| Building Technology and Urban Systems

About Us +
Researchers in the Building Technology & Urban Systems Division (BTUS) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory develop data and technologies that increase energy efficiency and improve the health, safety and comfort of building occupants, in the United States and worldwide.

We work closely with industry partners, academics and government officials to achieve these goals, and share our research widely
Research +
We are at the forefront of cutting-edge research that redefines building technology and explores all areas of urban systems.

We have been leaders for decades in developing energy-efficient windows, improving indoor air quality, coming up with new ideas to fix the nation's electricity grid, and so much more.

Visit our research areas at the right to find out more.
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Publications +
Enjoy presentations from Building Technology & Urban systems research experts on a wide variety of topics in the areas of building energy efficiency, the electricity grid and how it relates to buildings and much more.
- Presentations
News
Tools & Guides +
Explore our tools, guidebooks and software and download for free.

We offer a variety of technologies designed to simulate and model real-world circumstances to assist in energy-saving programs and help building owners build better buildings. These tools can help calculate performance of building systems like windows and shades, help consumers and builders pick the best windows for a variety of applications and much more.

2009

Coffey, Brian E, Sam Borgeson, Stephen E Selkowitz, Joshua S Apte, Paul A Mathew, and Philip Haves."Towards a Very Low Energy Building Stock: Modeling the US Commercial Building Stock to Support Policy and Innovation Planning."Building Research and Information 37:5 (2009).

2008

Hong, Tianzhen, Dale A Sartor, Paul A Mathew, and Mehry Yazdanian."Comparisons of HVAC Simulations between EnergyPlus and DOE-2.2 for data centers."ASHRAE Conference 115 Part 1 (2008).

Raustad, Richard, Mangesh Basarkar, and Robin K Vieira."Reducing Energy Use In Florida Buildings."16th Symposium on Improving Building Systems in Hot and Humid Climates, December 15-17, 2008 (2008).

Bhattacharya, Prajesh."Unlocking Historical Data in Critical IT."Data Center Dynamics Focus (2008).

Najafi, Massieh, David M Auslander, Peter L Bartlett, and Philip Haves."Fault Diagnostics and Supervised Testing: How Fault Diagnostic tools can be Proactive?."Eleventh International Conference on Intelligent Systems and Controls (2008).

Najafi, Massieh, David M Auslander, Peter L Bartlett, and Philip Haves."Overcoming the Complexity of Diagnostic Problems due to Sensor Network Architecture."Eleventh International Conference on Intelligent Systems and Controls (2008).

Akbari, Hashem, and Arthur H Rosenfeld."White roofs cool the world, directly offset CO₂ and delay global warming."Research Highlights (2008).

Najafi, Massieh, David M Auslander, Peter L Bartlett, and Philip Haves."Application of Machine Learning in Fault Diagnostics of Mechanical Systems."International Conference on Modeling, Simulation and Control (2008).

Sanchez, Marla C, Gregory K Homan, and Richard E Brown."Calendar Year 2007 Program Benefits for ENERGY STAR Labeled Products." (2008).

Akbari, Hashem, Surabi Menon, and Arthur H Rosenfeld."Equivalent CO₂ avoided by reflective roofs and pavements in California."Memo to California Air Resources Board (2008).

Keller, Martin, James O'Donnell, Karsten Menzel, Marcus Keane, and Ufuk Gökçe."Integrating the Specification, Acquisition and Processing of Building Performance Information."12th International Conference on Computing in Civil and Building Engineering (2008).

Brown, Richard E, Sam Borgeson, Jonathan G Koomey, and Peter J Biermayer."U.S. Building-Sector Energy Efficiency Potential." (2008).

Wetter, Michael, and Philip Haves."A Modular Building Controls Virtual Test Bed for the Integration of Heterogeneous Systems."SimBuild 2008, July 30-August 1 (2008).

Endrino, Jose L, Jose F Marco, Phitsanu Poolcharuansin, Ayalasomayajula R Phani, Matthew Allen, José M Albella, and André Anders."Functionalization of Hydrogen-free Diamond-like Carbon Films using Open-air Dielectric Barrier Discharge Atmospheric Plasma Treatments."Applied Surface Science 254.17 (2008). DOI

Jonsson, Jacob C, Eleanor S Lee, and Michael D Rubin."Light-scattering properties of a woven shade-screen material used for daylighting and solar heat-gain control."SPIE Optics+Photonics (2008).

Andersson, Joakim, Arutiun P Ehiasarian, and André Anders."Observation of Ti4+ ions in a high power impulse magnetron sputtering plasma."Applied Physics Letters 93.7 (2008) 71504. DOI

Homan, Gregory K, Marla C Sanchez, and Richard E Brown."Savings Estimates for the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s ENERGY STAR Voluntary Product Labeling Program."2008 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings (2008).

Rubinstein, Francis M, Dmitriy Bolotov, Mark S Levi, Kevin Powell, and Peter Schwartz."The Advantage of Highly Controlled Lighting for Offices and Commercial Buildings."2008 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings, August 17-22, 2008 (2008) 063901(1-5).

Wetter, Michael, Philip Haves, Michael A Moshier, and Edward F Sowell."Using SPARK as a solver for Modelica."Proceedings of the 3rd SimBuild Conference (2008).

Wetter, Michael."A Modelica-Based Model Library for Building Energy and Control Systems."Building Simulation '09 (2008).

McGibney, Alan, Martin Klepal, and James O'Donnell."Design of Underlying Network Infrastructure of Smart Buildings."2008 IET 4th International Conference on Intelligent Environments (2008).

Bazjanac, Vladimir."IFC BIM-based Methodology for Semi-Automated Building Energy Performance Simulation."CIB W78, Proc. 25th conf (2008).

Richardson, Thomas J."Phase transitions in non-hydride switchable mirror thin films."Phase Transitions 81.7-8 (2008) 807 - 813. DOI

Akbari, Hashem, Ronnen M Levinson, and Stephanie Stern."Procedure for measuring the solar reflectance of flat or curved roofing assemblies."Solar Energy 82.7 (2008) 648-655. DOI

O'Donnell, James, Marcus Keane, and Vladimir Bazjanac."Specification of an Information Delivery Tool to Support Optimal Holistic Environmental and Energy Management in Buildings."SimBuild 2008 (2008).