Evergreen California Leads The Nation In ENERGY STAR Buildings

As usual California is leading the nation in ENERGY STAR buildings with 917 of these buildings in the state. These buildings that cover about 177 million square feet of space saves $199 billion annually just from energy bills. But it is more than that as this also translate in to 1.6 Billion pounds of green house gas emission reduction. Well done California, Please keep it up.

(San Francisco, Calif.) Finding energy efficient schools, supermarkets, offices and other facilities throughout the country has become even easier for Americans interested in being green. Now we can find the ENERGY STAR not only where we live but where we work, shop, learn and play. The number of commercial buildings and manufacturing plants to earn the ENERGY STAR for superior energy efficiency is up by more than 25 percent in the past year, and the amount of carbon dioxide emissions reduced has reached an all-time high of more than 25 billion pounds.

California is home to 917 ENERGY STAR-qualified buildings representing approximately 177 million square feet of space and saving an estimated $199 billion annually in lower energy bills, while meeting industry standards for comfort and indoor air quality. These buildings also prevent 1.6 billion pounds of greenhouse gas emissions, equivalent to the emissions from more than 135,000 vehicles.

"Building owners in California are taking important steps to reduce their carbon footprint by creating ENERGY STAR buildings,” said Wayne Nastri, EPA administrator for the Pacific Southwest region. “They realize they can reduce energy costs without sacrificing comfort or tenant satisfaction."

In the U.S., 4,056 office buildings, schools, hospitals, and public buildings have earned the U.S. EPA's ENERGY STAR for superior energy and environmental performance, including 1,400 in 2007 alone.

Commercial buildings that have earned the ENERGY STAR use nearly 40 percent less energy than average buildings and emit 35 percent less carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. About 500 ENERGY STAR buildings use 50 percent less energy than average buildings. Many of these buildings excel due to good energy management practices such as routine energy efficiency benchmarking.

Energy use in commercial buildings and manufacturing plants account for nearly half of the total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 50 percent of energy consumption nationwide. For more than a decade, EPA has worked with businesses to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through strategic energy management practices. There are ENERGY STAR qualified facilities across the country. To qualify for the ENERGY STAR, a building or manufacturing plant must score in the top 25 percent using EPA’s National Energy Performance Rating System.

ENERGY STAR was introduced by EPA in 1992 as a voluntary, market-based partnership to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through energy efficiency. In 2006, Americans, with the help of ENERGY STAR, saved about $14 billion on their energy bills and prevented greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to those from 25 million vehicles.

To learn more about ENERGY STAR visit: http://www.energystar.gov/buildings. To see a complete list of California ENERGY STAR buildings, visit: http://www.energystar.gov/LabeledList .

tag: ENERGY STAR, EPA, ENERGY STAR buildings, greenhouse gas emissions, California,

EnergyStar 4.0, New Specifications for Many Office Products in 2007

2007 brings new ENERGY STAR specifications for office and imaging equipment. This means it will be more difficult for computers, copiers, fax machines, mailing machines, multifunction devices (MFDs), printers, and scanners to earn the ENERGY STAR

Energy Star 3.0 was all over the place, but those standards have been in place for a decade. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will introduce new ENERGY STAR 4.0 requirements on July 20th, 2007. What’s going to change? What is in it? What do manufacturers have to do to get compliant? What does business' need to do to be compliant? well it seems that it is easier than one tend to assume. Even small business' can still save money on power and cooling by implementing ENERGY STAR 4.0 compliant desktops and other office appliances.

There are two fundamental changes from the current ENERGY STAR 3.0 program to the ENERGY STAR 4.0 that will have a decided impact on your organization should you choose to implement the new standards:

1. Idle power usage will now be measured and used as a metric to earn the ENERGY STAR 4.0 rating as opposed to Standby power.
2. An 80% efficient power supplies are a requirement.

In Standby, the number of storage devices, processor cores, graphics power, memory, etc. makes very little difference to the power used. These devices are either turned off or are in a very low power state. However, in idle, all these devices are drawing power. The amount of memory or the number of hard drives has a big impact on power used. This is why the ENERGY STAR 3.0 configuration you’re buying today might not be a configuration that will meet ENERGY STAR 4.0 in the future.

The 80% efficient power supply is a principal requirement of Energy Star 4.0 and a major new innovation. What is an 80% efficient power supply? When a power supply converts AC power from the wall to the various DC voltages that the computer needs, there is always a loss of power. The power loss varies with how busy the computer is. An 80% efficient power supply is guaranteed to lose less than 20% of the AC power at 20%, 50% and 100% loads. Currently, power supplies for desktop computers range from approximately 65% to 75% efficiency.

Revisions to existing specifications by energy Star!

Tags: ENERGY STAR 4.0, ENERGY STAR, EPA