Paul Reale
Director of Building Operations Research
Co-Director, Training
CUNY Building Performance Lab

Paul Reale manages projects with key enabling technologies that improve building operational energy efficiency. Before joining BPL, Paul’s private consulting practice involved a wide range of issues regarding building sustainability and energy efficiency, including specific building projects, free cooling of electronics, green leasing techniques and extensive work as an instructor. Among many audiences and topics, Paul has taught building operators about sustainable and energy efficient practices, as well as having taught architects and engineers about energy code. He also guides teachers in enhancing their instruction techniques, and over the years he has spoken publicly on related issues and at countless venues.
Paul also founded a unique energy efficiency start-up that he ran for several years that focused on residential energy with utilities as his clients.
Paul’s experience started at Bell Laboratories, where he assumed varied engineering and managerial roles. He holds a Masters of Mechanical Engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology, and he is a LEED AP. Given his knowledge of building performance and by teaching literally thousands of building operators, Paul finds that the extent of opportunities for no-cost energy savings boggles the mind.

Mary Ann Piette, Senior Scientist
Director of the Building Technology & Urban Systems Division
& Director of the Demand Response Research Center
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

Profile: Mary Ann Piette is a Senior Scientist and the Director of the Building Technology and Urban Systems Division in the Energy Technologies Area at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She oversees LBNL's building energy research activities with the U.S. Department of Energy, and she is also the Director of the Demand Response Research Center. Mary Ann's work involves developing and evaluating new technology and building components, windows, controls, operations, simulation, whole building and electric load shape analysis and behavior. Her Division also conducts research in data center energy efficiency, industrial energy efficiency, and federal energy management. Mary Ann has authored over 90 peer reviewed publications related to energy efficiency and demand response and has worked at LBNL since 1983. She is a board member of the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy and of the OpenADR Alliance. Mary Ann has an MS in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley and a Licentiate in Building Services Engineering from the Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden.

Peter Crabtree
Principal Investigator, BEST Center California Institute for Energy and Environment (CIEE)-CITRIS.
UC Berkeley

Peter Crabtree is the PI for the NSF ATE Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow (BEST) Center now based at the California Institute of Energy and Environment (CIEE) and the Center for Information Technology in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) at UC Berkeley. After 17 years as the Dean of Instruction for Career Education at Laney College, Mr. Crabtree joins CIEE as a Visiting Project Scientist. The BEST Center provides resources and professional development for college faculty to support the education of the technical workforce in HVAC, Building Automation Systems, and Energy Management and Efficiency. BEST is completing development of a national certification for high performance building technicians, benchmarking industry-validated knowledge and skills standards in the sector.

With 35+ years of experience in workforce development and community engagement, Mr. Crabtree has directed numerous workforce and research projects including 18 years as an NSF PI with BEST Center and its predecessor projects as well as PI or Director for projects for the Department of Energy, the Department of Labor, the California Employment Development Department, the California Community Colleges, the California Workforce Development Board, the Bechtel Foundation, and the Microsoft Corporation.

He has an MA in Political Science with an emphasis in public policy and political economics from UC Riverside. He was a Lincoln-Juarez Graduate Fellow at the Universidad Nacionál Autónoma de México.

Peter Crabtree
Principal Investigator, BEST Center California Institute for Energy and Environment (CIEE)-CITRIS.
UC Berkeley

Peter Crabtree is the PI for the NSF ATE Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow (BEST) Center now based at the California Institute of Energy and Environment (CIEE) and the Center for Information Technology in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) at UC Berkeley. After 17 years as the Dean of Instruction for Career Education at Laney College, Mr. Crabtree joins CIEE as a Visiting Project Scientist. The BEST Center provides resources and professional development for college faculty to support the education of the technical workforce in HVAC, Building Automation Systems, and Energy Management and Efficiency. BEST is completing development of a national certification for high performance building technicians, benchmarking industry-validated knowledge and skills standards in the sector.

With 35+ years of experience in workforce development and community engagement, Mr. Crabtree has directed numerous workforce and research projects including 18 years as an NSF PI with BEST Center and its predecessor projects as well as PI or Director for projects for the Department of Energy, the Department of Labor, the California Employment Development Department, the California Community Colleges, the California Workforce Development Board, the Bechtel Foundation, and the Microsoft Corporation.

He has an MA in Political Science with an emphasis in public policy and political economics from UC Riverside. He was a Lincoln-Juarez Graduate Fellow at the Universidad Nacionál Autónoma de México.

Mary Ann Piette, Senior Scientist
Director of the Building Technology & Urban Systems Division
& Director of the Demand Response Research Center
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

Profile: Mary Ann Piette is a Senior Scientist and the Director of the Building Technology and Urban Systems Division in the Energy Technologies Area at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She oversees LBNL's building energy research activities with the U.S. Department of Energy, and she is also the Director of the Demand Response Research Center. Mary Ann's work involves developing and evaluating new technology and building components, windows, controls, operations, simulation, whole building and electric load shape analysis and behavior. Her Division also conducts research in data center energy efficiency, industrial energy efficiency, and federal energy management. Mary Ann has authored over 90 peer reviewed publications related to energy efficiency and demand response and has worked at LBNL since 1983. She is a board member of the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy and of the OpenADR Alliance. Mary Ann has an MS in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley and a Licentiate in Building Services Engineering from the Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden.

Peter Crabtree
"Principal Investigator, BEST Center California Institute for Energy and Environment (CIEE)-CITRIS "
UC Berkeley

Profile: Peter Crabtree is the PI for the NSF ATE Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow (BEST) Center now based at the California Institute of Energy and Environment (CIEE) and the Center for Information Technology in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) at UC Berkeley. After 17 years as the Dean of Instruction for Career Education at Laney College, Mr. Crabtree joins CIEE as a Visiting Project Scientist. The BEST Center provides resources and professional development for college faculty to support the education of the technical workforce in HVAC, Building Automation Systems, and Energy Management and Efficiency. BEST is completing development of a national certification for high performance building technicians, benchmarking industry-validated knowledge and skills standards in the sector.

