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This report presents the estimated impact of lighting and cooling efficiency and demand flexibility measures in large office buildings in each state in the contiguous United States. It provides modeled results for three different metrics: bill savings, regional grid operational costs savings, and carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions reductions. Lighting efficiency and demand flexibility are estimated to reduce load by up to 80 MWh/yr in a single large office building. These load reductions result in customer bill savings of up to $8,800/yr per building, with the highest savings in southern and midwestern states. Grid operating cost savings are estimated at upmore » to $3,240/yr/building, with greatest benefit in southern and northeastern states. CO₂ emissions reduction potential is highest in the Dakotas, Nebraska, across the Midwest, in West Virginia, and in Mississippi (<48,200 kg/yr/building). Comparatively, cooling measures are found to have less load reduction potential (<28.5 MWh/yr/building), with the greatest potential in southern states including Texas, which ranks top of the list across several of the metrics studied. In numerous states, shifting cooling load to off-peak hours is found to increase costs and CO₂ emissions because precooling results in increased load during high-cost or high-CO₂ emissions periods. In general, focusing on cooling efficiency and load shedding has the potential for more savings. In all cases, the specific rate structure is a significant determinant in actual bill savings, which are up to $4,000/yr/building. To realize the full potential for bill savings through an energy measure, building operators must identify how the measure will change the building load pattern and the interaction of this load change with the applicable rate tariff. To realize CO₂ emissions reductions, industry and state coordination is needed to verify which fuel source is on the margin and then to create incentives for end users to reduce load during high-CO₂ emissions hours. Regular updates to data sets and analyses are critical. Regulators and policymakers are well positioned to facilitate the necessary coordination between the electric industry and building energy managers to develop appropriate price signals and incentives.« less

The emission reduction benefits of EVs are dependent on the time and location of charging. An analysis of battery electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles under four charging scenarios and five electricity grid profiles shows that CO2 emissions are highly dependent on the percentage of fossil fuels in the grid mix. Availability of workplace charging generally results in lower emissions, while restricting charging to off-peak hours results in higher total emissions.

Utilities are proposing changes to residential rate structures to address concerns about lost revenue due to increased adoption of distributed solar generation. An investigation of the impacts of increased fixed charges, minimum bills and residential demand charges on PV and non-PV customer bills suggests that minimum bills more accurately capture utilities' revenue requirement than fixed charges, while not acting as a disincentive to efficiency or negatively impacting low-income customers.