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    UCF energy researcher part of CO2 Rating Index team to offer light on path to Building Decarbonization

    Oct. 24, 2022
    The Residential Energy Services Network, or RESNET, developed the new CO2 Rating Index. The tool calculates energy emissions from buildings in a manner similar to a miles per gallon rating
    Image credit David Goldstein, NRDC
    David Goldstein Nrdc 635683e46b775

    A team of researchers from the University of Central Florida’s energy center has helped develop a new tool for rating the carbon emissions from buildings and homes.

    The new tool could assist in targeting ways that businesses could be more energy efficient. Building energy use accounts for between 25 and 40 percent of consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., according to federal data from the Energy Information Administration and other sources.

    The Residential Energy Services Network, or RESNET, developed the new CO2 Rating Index. The tool calculates energy emissions from buildings in a manner similar to a miles per gallon rating, according to the UCF release detailing the CO2 Rating Index.

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    Philip Fairey, deputy director of UCF’s FSEC Energy Research Center, was a member of the RESNET team developing the rating index. The goal of the non-profit RESNET is to help facilitate greater national markets for energy efficiency technologies.

    “Climate change is a real problem, and the leading cause of it is carbon dioxide emissions,” Fairey told the UCF media team. “While the auto industry has made great strides in reducing carbon emissions from vehicles, the most well-known emitter of CO2, many people don’t know that buildings themselves are responsible for about 35% of greenhouse gas emissions due to burning fossil fuels for power, heating and cooling.”

    More on campus:

    UCF joins with Florida Power & Light, GE on Microgrid Controls Laboratory

    RESNET previously developed the Home Energy Rating System (HERS), shown in the image attached to story image gallery. The CO2 Rating Index goes one step further in helping make the case for building decarbonization, according to the UCF release.

    The National Resources Defense Council also has highlighted the CO2 Rating Index in a recent NRDC blog, noting the criticality of reducing building emissions if decarbonization goals are going to be reached. 

    Click here to see the full University of Central Florida story.

    About the Author

    EnergyTech Staff

    Rod Walton is senior editor for EnergyTech.com. He has spent 14 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist.

    Walton formerly was energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World. Later, he spent six years covering the electricity power sector for Pennwell and Clarion Events. He joined Endeavor and EnergyTech in November 2021.

    He can be reached at [email protected]. 

    EnergyTech is focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids.

    Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.