle the energy savings provided by each of the individual interventions. Our results reveal that the actual energy savings achieved by the efficiency upgrades are substantially smaller than exante, engineering predictions. Moreover, we present evidence that the energy savings provided by the simple behavioral interventions can exceed the savings resulting from the much more costly efficiency upgrades. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Improving energy efficiency can lower the cost of using energy-intensive goods and may create wealth from the energy savings, both of which lead to increased energy use, a "rebound" effect. I present a theoretical framework that parses rebound into economic income and substitution effects. The framework leads to new insights about the magnitude of rebound when goods are not priced at marginal cost and when consumers are imperfect optimizers, as well as the role of technological progress in rebound. I then explore the implications of this framework with illustrative calculations for improved auto fuel economy and lighting efficiency. These suggest that rebound is unlikely to more than offset the savings from energy efficiency investments (known as "backfire"), but rebound likely reduces the net savings by roughly 10% to 40% from these energy efficiency improvements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops an integrated approach to model heterogeneous household water and energy use and their linkages. The approach considers variations in behavioral and technological water and energy use factors that affect U.S. indoor residential water and energy use for toilets, showers, faucets, clothes washers, and dishwashers. The study uses a recent, large, national, disaggregated household water use data set collected from 11 cities, as well as national energy data on water heater efficiency and setpoint/intake temperatures. First, probability distributions of water and energy use factors are identified and correlated. Then, Monte Carlo simulations are used to calculate probability distributions for estimated household water and energy use. Finally, linear regressions are used to find the relative effects of water and energy factors on household energy use. Results show that water and energy distributions among households are skewed, with the largest 12% of the users consuming 21% and 24% of water and energy, respectively. Water heater setpoint temperature followed by intake temperature, heater efficiency, shower hot water percentage, household size, shower flowrate, and faucet flowrate have the highest relative effect on household energy use and should be targeted to reduce household energy use. The approach improves prior homogenous and deterministic water-energy models and can help utilities select and size cost-effective, collaborative water and energy conservation actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Occupancy-focused interventions to reduce building energy use have been shown to be effective but often result in unsustained energy reductions. In addition, these interventions have rarely been applied to commercial buildings. Research on residential buildings has linked the success of these interventions to the buildings' social structures. However, the results cannot be directly applied to commercial buildings given their complex social structures formed by independent entities (i.e., companies) with different organizational structures and cultures within a building. In this paper, an agent-based modeling framework is developed to (1) provide a more realistic representation of social subnetworks in commercial buildings, (2) model interactions between occupants and the resulting peer pressure to change their energy-use characteristics based on the relative agreement interaction model, and (3) evaluate the efficiency of occupancy interventions for different subnetwork characteristics on a typical medium-sized office building in the United States. Statistical analyses are performed and recommendations made on how to improve energy conservation from occupancy interventions by as much as 24.7%. The contributions of this research to the fields of computing and energy conservation are significant and can be used to shape future occupancy interventions for more effective and sustained energy reductions in commercial buildings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A case study based on the national BCycle bike-sharing program was presented. • The bike usage patterns were compared among different membership groups. • The spatio-temporal trends of empty and full bike stations were examined. • The current system configuration was optimized under three hypothetical scenarios. • This study has important implications to other cities in the BCycle program. Many cities around the world have integrated bike-sharing programs into their public transit systems to promise sustainable, affordable transportation and reduce environmental pollution in urban areas. Investigating the usage patterns of shared bikes is of key importance to understand cyclist's behaviors and subsequently optimize bike-sharing programs. Based on the historical trip records of bike users and station empty/full status data, this paper evaluated and optimized the bike-sharing program BCycle in the city of Boulder, Colorado, the United States, using a combination of different methods including the Potential Path Area (PPA) and the Capacitated Maximal Covering Location Problem (CMCLP). Results showed significantly different usage patterns between membership groups, revealed diverse imbalance patterns of bike supply and demand across stations in the city and provided three system upgrading strategies about maximizing the service coverage. This case study is committed to future energy conservation and sustainable energy systems nationwide and ultimately worldwide, by holding immerse potential to adapt the resulting optimization strategies to the cities with a similar urban context across the United States, as well as more emerging bike-sharing programs in other countries, such as China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential energy consumption accounts for 21% of the total electricity use in the United States. Unfortunately, research indicates that almost 41% of this power is wasted. Changing the way that consumers use energy may be important in reducing