With 35+ years of experience in workforce development and community engagement, Mr. Crabtree has directed numerous workforce and research projects including 18 years as an NSF PI with BEST Center and its predecessor projects as well as PI or Director for projects for the Department of Energy, the Department of Labor, the California Employment Development Department, the California Community Colleges, the California Workforce Development Board, the Bechtel Foundation, and the Microsoft Corporation.

He has an MA in Political Science with an emphasis in public policy and political economics from UC Riverside. He was a Lincoln-Juarez Graduate Fellow at the Universidad Nacionál Autónoma de México

Peter Crabtree
BEST Principal Investigator, Dean of Career & Technical Education
Laney College, Oakland, CA

Building engineers and technicians are tasked with operating buildings to assure occupants’ safety and comfort. In addition, these technical professionals must apply their knowledge and skill within an increasingly complex and challenging environment driven by new technology in equipment and operating systems coupled with the drive for more efficient facilities and new concerns about preserving healthy building operations.

Technical building professionals must effectively use building systems to collect and analyze data and problem solve. They are called upon to take a proactive approach, not only toward maintaining systems but also toward continually improving building operations to meet high performance goals such as net-zero carbon.

Higher level knowledge and skills are required to meet these challenges. Recognizing this, BEST Center has been developing a national certification for high performance building operations technical professionals. This session discusses industry needs, the background behind developing the certification, and the effort to provide guidance to colleges and other training providers for aligning curriculum to meet the need for this new certification.

Profile: Peter Crabtree has over 30 years of experience in community and workforce development. He has been the Dean of Career and Technical Education at Laney College for the past 14 years and worked for eleven years at the Peralta District Office leading local and regional career technical education program development as well as contract education. Dean Crabtree’s portfolio at Laney College includes multiple skilled trades departments, advanced manufacturing, Engineering, Construction Management, Architecture, workforce grants management, apprenticeships, cooperative education, and career center operations.

Dean Crabtree is the Principal Investigator for a National Science Foundation national Center of Excellence, “Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow” (BEST). BEST works with colleges across the U.S. to support and develop career preparation programs in energy management and efficiency, high-performance building operations, building automation systems, and commercial HVAC. He is a recognized expert in sustainability education and is a frequent speaker at national and regional events.

Dean Crabtree has broad experience working with industry advisory groups and leading and guiding faculty teams in program and curriculum design and development in technical fields. Dean Crabtree is ABD for a PhD in Political Science at the University of California, Riverside and has an MA from UCR. He was a Lincoln-Juarez Fellow at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and is fluent in Spanish.

Ted Wilinski, PE, BEST Co-PI & lead instructor
Automated Building Systems
Milwaukee Area Technical College, Milwaukee, WI

Building engineers and technicians are tasked with operating buildings to assure occupants’ safety and comfort. In addition, these technical professionals must apply their knowledge and skill within an increasingly complex and challenging environment driven by new technology in equipment and operating systems coupled with the drive for more efficient facilities and new concerns about preserving healthy building operations.

Technical building professionals must effectively use building systems to collect and analyze data and problem solve. They are called upon to take a proactive approach, not only toward maintaining systems but also toward continually improving building operations to meet high performance goals such as net-zero carbon.

Higher level knowledge and skills are required to meet these challenges. Recognizing this, BEST Center has been developing a national certification for high performance building operations technical professionals. This session discusses industry needs, the background behind developing the certification, and the effort to provide guidance to colleges and other training providers for aligning curriculum to meet the need for this new certification.

Profile: Mr. Wilinski has had a career of working on energy management and facilities operations, including as a consulting engineer and educator specializing in facilities and energy management. At Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC) Mr. Wilinski has developed over 20 courses and currently teaches in the Automated Building Systems program, which includes controls, M&V, Energy Auditing, and Commissioning. In addition to teaching at MATC, he works on an NSF ATE grant, the BEST Center, and still does work as a consultant for his firm, Wilinski Associates Inc

Ken Walz, PhD
CREATE PI & Renewable Energy Faculty
Madison Area Technical College

Dr. Walz earned his B.S. degree in science education and Ph.D. in Environmental Chemistry and Technology at the University of Wisconsin. He has taught chemistry, engineering, and renewable energy at Madison Area Technical College since 2003.

From 2005-2016, Dr. Walz was project director and principal investigator for the Consortium for Education in Renewable Energy Technology (CERET). With funding from the National Science Foundation, CERET pioneered some of the first online renewable energy courses available in the United States. In the past decade, CERET has provided professional development for over 300 high school and community college instructors in photovoltaics and biofuel technology. These instructors have used CERET content and pedagogy to deliver their own renewable energy programs in over 42 U.S. States and Territories.

Dr. Walz is an alumnus of the Department of Energy Academies Creating Teacher Scientists (DOE ACTS) Program at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). He is also an adjunct professor with the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Wisconsin and an advisory board member for the Wisconsin K-12 Energy Education Program (KEEP). Dr. Walz has been recognized as Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, and as the Energy Educator of the Year by the Wisconsin Association for Environmental Education.

