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.

Publications

Publications By Research Area

2006

Lee, Eleanor S, and Stephen E Selkowitz."The New York Times Headquarters Daylighting Mockup: Monitored Performance of the Daylighting Control System."Energy & Buildings 38 (2006) 914-929.

Nouidui, Thierry Stephane, Christoph Nytsch-Geusen, and Andreas Holm."Validierung der eindimensionalen hygrothermischen Wandmodelle der Modelica-Bibliothek "BuildingPhysicsLibrary"."BauSIM 2006 (2006) pp.144-146.

Shaughnessy, Richard J, and Richard G Sextro."What is an Effective Air Cleaning Device? A Review."Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene 3.4 (2006) 169-181. DOI

Apte, Joshua S, and Dariush K Arasteh."Window-Related Energy Consumption in the US Residential and Commercial Building Stock." (2006).

2005

Zhou, Nan, Masaru Nishida, Weijun Gao, and Chris Marnay."Assessment of Distributed Energy Adoption in Commercial Buildings. Part 1: An Analysis of Policy, Building loads, Tariff Design, and Technology Development."Bulletin of The Faculty of Engineering Kyushu Sangyo University 42 (2005) 8.

Levinson, Ronnen M, Paul H Berdahl, Asmeret A Berhe, and Hashem Akbari."Effects of soiling and cleaning on the reflectance and solar heat gain of a light-colored roofing membrane."Atmospheric Environment 39.40 (2005) 7807-7824. DOI

Levinson, Ronnen M, Paul H Berdahl, and Hashem Akbari."Solar spectral optical properties of pigments—Part I: model for deriving scattering and absorption coefficients from transmittance and reflectance measurements."Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells 89.4 (2005) 319-349. DOI

Levinson, Ronnen M, Paul H Berdahl, and Hashem Akbari."Solar spectral optical properties of pigments—Part II: survey of common colorants."Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells 89.4 (2005) 351-389. DOI

Zhou, Nan, Chris Marnay, Ryan M Firestone, Weijun Gao, and Masaru Nishida."An Optimization and Assessment on DG Adoption in Japanese Prototype Buildings."International Symposium on Sustainable Development of the Asian City Environment (SDACE) 2005 (2005).

Bhattacharya, Prajesh, Patrick E Phelan, and Ravi S Prasher."Computational Analysis of the Colloidal Stability of Nanofluids."International Mechanical Engineering Congress & Exposition (2005).

Nara, S, Prajesh Bhattacharya, P Vijayan, W . Y. Lai, W Rosenthal, Patrick E Phelan, Ravi S Prasher, David W Song, and Jinlin Wang."Experimental Determination of the Effect of Varying Base Fluid and Temperature on the Static Thermal Conductivity of Nanofluids."ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, November 5-11, 2005 (2005). DOI

Payne, Christopher T, and Beverly Dyer."Federal Participation in LEED in 2005."Greenbuild Expo 2005 (2005).

Yang, Yongwen, Weijun Gao, Yingjun Ruan, Ji Xuan, Nan Zhou, and Chris Marnay."Optimal Model of Distributed Energy System by Using GAMS and Case Study."International Symposium on Sustainable Development of the Asian City Environment (SDACE) 2005 (2005).

Curtil, Dimitri, Chris Marnay, Michael Stadler, Nan Zhou, Ryan M Firestone, and Judy Lai."Distributed Energy Enabling Technologies: Site Energy Simulation." (2005).

Akbari, Hashem, Ronnen M Levinson, and Leo I Rainer."Monitoring the energy-use effects of cool roofs on California commercial buildings."Energy and Buildings 37.10 (2005) 1007-1016. DOI

Matson, Nance, and Mary Ann Piette."Review of California and National Methods for Energy Performance Benchmarking of Commercial Buildings." (2005).

Akbari, Hashem, Asmeret A Berhe, Ronnen M Levinson, Stanley Graveline, Kevin Foley, Ana H Delgado, and Ralph M Paroli."Aging and Weathering of Cool Roofing Membranes." (2005).

Morrissey, Elmer, Marcus Keane, James O'Donnell, and John F McCarthy."Building Effectiveness Communication Ratios for Improved Building Life Cycle Management."IBPSA Building Simulation Conference 2005 (2005).

Crawley, Drury B, Jon W Hand, Michael Kummert, and Brent T Griffith."Contrasting the Capabilities of Building Energy Performance Simulation Programs."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

Carroll, William L, and Robert J Hitchcock."DElight2 Daylighting Analysis in Energy Plus: Integration and Preliminary User Results."Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

da Graça, Guilherme Carrilho, Paul F Linden, and Martha Brook."Design of the Natural Ventilation System for the New San Diego Children's Museum."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

Hand, Jon W, Drury B Crawley, Michael Donn, and Linda K Lawrie."Improving the Data Available to Simulation Programs."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

Fisher, Daniel E, and Simon J Rees."Modeling Ground Source Heat Pump Systems in a Building Energy Simulation Program (EnergyPlus)."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

Mehta, Mohit."Natural Ventilation Analysis of an Office Building with Open Atrium."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).

Wurtz, Etienne, Chadi Maalouf, Laurent Mora, and Francis Allard."Parametric Analysis of a Solar Desiccant Cooling System using the SimSPARK Environment."IBPSA Building Simulation 2005 (2005).