home energy consumption. This paper looks at whether the implementation of certain real-time energy monitors has an impact on the residential rate of energy consumption in a metropolitan area with relatively low electricity rates. In the following case study, 151 Omaha residences were equipped with two variants of the Aztech In-Home Display (Aztech) as well as the Blue Line Power Cost Monitor (PCM) real-time energy monitors for a period of 16 months. The results of the data, 30 days after installation, revealed a statistically insignificant reduction of 12% in mean electrical consumption in houses equipped with a PCM and no reduction in mean consumption in homes using either variants of the Aztech device when compared to a randomly selected control sample. However, they proved effective in the short term if utilized by utilities for mass distribution to foster awareness among participating residents of their own patterns of residential electricity consumption and on the environmental impacts of energy saving. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Low carbon cities. What, exactly, are we talking about? Are we talking about lifestyles, activities, or enterprises? Are we talking about individual or group voluntary behavior change or a policy framework that seeks to encourage behavior change by regulatory force? Faced with an enormous literature that mixes related topics like sustainable development/climate change/energy conservation/low carbon, it is not surprising to hear about local governments’ or planners’ “climate change initiatives”. This paper describes/reflects on how officials in Broward County, Florida, are dealing with issues of awareness, governance, measurement, and instruments for challenges arising from the combined threats of energy depletion and climate change. The overriding objective of this paper is to provide some pith for the discussion of planning for low carbon cities. To this end, we describe and reflect on the planning management responses of Broward County, Florida, USA – as an illustrative local government – in dealing with climate change challenges (CCC), energy conservation (EC) and greenhouse gas reduction (GHG). Both description and reflection are important as it is primarily the latter that provides the critical perspective necessary for assessing both potential and effect. The paper is organized into five sections. The first two sections address the “contextual” questions raised above: what is the level of knowledge and/or awareness among the collection of planners and/or local governments; and, what are/is appropriate responses of different levels of government. In the next section, we review overall levels of knowledge and awareness of basic science and policy dimensions, with particular attention paid to (a version of the) US planning profession. This is followed by a discussion of “theoretical” prescriptions for actions at different levels of government. The third and fourth sections focus on Broward County. The third section describes the county and presents a current measurement of its carbon footprint (at least at the level to which it can be measured). The fourth section describes the operational response of Broward County government. The final section returns to the original questions of knowledge and appropriate types of responses and argues that while the Broward response is generally effective in certain aspects, the current policy paradigm contains both strengths and weaknesses, which are generally outlined and discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Over many years, the increase usage of electricity and natural gas has caused the U.S. carbon footprint to expand in size. While many of the greenhouse gas effects can be attributed to the industrial, transportation, and commercial sectors, the residential sector of our economy does not lag behind. The authors of this paper seek to investigate the importance of age cohorts in the reduction of the residential sector energy consumption within the United States. The authors utilized 2007 National American Housing Survey within a multivariate regressions analysis to derive the results. The findings suggest that U.S. households' energy consumption habits vary based upon age, which may be attributed to individual's relationship to the time period to which they grew up. The findings are helpful for policy makers to understand the importance of instilling conservation knowledge to children and young adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fuel economy improvement on medium-duty tactical truck has and continues to be a significant initiative for the U.S. Army. The focus of this study is the investigation of Automated Manual Transmissions (AMT) and mild hybridization powertrain that have potential to improve the fuel economy of the 2.5-ton cargo trucks. The current platform uses a seven-speed automatic transmission. This study utilized a combination of on-road experimental vehicle data and analytical vehicle modeling and simulation. This paper presents the results of (1) establishment of a validated, high fidelity baseline analytical vehicle model, (2) modeling and simulation of two AMTs and their control strategy, (3) optimization of transmissions shift schedules, and (4) modeling and simulation of engine idle stop/start and Belt-Integrated-Starter-Generator (B-ISG) systems to improve the fuel economy. The fuel economy discrepancy between experimental average and the baseline simulation result was 2.87%. The simulation results indicated a 14.5% and 12.2% fuel economy improvement for the 10-speed and 12-speed AMT respectively. A stop/start system followed by a B-ISG mild hybrid system incorporating regenerative braking was estimated to improve fuel economy 3.39% and 10.2% respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on research on consumer energy. According to the author, the social significance of consumer energy research can be established by observing the importance of consumer energy conservation in the quest for long-run energy security and by recognizing the role of consumer research in the identification of effective conservation initiatives. Consumer energy research can be segmented into two general categories: research that focuses primarily on understanding consumers and research that focuses primarily on the impact of energy-conservation initiatives.