William P. Bahnfleth, PhD, PE, ASHRAE Fellow
Professor of Architectural Engineering
The Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA

Contact Information: wbahnfleth@psu.edu

With the exception of healthcare facilities and some specialized environments, the vast majority of buildings are not designed with infection risk mitigation as an explicit strategy. The criteria used to define acceptable indoor air quality in such buildings that is employed in typical ventilation standards is safety with respect to chemical and particulate air contaminants and control of odors to achieve occupant satisfaction. The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed that this definition is inadequate if buildings are expected to provide good protection from airborne infectious disease transmission. It can be expected that, in the wake of the pandemic, ventilation standards such as ASHRAE Standard 62.1 Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality will change in ways intended to provide better protection from the next epidemic – or flu season. This presentation will summarize key background on airborne disease transmission, review current ventilation and filtration requirements of ASHRAE Standard 62.1 from the perspective of airborne transmission risk mitigation, and speculate about possible future changes resulting from the pandemic experience.

Profile: William Bahnfleth is a professor of architectural engineering at the Pennsylvania State University. He held previous positions as Senior Consultant for ZBA, Inc. in Cincinnati, OH and Principal Investigator at the U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratory in Champaign, IL. He holds BS, MS, and PhD degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois and is a registered professional engineer. At Penn State, Dr. Bahnfleth teaches undergraduate courses in HVAC fundamentals and system design, and graduate courses in district cooling systems and indoor air quality. His research interests cover a wide variety of indoor environmental control topics including chilled water pumping systems, stratified thermal energy storage, protection of building occupants from indoor bioaerosol releases, and ultraviolet germicidal irradiation systems. He is the author or co-author of more than 170 technical papers and articles and 14 books and book chapters. Dr. Bahnfleth is a fellow of ASHRAE, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the International Society for Indoor Air Quality and Climate (ISIAQ). He served as President of ASHRAE in 2013-2014. His ASHRAE honors include the Louise and Bill Holladay Distinguished Fellow Award, E.K. Campbell Award, and F. Paul Anderson Award. He is also a recipient of the Penn State Engineering Alumni Society’s World-Class Engineering Faculty Award.

Peter Crabtree
BEST Principal Investigator, Dean of Career & Technical Education
Laney College, Oakland, CA

Profile: Peter Crabtree has over 30 years of experience in community and workforce development. He has been the Dean of Career and Technical Education at Laney College for the past 14 years and worked for eleven years at the Peralta District Office leading local and regional career technical education program development as well as contract education. Dean Crabtree’s portfolio at Laney College includes multiple skilled trades departments, advanced manufacturing, Engineering, Construction Management, Architecture, workforce grants management, apprenticeships, cooperative education, and career center operations.

Dean Crabtree is the Principal Investigator for a National Science Foundation national Center of Excellence, “Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow” (BEST). BEST works with colleges across the U.S. to support and develop career preparation programs in energy management and efficiency, high-performance building operations, building automation systems, and commercial HVAC. He is a recognized expert in sustainability education and is a frequent speaker at national and regional events.

Dean Crabtree has broad experience working with industry advisory groups and leading and guiding faculty teams in program and curriculum design and development in technical fields. Dean Crabtree is ABD for a PhD in Political Science at the University of California, Riverside and has an MA from UCR. He was a Lincoln-Juarez Fellow at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and is fluent in Spanish.

Woody Delp, PhD, Mechanical Engineer
Indoor Environment Group
Building Technology & Urban Systems Division
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

This talk will cover Berkeley Lab’s work evaluating low-cost particle monitors with a focus on how good they are for wildfires and how they might be used for informing building operations. On-line sites (in particular purple air) will be discussed together work we have done on finding calibrations for on-line information sources to get the right particle concentrations for wildfire. The talk will cover mitigation methods with a focus on filtration systems in buildings and a discussion on the use of DIY filters.

Profile: Woody Delp has been at LBNL since 1995 and has worked in various project areas involving HVAC systems and how these systems actually operate in real buildings. His work has ranged from measuring duct leakage in light commercial buildings to understanding how pollutants move in large buildings. He is equally at home working with residential HVAC systems as well as systems found in the largest buildings. Woody Delp earned a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from University of Missouri Rolla in 1995. His graduate work involved modeling how much ventilation (outside air) comes into variable air volume (VAV) systems as they operate across a range of climates and seasons. Woody grew up in Rolla working in a family-owned HVAC contracting business. In his dad’s business he worked in every capacity, from service calls at a young age, to designing and installing complex systems for local laboratories. HVAC is very much in his blood.

Paul Ehrlich, PE
Founder and President
Building Intelligence Group

Building engineers and technicians are tasked with operating buildings to assure occupants’ safety and comfort. In addition, these technical professionals must apply their knowledge and skill within an increasingly complex and challenging environment driven by new technology in equipment and operating systems coupled with the drive for more efficient facilities and new concerns about preserving healthy building operations.

Technical building professionals must effectively use building systems to collect and analyze data and problem solve. They are called upon to take a proactive approach, not only toward maintaining systems but also toward continually improving building operations to meet high performance goals such as net-zero carbon.

Higher level knowledge and skills are required to meet these challenges. Recognizing this, BEST Center has been developing a national certification for high performance building operations technical professionals. This session discusses industry needs, the background behind developing the certification, and the effort to provide guidance to colleges and other training providers for aligning curriculum to meet the need for this new certification.

Profile: Paul Ehrlich is a well-known industry stakeholder and advocate of sustainable and intelligent buildings. In 2004, he formed Building Intelligence Group LLC, an independent consultancy whose primary purpose is to support and promote the delivery of high performance buildings. Services include systems assessment, master planning, training, and design for intelligent and sustainable building systems with a focus is in the areas of integrated systems, facility operations and enterprise management. Projects have been delivered for owners worldwide including major universities, corporations, and developers. Building Intelligence Group also provides market research and strategic planning services for leading system suppliers and organizations. Prior to forming Building Intelligence Group, Mr. Ehrlich held a series of corporate roles with Trane and Johnson Controls.

