The US-DoE is seeking to develop a consortium of commercial building professionals and industry stakeholders as a vehicle to help accelerate the commercialisation of the DoE’s high performance building technologies.  The DoE issued a Funding Opportunity Announcement on 29 May and will select the consortium at the end of 2009.  The establishment of the consortium was a key requirement of the 2007 Energy and Independence Security Act.

The consortium is an element of the DoE’s Net Zero Energy Commercial Building Initiative (CBI), whose objective is to develop the technologies to enable the delivery of net zero energy commercial buildings by 2025.  The consortium will support the CBI’s objectives by increasing the diffusion and uptake rate of current and next generation technologies that will impact building components and systems.  The DoE will also be able to access the consortium members’ technical expertise and promote the demonstration of high performance building technologies.

The consortium will need to demonstrate the expertise to shift the market to net zero energy in five key building markets: commercial, retail, hospitals, higher education and state/local government.  Partner companies will be required to demonstrate leadership in one or more of the following areas: HVAC, envelope design, materials, windows, lighting, mechanical systems, energy management and intelligent control systems, on-building and onsite renewables technologies, air quality, sensors and fuel cells.