Abstract: High rates of oil consumption and obesity in the US have become important socioeconomic concerns. While these concerns may seem unrelated at first, growing obesity rates in the US increase fuel consumption by adding passenger weight to vehicles. This paper estimates the additional amount of fuel (i.e., gasoline) consumed annually by noncommercial passenger highway vehicles in the US due to passenger overweight and obesity. The mathematical model presented in this paper estimates that as many as one billion additional gallons of gasoline are consumed each year due to overweight and obesity in the US, accounting for up to 0.8% of the fuel consumed by these vehicles annually. This additional fuel consumption causes carbon dioxide emissions of up to 20 billion pounds or more, accounting for up to 0.5% of the annual carbon dioxide emissions in the transportation sector. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

I have recently traveled to South Korea, where Seoul National University hosted the XXII World Congress of Philosophy, the first time the congress has been hosted in Asia. I was astonished by the pervasive use of many of the latest technological advancements. Among the most impressive changes were environmental. The methods employed in hotels and at the University for minimizing unnecessary consumption of electricity were exemplary. Given the great need America has now for developing its economy, and preferably in a way that does not easily lend itself to outsourcing, South Korea can serve as a model for change implemented through the development and manufacturing of advanced technological tools including high-speed internet access, which will be the focus of the present paper. Some changes have begun already in some arenas of industry and responsiveness to environmental forces, such as in Toyota's decision to move from making SUV's in its new factory coming to Tupelo, Mississippi, to making only the Prius. But Americans have let the governmental incentives for a number of environmentally preferable products run out, and have not lead the way in the propagation of new renewable energy source technologies. Also, America's common approach to the propagation of technological and business development with the use of tax-incentives is fundamentally different far less forceful than the South Korean approach I will discuss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Successful binational planning and management of water resources is a complex process dependent on informed decision-making across diverse economic, social and political sectors. Additional technical and scientific information is often required as a part of this process. A critical factor in this process is how effectively social and physical scientists can help build collaboration and trust among stakeholders, water and land managers, and policy-makers. Within the international San Pedro River Basin, disparities between Mexico and the USA regarding economic development and political orientation, combined with a highly variable and complex physical setting, suggest that the successful engagement of scientists with communities and stakeholders will be essential for addressing challenges in water management. Based upon concepts associated with collective action theory, adaptive management and conflict resolution, the present paper proposes a process for fostering collaborative binational water management in basins such as the San Pedro that span international borders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Driven primarily by energy considerations, there has been a major change in the geographical distribution of primary aluminum production over the past few decades, even as the energy efficiency of the process has been improved Meanwhile, in the United States, production of aluminum from secondary sources increased nearly ten-fold. This paper discusses past and projected future trends, emphasizing the changes in energy savings potential as the industry comes to rely morn on remelting and less on primary production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four major themes will dominate United States energy-security in the 21st century. One is the need to diversify the fuel mix (i.e., oil, natural gas, nuclear power, hydro-electricity and other renewable and alternative energy resources). Another is the need to diversify the geographic origin of energy. A third theme is conservation and energy efficiency. And the final theme is devising new ways of managing growing dependence on oil imports rather than aiming at achieving “energy independence”. This paper will examine the new frontiers of the United States’ energy security in the 21st century. It will argue that fossil fuels will continue to dominate US energy needs well into the 21st century and that the Gulf region will maintain its strategic importance for US energy security for the foreseeable future. The paper will conclude that US energy-security could be better served by devising ways of managing dependence on oil imports rather than engaging in meaningless debate over energy independence. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