Throughout his career, Mr. Ehrlich has been actively involved with industry groups focused on the creation of new automation standards and technologies. Previous roles include chairing the ASHRAE Guideline 13 committee on how to specify DDC controls, chairing the BACnet sub-committee on interoperability, and acting as the inaugural chair for the oBIX committee to establish XML standards for building controls. He also served for eight years as an advisor to the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and is currently a board advisor for the World Orphan Fund.

At RealComm 2008, Mr. Ehrlich was honored with the Digie Digital Impact Award, recognizing a commitment and passion to advance the concept of next generation buildings. Previously he had been awarded the Buildy Vision Award for his perseverance in promoting whole building integration and interoperability through advocacy, promotion, educational and training endeavors.

Mr. Ehrlich has a Bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin and a Masters of Business Administration from the University of St. Thomas. He is a licensed professional engineer in the State of Wisconsin.

Milica Grahovac, PhD, Principal Scientific Engineering Associate
Energy Efficiency Standards Department & Simulation Research Group
Energy Analysis and Environmental Impacts Division
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

Contact Information: mgrahovac@lbl.gov

Control Description Language (CDL) is a declarative language for expressing control algorithms as block-diagrams that was developed by the Simulation Research Group of the Energy Technologies Area at Berkeley Lab. The CDL is a technology initiated in the scope of and used by the OpenBuildingControl (OBC) project that has a goal to revolutionize conventional building controls design and delivery process. The OBC project develops innovative technology and processes to digitize control design, verification, commissioning, and delivery.

In this presentation I will introduce you to the CDL by showing a few selected “words of the language”, that is, a few of the CDL basic blocks. I will also demonstrate the essence of simulation built using the CDL through a short demonstration.

The CDL is essentially a set of declarative elementary building blocks that represent either a physical (such as a sensor or an actuator) or a logical entity. The blocks can be composed into models, and this can be repeated hierarchically. The OBC project uses CDL blocks to create libraries of reference implementations of ASHRAE published Guideline 36 that features a number of high-performing control sequences for buildings. The OBC technology is already freely available through public code repositories. Additionally, the OBC team is currently developing a Sequence Configuration and Selection Tool that will make the OBC technology accessible and useful to the broader audience of control designers and energy modelers.

The processes invented in the scope of the OBC project hold significant potential to increase the energy efficiency of building controls in the commercial buildings sector. In the presentation, I will provide early estimates of the OBC technology environmental impact potential. In the final part of the presentation, I will introduce you to the ASHRAE standardization process for the CDL, which is currently in its early stages.

Profile: Milica Grahovac is a Principal Scientific Engineering Associate with the Energy Technologies Area at Berkeley Lab. She works with both the Energy Efficiency Standards, at the Energy Analysis and Environmental Impacts Division, and with the Simulation Research Group, at the Buildings Technologies and Urban Systems Division. Milica performs modeling, research, analysis, and develops sophisticated software tools at intersections of the fields of energy conservation standards, policy analysis, energy efficiency, renewable energy systems, HVAC systems and controls, and economy. She holds a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering with a focus on Energy Economy from The Technical University of Munich in Germany, and has a background in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Banja Luka in Bosnia and Herzegovina. She is a member of ASHRAE, IEEE, and IBPSA.

Jessica Granderson, PhD
Director for Building Technology,
White House Council on Environmental Quality

Dr. Jessica Granderson is the Director for Building Technology at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Dr. Granderson is on leave from her work as a Staff Scientist and Deputy Division Director of Building Technology and Urban Systems Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley, and an AB in Mechanical Engineering from Harvard University. Her research focuses on building energy performance monitoring and diagnostics, advanced measurement and verification, and intelligent controls. She is the recipient of the 2015 Clean Energy Education and Empowerment (C3E) Award for Leadership in Research and the 2020 Federal Laboratory Consortium Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer.

Deb Hall, PhD, Chair
Energy Management and Controls Technology
Valencia College, Orlando, FL

Contact Information: dhall@valenciacollege.edu

Valencia College (Orlando, FL) is addressing the needs of the State of Florida's educational programs, the underrepresented student population, the local area Building Automation Systems (BAS) industry, and the Central Florida community through the creation of an Associate in Science (A.S.) degree in Energy Management and Controls Technology (EMCT). Development of this new program has been possible thanks to a National Science Foundation (NSF) Advanced Technological Education (ATE) grant. One of the grant deliverables is to increase Valencia College’s EMCT female student population. In order to make strides towards this goal, we have been conducting a wide variety of outreach activities at events related to Veteran Career Fairs, Electrician Apprenticeships, HVAC/R Apprenticeships, Industry Partner Conferences, High School College Fairs, Middle School and 5th Grade Female Student Outreach Events. This presentation will include sharing some of Valencia College’s BAS tech outreach activity ideas, one of which involves BAS Tech Barbie and her Smart Barbie Grand Hotel, along with an open brainstorming session of how else we might be able to attract and encourage even more females to pursue a career in the building automation systems industry.

Profile: Dr. Hall is the Principal Investigator of the NSF ATE Proposal 1601403 for Valencia College called Broadening Education, Access, and Momentum in Energy Management and Controls Technology. Since January 2001, she has taught at Valencia College within its Division of Engineering, Computer Programming, and Technology. Dr. Hall has been teaching courses which fall under Valencia’s Electronics Engineering Technology Associate in Science Degree Program, Pre-Major Engineering Associate in Arts Degree Program, and Bachelor of Science in Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology Degree Program. She is currently Valencia College’s Energy Management and Controls Technology Associate in Science Degree Program Chair and Professor of Electronics Engineering Technology. Dr. Hall is also a National Visiting Committee Member of the Center for Renewable Energy Advanced Technological Education (CREATE). Prior to Valencia College, she worked as an electrical engineer for seven years with theme park ride and show control, electric vehicle battery testing, and solar power feasibility studies. Dr. Hall earned both her Master of Science in Electrical Engineering and her Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Central Florida and earned her Doctor of Education in Higher Education Leadership from Nova Southeastern University. She also has served within the Central Florida community as the 2018 IEEE Orlando Section Executive Committee Chair and is currently involved in many engineering technology related hands-on outreach programs to encourage 4th through 12th grade female students to pursue STEM related careers.

