CHP REGIONAL APPLICATION CENTERS: ACTIVITIES AND SELECTED RESULTS
- ORNL
Between 2001 and 2005, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) created a set of eight Regional Application Centers (RACs) to facilitate the development and deployment of Combined Heat and Power (CHP) technologies. By utilizing the thermal energy that is normally wasted when electricity is produced at central generating stations, Combined Heat and Power installations can save substantial amounts of energy compared to more traditional technologies. In addition, the location of CHP facilities at or near the point of consumption greatly reduces or eliminates electric transmission and distribution losses. The regional nature of the RACs allows each one to design and provide services that are most relevant to the specific economic and market conditions in its particular geographic area. Between them, the eight RACs provide services to all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Through the end of the federal 2009 fiscal year (FY 2009), the primary focus of the RACs was on providing CHP-related information to targeted markets, encouraging the creation and adoption of public policies and incentives favorable to CHP, and providing CHP users and prospective users with technical assistance and support on specific projects. Beginning with the 2010 fiscal year, the focus of the regional centers broadened to include district energy and waste heat recovery and these entities became formally known as Clean Energy Application Centers, as required by the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007. In 2007, ORNL led a cooperative effort to establish metrics to quantify the RACs accomplishments. That effort began with the development of a detailed logic model describing RAC operations and outcomes, which provided a basis for identifying important activities and accomplishments to track. A data collection spreadsheet soliciting information on those activities for FY 2008 and all previous years of RAC operations was developed and sent to the RACs in the summer of 2008. This represents the first systematic attempt at RAC program measurement in a manner consistent with approaches used for other efforts funded by DOE's Industrial Technologies Program (ITP). In addition, data on CHP installations and associated effects were collected for the same years from a state-by-state database maintained for DOE by ICF international. A report documenting the findings of that study was produced in September, 2009. The purpose of the current report is to present the findings from a new study of RAC activities and accomplishments which examined what the Centers did in FY 2009, the last year in which they concentrated exclusively on CHP technologies. This study focused on identifying and describing RAC activities and was not designed to measure how those efforts influenced CHP installations or other outcomes.
- Research Organization:
- Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
- DOE Contract Number:
- DE-AC05-00OR22725
- OSTI ID:
- 984396
- Report Number(s):
- ORNL/TM-2010/148; ED1905020; CEED210; TRN: US201016%%1450
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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