From 1996 through 2000, the US experienced an unprecedented 2.7% annual reduction in energy intensity. This is three times the rate of the previous 10 years and far higher than the rate projected by traditional energy forecasters. There is increasing data and analysis to support the view that there is a connection between the recent reductions in energy intensity and the astonishing growth in information technology (IT) and the internet economy. Growth in the Internet economy can cut energy intensity in two ways. First, the IT sector is less energy-intensive than traditional manufacturing, so growth in this sector engenders less incremental energy consumption. Second, the internet economy appears to be increasing efficiency in every sector of the economy, which is the primary focus of this paper. The impact of the Internet economy on manufacturing, buildings, and transportation are all explored. The paper also considers the implications for growth in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions during the next 10 years. Also, there has been a widely quoted argument put forward by two analysts, Mark Mills and Peter Huber, that the Internet is using a large and rapidly growing share of the nation''s electricity, which in turn is supposedly driving an acceleration of overall US electricity demand. That analysis should be rejected as it is based on seriously faulty analysis and is inconsistent with recent data and analyses. Finally, the Bush administration put forward a new approach to US climate change strategy, based on reducing carbon intensity. This paper suggests that such an approach may not lead to reductions in carbon emissions beyond business as usual trends. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Occupants are integral elements of a building ecosystem and their behavior can have a substantial impact on energy consumption in buildings. A wide range of energy feedback programs have been developed to make energy consumption more visible and interpretable to occupants and help them learn how to control and save energy. In this paper, we conduct a critical review of the literature related to energy feedback and identify four key methodological approaches to designing and studying energy feedback programs: experiments, analytics, surveys and simulation. Our meta-analysis reveals five research gaps and opportunities for future methodological fusion at the intersection between such approaches, including the analytics-survey, experiments-analytics, experiments-analytics-surveys, simulation-experiments and analytics-simulation interfaces. Future research at these crucial interfaces could provide the deeper understanding necessary to develop energy feedback programs that yield substantial and persistent energy savings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Buildings contribute to about 40% of total annual energy consumption in the U.S. and saving a small percentage of that can lead to significant economic and environmental impacts. Building Energy Modeling (BEM) tools are important in reducing building's energy consumption. Most of the available tools only provide total energy consumption related to HVAC system, lighting, hot water, and appliances. While fine-grained data may be available in some computer tools, the process for obtaining these data is time-consuming, error-prone, and requires software-related skills. This paper explains a developed tool that contributes in automation of building energy simulation and providing fine-grained outputs by using Building Information Modeling (BIM) and modified source code of energy simulation tools such as EnergyPlus and OpenStudio. This tool, which is referred to as ABEMAT (Automated Building Energy Modeling and Assessment Tool), receives gbXML file and provides users with the amount of heat transfer through every single building envelope component such as windows, doors, and walls through an automated process. ABEMAT's and EnergyPlus advanced outputs are compared for validation; the latter being a time consuming process and error-prone, which requires software-related skills compared to ABEMAT. Results showed similar findings indicating the functionality of ABEMAT in providing fine-grained outputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bus systems in small California cities are widely believed to produce air quality, energy conservation, and traffic congestion benefits by inducing car-to-transit mode shifts. This paper tests the validity of these claims for a conventional bus system in Davis, California. Results from the Davis case fail to support claims for transit's benefits. The paper concludes that questions raised by the unexpected effects of transit in Davis and the lack of adequate data to evaluate similar systems in other cities should be addressed by collecting and analyzing additional data. Otherwise, transportation planners and public officials may be misled by inadequate or invalid information when formulating transportation policy or committing public resources to conventional bus systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the attitudes and behaviors of Texas citizens in response to the circumstances existing during and shortly after the Arab countries' oil embargo of Spring 1974. The focus is on the credibility of defining the situation in terms of incipient long-term energy shortages and on the adoption of energy conservation practices. The purpose of