Brian Lovell, BEST Co-PI
Founder, GPTC’s BAS Program,
President, Association of Controls Professionals

Brian Lovell has been working in the building automation systems (BAS) field for over 25 years in every role from technician to BAS contracting firm business owner in the Atlanta area. Experiencing the need for more trained BAS technicians first-hand, he led the development of the nation’s first BAS Associate’s Degree of Applied Sciences, and has disseminated that program to several dozen colleges around the country through his ongoing work with the National Science Foundation, Department of Energy and others.
In response to the need for better training and definition of skills standards in the BAS industry, Brian co-founded the Association of Controls Professionals in 2014 and has served as its president. He holds various technical degrees, industry certifications and licensures, and post-graduate degrees in education.

John D. Macomber, Senior Lecturer
Harvard Business School
Cambridge, MA

Contact Information: jmacomber@hbs.edu

In this keynote discussion, Prof. Macomber will review the health science, financial approach, and positive impacts of a healthy building for building owners and occupiers (people). He will help facilities staff and design/construction professionals communicate the value proposition of healthy building design and the investment value of building to a healthy building standard with certification systems like Fitwel, LEED and WELL. Time frames include prior to COVID-19, returning to work and school after COVID-19, and the long term impacts of increases awareness of healthy air and buildings. Humans are estimated to spend 90% of their lives indoors, and this figure may be higher in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Scientific research shows that the buildings in which we live, learn, work, play and sleep can have a major impact on our health, productivity and overall wellness. But it’s not always easy for architects, engineers and contractors to persuade owners, developers and tenants about the business case for:

• healthy building materials

• going beyond the building code for ventilation

• increasing filtration of particulates to improve indoor air quality

• the many ways the indoor air we breathe is affecting our bodies and our ability to focus, learn, and be more productive

Join us to learn how to make the business case for healthy buildings as Professor Macomber discusses the foundations of a healthy building, how smart technology can boost employee performance, and the financial business case behind the healthy building movement.

Profile: John D. Macomber is a Senior Lecturer in finance at Harvard Business School. His work has appeared in the Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Wall St. Journal Asia, and the Boston Globe. He is the author of more than thirty case studies on infrastructure projects with particular emphasis on office buildings in the U.S., housing in India, water in Mexico, innovative project finance in Africa, and private sector-led new cities in Asia.

Robert Nirenberg, Program Coordinator
Heating, Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVACR)
Metropolitan Community College, Omaha, NE

Contact Information: rtnirenberg@mccneb.edu

Over the past year, we faculty have been asked to make a significant number of changes and accommodations to the way we teach, probably none more challenging than being asked to move entirely online when teaching lab-critical courses. We already do everything we can to ensure that students are prepared before they walk in to our labs, we do our best to optimize the lab time they do get, but what do we do when they can no longer access the lab? Virtual environments will never replace lab time, but what if they could augment it? What if we could present the student with a problem in a virtual environment that allows them to explore and troubleshoot, basically do everything except have the actual tools in their hands? What if we could even accomplish this without costing our institution or our students a fortune?

Follow me through a “Choose your own adventure” style variable air volume (VAV) troubleshooting call--created with nothing more than what you probably already have in your lab, your pocket, and YouTube!

Profile: Since 2017, Robert has taught in Metropolitan Community College’s HVACR department and is currently the Program Coordinator. His background in both computer science and energy management helped to inform MCC’s building automation-related project titled AUTOMATE! (funded by National Science Foundation). Prior to this, he served as the college’s Energy Management Systems Coordinator and worked as both a Systems Programmer and Application Technician.

Mary Ann Piette, Senior Scientist
Director of the Building Technology & Urban Systems Division
& Director of the Demand Response Research Center
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

This talk will discuss the concept of Grid Interactive Efficient Buildings (GEBs), which is the new term to develop energy efficient buildings that can also interact with the electric grid. The US electric grid is changing with higher levels of variable renewables. Given that the renewable energy is intermittent, we need to have flexible demand to ensure we can have a clean, affordable, reliable, and equitable grid. This presentation will also talk about shape, shift, shed and shimmy demand response services from buildings. These capabilities require automation and there are numerous efforts and standards to enable automation. Finally, these technologies are important for a low-carbon grid. There are several efforts underway to evaluate the greenhouse gas savings from energy efficiency and GEBs.

Profile: Mary Ann Piette is a Senior Scientist and the Director of the Building Technology and Urban Systems Division in the Energy Technologies Area at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She oversees LBNL's building energy research activities with the U.S. Department of Energy, and she is also the Director of the Demand Response Research Center. Mary Ann's work involves developing and evaluating new technology and building components, windows, controls, operations, simulation, whole building and electric load shape analysis and behavior. Her Division also conducts research in data center energy efficiency, industrial energy efficiency, and federal energy management. Mary Ann has authored over 90 peer reviewed publications related to energy efficiency and demand response and has worked at LBNL since 1983. She is a board member of the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy and of the OpenADR Alliance. Mary Ann has an MS in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley and a Licentiate in Building Services Engineering from the Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden.

