WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released its 2011 Strategic Plan, a comprehensive blueprint to guide the agency’s core mission of ensuring America’s security and prosperity by addressing its energy, environmental, and nuclear challenges through transformative science and technology solutions.

The DOE Strategic Plan is organized into four distinct categories, representing the broad cross-cutting and collaborative efforts taking place across the department’s headquarters, site offices and national laboratories. It also covers four objectives the agency has, which the plan says the department will achieve the following:

1. Enforce the standards [the DOE has] in place.

2. Review minimum appliance efficiency standards at least every five years.

3. Develop standards and processes to address the entire spectrum of energy intensities for a given product class, not just the least (or most) efficient limits.

4. Leverage precompetitive research and development to understand the potential and limits for new technologies to improve building, appliance, vehicle, and industrial efficiency while providing economic benefits.”

The plan also states, “The department will develop efficiency standards and test procedures to address at least 75 percent of the energy used in the building sector. In addition to appliance standards, the department will use a variety of other mechanisms to achieve significant savings in the 40 percent of U.S. energy that is consumed in buildings and the 30 percent used in industry. The department will advance new approaches for improving the efficiency of our nation’s homes, buildings, and facilities.”

The plan’s targeted outcomes are:

• “DOE and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development will work together to enable the cost-effective energy retrofits of a total of 1.1 million housing units by the end of fiscal year (FY) 2013. DOE programs will contribute to retrofits of an estimated 1 million housing units (High Priority Performance Goal).

• Facilitate the transition to a more energy-efficient economy by establishing or updating efficiency standards and best practices, including at least six appliance standards annually and establishing an American National Standards Institute-accredited commercial and industrial energy-efficiency certification process by 2015.”

Publication date: 07/18/2011