the paper is to elucidate the relationships between the attitudes which people held about the energy situation and their efforts to conserve energy. The authors found that most of those surveyed did not interpret energy shortages as simply a result of the Arab countries' oil embargo. Even fewer interpreted the events of the spring of 1974 as the advent of a serious energy crisis for the U.S. Skepticism about the reality of the crisis seemed linked to distrust of energy' producing corporations and leadership in the national government. The findings suggest that differences in energy conserving behavior were dependent on differences in the degree to which the energy crisis was credible and on differences in socioeconomic status. Many of those who could afford to pay the costs of higher priced energy continued their consumption patterns pretty much as before the period of shortages.

As a result of the National Energy Conservation Policy Act (NECPA) of 1978, US utilities were mandated to offer a variety of Residential Conservation Service (RCS) programmes. While utilities in some sections of the country have been much more aggressive in pursuing conservation through RCS programmes, all utilities have had to consider RCS programmes as alternatives to increased generating capacity. The conservation programmes that have received the greatest focus are home energy audits, low interest loans, and information regarding the costs and savings of alternative conservation investments. The conservation investments stressed include weatherization (insulation, storm windows and doors, weatherstripping) and water heating improvements (pipe wraps, water heater wraps, shower flow restrictors).
This paper provides some answers to these questions by specifying and estimating a model of the effects of utility-sponsored conservation programmes. The model, which incorporates current residential energy demand analyses (Cambridge Systematics Inc, 1981, Hartman, 1984b, Hausman, 1979) is developed in Section I.
Section II estimates the model for a particular set of RCS programmes with micro data on 750 households from a particular utility-Portland General Electric Company (PGE). Section III utilizes the estimated model to evaluate the conservation programme effects for five synthetic households. The five synthetic households are designed to represent a wide spectrum of possible programme participants in the service area. They are used to identify which households will be the most likely to participate in the programmes and the most likely to save significant amounts of electricity as a result. Finally, Section IV summarizes the empirical findings of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a conceptual framework aimed at integrating the conservation behavior literature and facilitating the comparison of findings across studies. Within this framework, conservation behavior is approached from the theoretical orientations of attitude change, behavior modification and behavior maintenance. Seven commonly used approaches to encouraging conservation behavior are described in terms of these perspectives. Illustrative research related to each approach is reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the role that social science research plays in Federal transportation energy conservation policy; assesses the current forms and degrees of consideration of social issues in transportation energy conservation policy; and identifies additional contributions that the social sciences could make toward achieving energy conservation goals. The analysis begins with transportation energy consumption figures. It then discusses conventional techniques used to develop transportation energy conservation policy, provides an assessment of the implications of these conventional techniques, and finally, examines certain case studies to identify roles that the social sciences could play in transportation energy conservation policy. The conclusions reached include: that energy conservation policy does not consider psychological factors underlying mechanical economic realities except as evidenced by market responses to rising energy prices and other economic measures; that transportation and energy philosophy, analytical tools, and interpretive techniques do not allow for consideration of social and behavioral issues; that energy problems are causing a shift in the nature of the U.S. transportation system; and, that there is a serious need for government to identify, analyze and understand the psychological and sociological forces affected when national transportation/energy conservation policy is charted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective development, implementation, evaluation, and improvement of energy conservation programs requires detailed disaggregate data from individual energy consumers. Unfortunately, the data currently available are generally not adequate to deal with these issues. This paper discusses a data base containing information on 1,860 public buildings in Minnesota. Considerable attention is devoted to questions of data quality. Validation tests are developed and applied to the data from these buildings. Roughly speaking, 15% of the data elements examined were missing and another 15% were almost surely incorrect. These errors greatly