Carolyn Szum, Program Manager
Energy Analysis & Environmental Impacts Division
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

Building operations and construction account for 39% of global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. However, according to Architecture 2030, less than 1% of buildings are retrofitted annually. In order to stabilize atmospheric concentration of CO2 over the next several decades, a substantial increase in the speed and scale of building retrofits is needed. To fully capture this potential, Berkeley Lab is partnering with Johnson Controls to develop the Building Efficiency Targeting Tool for Energy Retrofits (BETTER) – a free web application that enables building operators to quickly, easily identify the most cost-saving energy efficiency measures in buildings and portfolios. Winner of a 2020 R&D 100 Award and a 2020 Berkeley Lab Director's Award for Exceptional Achievement in Technology Transfer, this presentation will introduce BETTER; discuss its features, analytical methodology, and capacity to support U.S. economic recovery in this unprecedented time of a global pandemic; and highlight partnerships with universities to provide training on BETTER to develop the next generation of cloud and field based comprehensive energy workers.

Profile: Carolyn Szum is a Program Manager at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with 17 years of experience in energy efficiency market transformation, remote building energy analytics, and climate finance. She is the winner of a 2019 Keeling Curve Prize Honorable Mention for innovation in climate finance; a 2020 R&D 100 Award for the BETTER software application; and a 2020 LBNL Director’s Award for Exemplary Achievement in Technology Transfer. Prior to joining LBNL, Ms. Szum was a Lead Managing Consultant at ICF where she led energy efficiency projects for the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Department of State, U.S. Agency for International Development, and The World Bank Group. She also served on the Hong Kong Business Environment Council and as Co-Chair of the U.S.-China Energy Cooperation Program Energy Efficient Building Design Working Group in Beijing, China. She has an M.A. in International Relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. She speaks Mandarin Chinese and Spanish. She has worked in the United States, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Mexico, Philippines, Taiwan, and Thailand.

Margaret S. Torn, PhD, Senior Scientist
Senior Advisor, Climate & Ecosystem Sciences Division
Earth & Environmental Sciences
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

I will present three vignettes about the global cycle of the element carbon, in the context of climate change. First, soils store more than twice as much carbon (in form of organic matter) as the atmosphere does (as CO2), but this soil organic matter can be destabilized by climate warming. Second, we have some of the first direct, physical evidence of the greenhouse effect from atmospheric CO2. Third, it is possible to decarbonize the U.S. energy and industrial systems. Combined with terrestrial sequestration there are multiple pathways to achieve net-zero energy emissions in the U.S. by 2050.

Profile: Dr. Margaret S. Torn is an ecologist and biogeochemist who studies the global carbon cycle and climate change. Margaret is an internationally recognized expert in soil carbon cycling and the potential for soils to generate positive feedbacks to climate change as well as for soils to sequester carbon. She runs climate change experiments in Arctic tundra and California forests. Margaret also leads the AmeriFlux Management Project, a network of 475 sites across the Americas measuring ecosystem carbon fluxes, with data used by thousands. Margaret helped found the first Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project, creating technical road maps for national and sub-national action to protect Earth’s climate. Margaret has published more than 150 scientific papers. She received the Presidential Early Career Award in 2003, has an honorary doctorate from the faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the University of Zurich, was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), and is the President-elect of the AGU Biogeosciences Section.

Iain Walker, PhD, ASHRAE Fellow, Staff Scientist/Engineer
Deputy of Whole Building Systems Department
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA

Dr. Iain Walker is a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He has more than 30 years of experience as a building scientist, conducting research on indoor air quality, ventilation, and reducing the energy and CO 2 impacts of buildings. He is an ASHRAE Fellow and currently serves on the Residential Team of the ASHRAE COVID-19 Epidemic Task Force. He works on standards and technical committees for ASHRAE, ASTM, RESNET, the IEA and other national and international organizations. His current work focuses on residential ventilation and home decarbonization.

Erin Mayfield, Ph.D
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment; High Meadows Environmental Institute
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ

Dr. Mayfield will provide an overview of the Net-Zero America Project, a Princeton University study which outlines multiple pathways to reach net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases in the United States. This requires planning based on realistic, real-world assessments. The Net-Zero America Project aims to provide policy makers with analyses to support such planning. These analyses include estimates of key infrastructure build-outs across the country and potential impacts on industries, communities, existing infrastructure and the natural environment.

Alexandra ""Sascha"" von Meier,
Director, Electric Grid, California Institute for Energy and Environment (CIEE) ;
Adjunct Professor, UC Berkeley

"Alexandra “Sascha” von Meier is the director of the California Institute for Energy and Environment‘s electric grid program area, which focuses on power distribution systems, smart grid issues, and the integration of distributed and intermittent generation. Her current research projects center on the use of high-precision micro-synchrophasor measurements for situational awareness, diagnostics and control applications in distribution grids. Von Meier is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at UC Berkeley, where she teaches a course on electric power systems. She is the author of the textbook Electric Power Systems: A Conceptual Introduction. Von Meier received a B.A. in physics in 1986 and a Ph.D. in energy and resources in 1995, both from UC Berkeley. In addition to studying all things related to electric energy, she loves cycling, rock climbing and being in the mountains."

Andrew McAllister
Commissioner at California Energy Commission

"Commissioner Andrew McAllister is serving his second term on the California Energy Commission. At the Energy Commission, he leads the policy area of energy efficiency, including the Building Energy Efficiency Standards, appliance efficiency, and load management and flexibility. More broadly, he is focused on enabling modern, data-rich analytical tools to support strong clean energy policy development and program implementation. Commissioner McAllister has worked on energy deployment and policy since the early 1990s. He has worked across the world to deploy clean, cost-effective energy solutions with counterparts ranging from tiny remote communities to the largest of utilities. He administered two of California’s signature renewable energy programs, developed and operated energy efficiency programs for utilities, and conducted a broad range of policy-related research for California and the federal government. "

Armando Casillas, LBNL
Scientific Engineering Associate

Armando has been a Scientific Engineering Associate, at LBNL since 2019. He works in a number of projects related to building energy efficiency, grid-interactiveness and flexibility and HVAC fault detection and diagnostics. During his undergraduate years, Armando worked as an Energy Analyst at UC Merced Facilities Management for two years where he was exposed to highly automated building systems, including HVAC, and has also worked for the Energy Conservation Office at UC Davis performing continuous commissioning. His Masters work was conducted at the Wester Cooling Efficiency Center, which involved wireless sensing for building leakage diagnostic applications. Armando holds a M.S in Energy Systems from UC Davis and a B.S in Mechanical Engineering from UC Merced.

