FEMP Call for Innovation
Background
With more than 350,000 buildings, the federal government is our nation’s largest energy consumer. Federal agencies have a tremendous opportunity and an obligation to reduce energy, water, and petroleum use, as well as greenhouse gas emissions in their operations. The Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) provides federal agencies and organizations with the information, tools, and assistance they need to meet and track their energy-related requirements and goals. FEMP is collaborating with the JUMP team to accelerate deployment efforts of energy efficient technologies in the federal space. This call for innovation is intended to identify near commercialization or newly commercialized innovative technologies that have the potential to realize significant energy savings if implemented in federal buildings. At this year's Energy Exchange, held August 9-11 in Providence, RI, up to 3 finalists will have the opportunity to present on their technologies. Energy Exchange attendees will have an opportunity to vote on the most promising technologies. A team of technical judges will consider the votes and announce the winner at the Energy Exchange closing plenary.
The Challenge
Identify near commercialization or newly commercialized innovative energy saving technologies that are currently underutilized in the federal building space. The technology areas open to the JUMP call would be limited to lighting and/or lighting controls, and packaged HVAC and/or HVAC control systems. In case of innovations in control systems, interoperability with standards based communication protocols will be encouraged to facilitate rapid testing and evaluation. Technology areas that require more extensive analysis such as boilers, chillers, distributed generation/renewables, etc. will not be considered for this initial call. Commercialization efforts of qualifying technologies would benefit from analysis and verification by an accredited third party with building technologies expertise, such as Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).
The Award
The winning idea will receive funding up to $50,000 awarded directly to ORNL by EERE for ORNL to validate, evaluate, and analyze the winning technology and its potential energy savings impact in federal buildings. ORNL would then produce a case study report documenting the analysis results and, if results are favorable, it could be used to promote the technology among federal buildings.
Idea Submission Deadline
Idea Submission Period Ends: Sunday, July 10, 2016 at 11:59 PM EST