complicate management of state and federal programs to audit and retrofit public buildings. They also seriously distort both the descriptive statistics and the regression results obtained from analysis of this data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews the United States' experience with utility sponsored energy conservation programs. Such programs are central to the recent discussions about electric utility regulation in the United States and elsewhere. First it is shown that these programs are exposed to three problems on the consumers' side - rebound, adverse selection and moral hazard - which lower the effectiveness of conservation incentives and impede in most practical cases a reliable quantification of the achieved conservation, Moreover, the utilities have under the regulatory practice an incentive to invest in conservation measures but to limit factual conservation through a proper design of the program. Reviewing the recent literature shows that these four crucial points, which affect many of the applied conservation programs, are either insufficiently covered (rebound and adverse selection) or neglected entirely (moral hazard and regulated utilities' interest in little conservation). We conclude, that this undertaking has resulted in insignificant conservation and doubt the adequacy of these programs to reduce external social costs from energy use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the relationship between electricity and growth of the economy is investigated by applying the newly-developed bootstrap autoregressive-distributed lag test with a Fourier function to examine both the causality and cointegration for China, India, and the United States (US). While it is not possible to detect a long-term cointegration relation among the economy's electricity and growth, the study findings demonstrate the contingency of the causality. The ensemble method in machine learning performs better than conventional methods as electricity is an independent indicator for forecast economics. Concerning the US, previous electricity consumption has a positive impact on the current nature of economic growth. In contrast, the consumption of electricity is negatively affected by the development of the economy. However, for China and India, positive and negative feedback can be observed, respectively. Due to the increased awareness of the environment's adverse effects, China should promote technologies that conserve energy and boost energy efficiency to achieve sustainable development in both environmental and economic terms. In India's context, broadening access to electricity has significance for residents in rural areas and enhances economic growth. It is recommended that policy-makers promote innovative technologies in the US, as the abundant natural and human resources can make valuable contributions to the society and development of the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates potential changes in the power system associated with sustained growth in wind generation in the United States to 35% of end-use demand by 2050; Wiser et al. (2016) evaluate societal benefits and other impacts for this same scenario. Under reference or central conditions, the analysis finds cumulative wind capacity of 404 gigawatts (GW) would be required to reach this level and drive 2050 incremental electricity rate and cumulative electric sector savings of 2% and 3% respectively, relative to a scenario with no new wind capacity additions. Greater savings are estimated under higher fossil fuel costs or with greater advancements in wind technologies. Conversely, incremental costs are found when fossil fuel costs are lower than central assumptions or wind technology improvements are more-limited. Through 2030, the primary generation sources displaced by new wind capacity include natural gas and coal-fired generation. By 2050, wind could displace other renewables. Incremental new transmission infrastructure totaling 29 million megawatt-miles is estimated to be needed by 2050. In conjunction with related societal benefits, this work demonstrates that 35% wind energy by 2050 is plausible, could support enduring benefits, and could result in long-term consumer savings, if nearer-term (pre-2030) cost barriers are overcome; at the same time, these opportunities are not anticipated to be realized in their full form under “business-as-usual” conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Regulations governing the energy efficiency of new buildings have become a cornerstone of US environmental policy. California enacted the first such codes in 1978 and has tightened them every few years since. I evaluate the resulting energy savings three ways: comparing energy used by houses constructed under different standards, controlling for building and occupant characteristics; examining how energy use varies with outdoor temperatures; and comparing energy used by houses of different vintages in California to that same difference in other states. All three approaches yield estimated energy savings significantly short of those projected when the regulations were enacted. (JEL Q48, Q51, Q52) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do children in the U.S. represent the ideal society? A scientific understanding of how children