Bob Clark, COD
College of DuPage HVACR Coordinator

"Clark earned an associate degree in Electrical and Electronic Automated Systems, Industrial Maintenance Technology and HVACR; a bachelor’s degree with a double major of Business and Communications; an MBA in Energy and Sustainability; and a doctorate in Career and Technical Education. He also holds multiple building automation certifications, including an electrical license and Chicago Stationary Engineers License; and numerous other certifications, including EPA Universal, HAZWOPER OSHA 40, Industrial Firefighting, NFPA 70E, Solar Energy, Sporlan Valve, VRF, and Bell & Gossett certifications in chilled water design, hydronic design and steam design. Clark is president of the Illinois Council of Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Educators (ICARE) and works with educators at state and national levels to improve HVACR education. Before he became an instructor in the HVACR program at College of DuPage, Clark worked in industrial maintenance and industrial refrigeration and ran his own HVACR business. He said he was attracted to the HVACR industry because of the opportunities for learning and working available in the field."

Carlos Santamaria
Principal, Optimal Building, (Formerly CEES-Advisors)

Carlos Santamaria is Founder and Principal of Optimal Building, (formerly CEES-Advisors) & Board of Trustee of the IFMA Foundation. Currently, he is acting Regional Director for the Bay Area Region - Energy, Utilities & Construction Sector and FM Statewide Liaison for the California Community Colleges. As former Vice President of Engineering Services for Glenborough, he provided technical assistance and was responsible for transforming the company’s real estate portfolio towards being one of the most Energy Efficient & Sustainable companies in the U.S. Mr. Santamaria has worked in the commercial real estate industry concentrating on energy efficiency, construction and operational best practices being recognized as a top performer and leader in energy efficiency.

Cindy Regnier
FLEXLAB Executive Manager; Technical Leader - Commercial Building Systems

Cindy Regnier is the Technical Leader for Commercial Building Systems and FLEXLAB Executive Manager at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. FLEXLAB (Facility for Low Energy eXperiments in Buildings) is Berkeley Lab’s series of experimental testbeds dedicated to integrated and low carbon building, DER and grid systems integration research and development. She also manages several research projects focused on community scale deployment of coordinated grid interactive efficient buildings, and deployment of low energy systems and technologies. These include the development of integrated systems incentive programs for utilities, and solutions focused on small commercial buildings and schools. Prior to joining LBNL in 2009, she spent 13+ years on design of innovative, integrated HVAC systems, including AIA COTE Top 10, LEED Platinum buildings, and a 200,000sf carbon neutral science museum. Her Bachelor’s degree is in Mathematics and Mechanical Engineering from Queen’s University, Canada, and she holds professional engineering licenses in California, USA and Ontario, Canada.

BEST & Colette Flood & Nakeiah Harrell, LBNL Workforce Development & Education, and Internships
Berkeley Lab (LBNL) Education Director

Colette Flood, Berkeley Lab (LBNL) Education Director for the Department of Energy Office of Science, Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS) programs; Manager of Workforce Development & Education (WD&E) — stewards all of the programs for WD&E. She is the main point of contact for LBNL divisions, community partners, faculty interns, and mentors.

Doug Hampton
Energy Engineer Trane CEM, EMP, QCxP, Thermographer II

I started my HVAC career working for a plumbing and heating contractor in my home town full time and part time during college. Later, working for Trane as a building automation technician, I learned the value of life time client relationships. I believe that any building can operate more efficiently, and we should push them as far as possible. As an Energy Engineer at Trane, and with my experience in building automation, contracting, thermal imaging, and commissioning, I am here to push the built environment as far as possible. Any building should operate as efficient as possible while providing a healthy and comfortable environment for the people who use it. Now offering custom building operation and maintenance manuals. custom built training for your facility controls, components, and sequences.

Eliot Crowe
Program Manager

Eliot Crowe is a Program Manager at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, supporting technical research on energy management and information systems (EMIS), measurement & verification (M&V), commissioning, and other related areas. Prior to joining LBNL Eliot spent 10 years working on utility program implementation, technical research, outreach, and training program management for PECI and CLEAResult. Eliot supported management of the nonprofit California Commissioning Collaborative from 2009-2016, including a period as Executive Director from 2015-2016. Prior to joining the energy efficiency field Eliot held an engineering project management position in a global battery manufacturing corporation for 10 years.

Eugene Silberstein, HVAC Excellence

"Mr. Silberstein has over 35 years of experience in the HVACR industry. He holds a Master of Science in Energy and Environmental Science from the State University of New York, and dual Bachelor degrees. He is a Certified Master HVACR Educator (CMHE), and Building Energy Assessment Professional (BEAP). Mr. Silberstein has worked in education at both the secondary and post-secondary levels, having served as an instructor, professor, program coordinator and department chair. He worked as a field technician, system designer, administrator, consultant and is the author/co-author of several text books."

