RMI Carbon-Free Buildings

You may be wondering: what’s with all the buzz I keep hearing about heat pumps?     As IRA incentives continue to roll out, heat pumps are one of the many ways households are electrifying their lives and creating a better climate future for generations to come. If you’re curious about how heat pumps and electric water heaters stack up against gas furnaces and water heaters, check out RMI’s new data hub on the heat pump and water heater market in the U.S.    Learn More 👉 https://lnkd.in/gzi3MfJf

Who says playing SimCity doesn’t prepare you for real life? RMI and Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning’s Environmental System Lab (ESL) helped the City of Ithaca, N.Y. build digital energy models of over 5,000 buildings to help plan how to electrify its entire building stock to reach city-wide carbon neutrality by 2030. The ESL’s automated Urban Building Energy Model (UBEM) tested the most common building retrofit measures to identify the optimal combinations for each building individually. And RMI’s Green Upgrade Calculator provided the framework to understand the cost and environmental benefits. The Ithaca buildings analysis offers three crucial lessons for other cities looking to conduct large-scale electrification projects: • Improve the building envelope* before electrifying • Pair solar installation with electrification • Align with community priorities Learn more: https://bit.ly/3BXT8ih *The building envelope refers to all components – walls, windows and doors, floors, roofs, etc. – that separate the indoors from the outdoors.

What a great final morning breakfast panel for Day 3 at the #ASHRAE Decarbonizing Tall Existing Buildings conference! Fascinating candid conversation on the Business Case for Large Building Decarbonization among Lauren Moss, Emily Kildow, and Brodie Boland, led masterfully by Charlotte Matthews. Big thanks to the panel, and some great questions from conference participants.

🆕: In the last few years, communities across the United States have increasingly faced climate-driven hardship — from extreme cold in Texas, to heat waves and wildfires nationwide, to the devastating Hurricanes Helene and Milton earlier this month. Power outages following extreme weather events threaten lives and are one of many reasons why prioritizing both resilience and decarbonization in building design, codes, and policies is paramount. RMI's Xinxin H., Emma Hines, and Mike Henchen offer a fresh look at the existing opportunities to better integrate resilience and building decarbonization through two key pillars of passive and active measures that include better sealing and insulation, battery storage, electrification, and more. ⬇️ 🔗 https://lnkd.in/gsz-rsVx

We recognize the crucial importance of lifecycle refrigerant management and its role in shaping the circular economy for reclaimed refrigerants. It was a pleasure to welcome Liane Randolph, Chair of the California Air Resources Board, to discuss the key findings of our latest report with RMI, highlighting how reclaimed refrigerants are a vital solution to meet the growing demand and support our expanding population. #ClimateWeekNYC #RMI #HDSN

Are you a building pro who wants to step up to tackle climate change? Tune in today at 11:30 ET to Passive House Accelerator's online conference examining how buildings can be a powerful climate solution. Bonus: hear from our very own Chris Magwood! Register to join 👉 https://ow.ly/jPvq50TBu3u

💥 Clean construction has all the momentum! RMI recently had the pleasure of partnering with The White House and Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) to host a series of high-impact regional convenings to spur low-carbon solutions and technologies for the concrete industry. As part of this initiative, the Administration announced several ambitious low-carbon concrete pledges yesterday by leading states, cities, builders, and suppliers to take action to solve this critical climate issue, create thousands of jobs, and boost clean manufacturing. 🔗 Read the fact sheet: https://lnkd.in/ev8f_3Ua 📰 Read “White House cements ‘clean' construction deal with states, industry” in E&E News: https://lnkd.in/ecCCwfrP Check out the photos below, which include a ribbon cutting hosted by WS Development and Sublime Systems for the first commercial installations of Sublime's low-carbon cement in Boston’s largest net-zero-carbon office building. City of Los Angeles, City of New York, City of Boston, NYSERDA, BXP, Inc., Heidelberg Materials, National Ready Mixed Concrete Co., Turner Construction Company, Ozinga, Cemex, Third Derivative, Open Compute Project Foundation, NYS Office of General Services, U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), GSA, State of Washington, State of Michigan, C-Crete Technologies, Urban Mining Industries - Pozzotive®, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Prometheus Materials, CarbonCure Technologies, Clark Pacific, Weldon Development Group

If I could " 👍 " something 1,000x it would be this new resource from RMI on the business case for embodied carbon (read here: https://lnkd.in/ge95chTm). This is my favorite kind of resource. It's insightful, digestible, and actionable--and chalked full of loads of interesting links and resources! Please share!! Awesome work from two awesome people! Well done, Auri Bukauskas, PhD and Anish Tilak.

Join EEBA for an upcoming webinar next Tuesday: Innovation and Experience with Various All-in-One Mechanical Systems to Streamline Retrofit Electrification in Single Family and Multifamily In this webinar, researchers and practitioners will share about innovations and experience with emerging system design strategies that advance efficient electrification of single family and multifamily buildings. 📅 Date: October 15th ⏰ Time: 2:00 - 3:00 PM CT 🔷 Register here: https://lnkd.in/gTQ6MpHB Learning objectives: - Introduce and discuss combined mechanical equipment both in development for and available in the US residential building market today. - Understand installation experience, system performance, and serviceability from case studies of equipment installations in occupied apartments. - Compare and contrast with conventional mechanical equipment retrofits, and evaluate market applicability for these products. - Share lessons learned from field demonstration research on product design for manufacturers, system design for building owners and design teams, and installation procedures for contractors.

📰 Weekend Read: As temperatures rise globally, the number of air conditioners around the world is expected to skyrocket, especially in the Global South. But the most commonly sold AC units are energy-intensive, use refrigerants with high Global Warming Potential, and don’t effectively address a key factor: humidity. RMI is helping lead the charge on next-generation AC units that efficiently tackle both temperature and humidity, while using about 75% less energy than traditional models. As RMI cooling expert Ankit Kalanki recently told The Washington Post’s Allyson Chiu for a new series on cutting-edge technologies to displace the world’s biggest sources of climate pollution, the Global Cooling Prize-winning prototypes could provide households with vastly more consistent, comfortable cooling and lower electricity bills. “We must switch and try to accelerate the market toward these super-efficient ACs now,” Kalanki said. “Otherwise, we will be adding a large number of inefficient units that will only contribute to this vicious loop of warming.” Learn more about how RMI, CEPT Research and Development Foundation, Clean Cooling Collaborative and other partners are working to solve this challenge in India.👇