engage in utopian thinking—and how their ideas relate to cross‐cultural standards developed by the United Nations—is potentially useful for the development of social movements aimed at progressive social change. In this article we report the results of group projects created by 56 fifth‐grade students (27 boys, 29 girls) in New York City who were instructed to work together in small groups to represent their ideal society of the future. We found that themes of economic prosperity and cultural sensitivity, especially the need to promote social and economic equality and to prevent discrimination and prejudice, were central to children's conceptions of the good society. On several major issues, the utopian societies that were proposed dovetailed with the sustainability development goals identified by the United Nations, especially 'Decent Work and Economic Growth', 'Reduced Inequality', and 'Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions'. The children were acutely aware of the need for environmental protection and climate action but understandably lacked a clear sense of how to provide 'Affordable and Clean Energy' and 'Clean Water and Sanitation' in their ideal societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developing policies for a greener society calls for understanding the energy consumption patterns of its households. Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics 2015 Consumer Expenditure Survey and the U.S. Energy Information Administration, this article considers variations in energy expenditure and consumption patterns in the United States and seeks to determine if there is a relationship between a household's energy expenditure and use patterns, and its sociodemographic characteristics. The study begins with a set of sociodemographic characteristics such as housing size, family size, number of cars, and education level, and uses cluster analysis to reduce these variables into a single categorical sociodemographic variable. Analyses of variance are then performed to study differences in energy consumption patterns among the clusters across the United States. Additionally, chi-square tests are applied to study associations between energy use with other defining variables such as geographic region and housing tenure. Notable findings include an economy of scaling when multiple people live together, larger energy demands of more isolated residences, and lower energy demands of urban blue-collar households. In the face of climate change, there has been growing interest in developing energy conservation goals. With this study, we seek to contribute to the discussion by investigating possible factors associated with certain energy use patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Combustion of fossil fuels is the major source of energy in the United States and around the world. The combustion causes emission of greenhouse gases and particle pollution, which leads to health hazards. As people become increasingly conscious of their carbon footprints, they may choose to reduce their energy consumption using a variety of energy-saving technologies. We design a context-rich incentivized decision-making experiment in a laboratory set-up. The decision scenario has been enriched with elements of a public good, risk, and intertemporal discounting. Each subject represents a household and decides how much to spend on energy-saving technologies that can reduce future energy costs and emissions. The reduction in emission decreases health risk and medical costs for an individual and everyone else in the group. Discounting is represented by the ability to save, with interest. Each subject plays three sections (baseline, a treatment, and a repeated baseline). Each section had 30 rounds. The treatment has a threshold public good feature of energy-savings. The emission tax level depends on the aggregate energy-savings. Subjects exhibit significant learning effect and tend to increase adoption rate of energy-saving technologies over time. The adoption rate significantly improves when subjects can reduce their emission tax obligations by decreasing their energy consumption. There is no evidence of significant change in behavior when subjects learn energy-saving choices made by other group members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Daylight Savings Time (DST) is promoted as a tool to conserve energy. However, ex post reduced form estimates of the effects of DST find no evidence of energy savings and find some evidence of a small increase in energy use. This paper investigates this disconnect using detailed individual time use data to look at the behavioral effects of DST. We study how individuals change their time use in response to the abrupt shift in daylight associated with DST. We leverage two natural experiments to identify the effect of DST on behavior. First, we study periods around the annual shift in daylight induced by moving into and out of DST. Second, we compare activities by time interval before and after the change in DST start dates that occurred in 2007. We find cautious evidence that individuals are shifting potentially energy intensive activities earlier in the day, which is consistent with earlier findings of increased energy usage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]