Have you ever wondered how appliance standards are created? This summer the California Youth Energy Services will play an active role in influencing procedures and minimum energy efficiency standards for residential appliances. The California Youth Energy Services CYES has teamed up with researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory through the SPARK: Innovation Education project to collect appliance energy-use data from 100 Bay Area households. The project is funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and a component of the Appliances and Commercial Equipments Standards Program.
CYES youth will be performing scientific research in residential homes by installing testing equipment to monitor real-time energy use of appliances while they operate. In each home, Energy Specialists will install one or more metering devices that records the energy consumption of each appliance throughout multiple use cycles. After two-four weeks CYES Energy Specialists will return to remove the recording devices and provide to LBNL researchers for analysis. The data collected by CYES will directly influence the US Department of Energy’s appliance standards and help improve energy efficiency requirements for household appliances in the future.
This exciting research project is a component of SPARK: Innovation Education, a partnership of students, educators, scientists, and policy analysts who are working together to promote sustainable resource use through hands-on classroom experience. SPARK aims to make the examination of energy use and efficiency fun and engaging by providing young people with tools to investigate energy consumption in their own lives. CYES will play a critical role in this project by providing real-life data from a demographically diverse range of households throughout the Bay Area.
CYES looks forward to increasing its impact in the energy efficiency field, now through hands-on data collection and research. CYES has always been proud of creating tangible energy savings through direct installation of energy efficiency measures, but is excited to contribute to a different element of energy efficiency. Through this project, CYES youth will gain valuable research skills and exposure to the process of governmental regulations and standards. Stay tuned to learn more about the project implementation this summer, the study’s results, and its influence on future federal appliance standards.