Jared Langevin, LBNL
Research Scientist

Jared Langevin is a Research Scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he models the national impacts of building efficiency on long-term energy use and CO2 emissions, develops decision support algorithms for energy flexible building operations, and researches human-building interactions. Based in Washington, D.C., Jared was previously a Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Building Technologies Office (BTO), where he co-created BTO’s Scout program for national building efficiency impact analysis. Jared holds a Ph.D. in Architectural Engineering from Drexel University, where his research focused on measuring and modeling the adaptive interactions between building occupants and their surrounding thermal environments, examining the links between these interactions and building energy use. Before entering into his graduate studies at Drexel, Jared received a Bachelor’s degree in Architecture from Carnegie Mellon University.

Jay Santos
Founder and Principal, Facility Dynamics

J. Jay Santos, P.E. has more than 30 years of experience in controls design, controls Master Planning, commissioning, retro-commissioning, and training. Jay is a recognized expert with a preeminent record of conceiving and implementing innovative, energy and cost-efficient designs in the fields of DDC controls, Building Controls Master Planning, and Building Automation Systems (BAS). He is also a renowned lecturer, educator, and author. Jay’s specialty is in developing BAS user guides covering interoperability concerns, architecture, hardware and software issues, and assisting owners and engineers in designing and selecting systems that best meet their BAS needs. Additionally, Jay teaches commissioning and DDC controls classes, conducts on-site training programs, provides technical consulting, and presents papers and lectures on commissioning, controls, and HVAC diagnostics. As principal-in-charge, Jay oversees review processes and identifies commissioning, retro-commissioning, and energy-conservation strategies based on his in-depth knowledge of the commissioning process and building optimization. He also supervises numerous commissioning and retro-commissioning projects, manages the implementation of PACRATTM, and oversees contract administration and project quality control/quality assurance.

Jennifer Holm , LBNL
Research Scientist, Terrestrial Ecosystem Scientist

My main area of research is terrestrial ecosystem modeling. Within this area my research topics include forest disturbance and recovery processes, dynamic vegetation processes, model sensitivity and uncertainty, and understanding tropical and boreal forest response to changing climates. Current projects include improving global simulations of the demographic model FATES (Functionally Assembled Terrestrial Ecosystem Simulator) which is coupled to the Earth System Model E3SM, application of a gap model for a tropical forest to evaluate forest response to elevated disturbance regimes, improving modeling predictability of gradients in tropical tree growth, reproduction, and mortality across the Amazon Basin and Puerto Rico. Previous projects have included improving modeling capacity to accurately represent biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs) emissions from tropical ecosystems, and working with a multi-lab team to create a first generation earth system model with a fully integrated human systems component, representing human activities affecting land use and greenhouse gas emissions. Jennifer Holm received a B.S. in Environmental Studies from Emory University, M.S. in interdisciplinary ecology, with a focus on Tropical Conservation Development and forest resources and conservation, from University of Florida, and a Ph. D. in environmental sciences from University of Virginia.

John Elliott
Chief Sustainability Officer, LBNL

John Elliott is Chief Sustainability Officer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. With broad and detailed experience across a wide range of sustainability topics, he is responsible for directing and implementing the Lab’s sustainability strategy. He was previously Director, Energy and Sustainability at UC Merced and has done prior work in energy efficiency program design, strategy consulting to utilities, advancing efficiency and renewables with native American tribes, and leading a professional services team implementing energy software solutions. He holds a masters degree in Energy and Resources from UC Berkeley and a bachelors in civil and environmental engineering from Stanford University.

Larry Chang
BEST Center Director

"Larry Chang is Director of the Building Efficiency for a Sustainable Tomorrow (BEST) Center, which is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education program. BEST’s mission is to boost the technician workforce in high performance building operations through education and professional certification. Since helping to establish BEST in 2012, Larry has worked with U.S. community and technical colleges to develop certificate/degree programs in environmental control technology, building automation, and energy management. He is also part of a team creating a new technician-level certification which will standardize skills and knowledge for advanced commercial building operations. In addition, Larry is a registered architect who earned his B.S.E. in Architecture and Engineering from Princeton University and his M. Arch. from Yale University. He has worked across the U.S. on both commercial and residential projects with a focus on sustainability, accessibility, and healthy buildings. On the academic side, he has taught design at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Savannah College of Art & Design, and City College SF."

Madeline Salzman , DOE
Workforce Lead, Building Technologies Office, Department of Energy

Madeline Salzman is a Management and Programs Analyst in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Building Technologies Office. Madeline joined U.S. DOE in 2015 to support programs that increase access to energy efficient technologies, including through the Home Energy Score program and Better Buildings Workforce Accelerator. These efforts include conducting strategic analysis on how to increase affordability of and access to efficiency retrofits in US housing across income groups, regions, and housing types. She also advises on clean energy workforce development strategy for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. Prior to joining the Building Technologies Office, Madeline received her Master of Public Service from the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service and worked on residential efficiency and solar in Missouri, Arkansas, and rural India.

Marco Pritoni
Research Scientist

Marco Pritoni is a Research Scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory where he conducts research in the area of advanced controls, data-driven modeling and data analytics applied to buildings. He leads a team of researchers working on optimization of building operation and building-to-grid interaction. Marco has a multidisciplinary background spanning mechanical engineering, building science, data science and human behavior. He holds a PhD and MS in Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering from UC Davis and MS in Industrial Engineering from the University of Bologna, Italy.

Nihar Shah
Presidential Director of the Global Cooling Efficiency Program

"Nihar Shah is Presidential Director of the Global Cooling Efficiency Program(link is external) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, leading research on alternate refrigerants and energy efficiency for Heating, Ventilation, Airconditioning and Refrigeration (HVAC&R) equipment, including Berkeley Lab’s research in support of the Clean Cooling Collaborative(link is external) (formerly the Kigali Cooling Efficiency Program or K-CEP) in China, India, ASEAN and various emerging economies. His other research interests include corporate disclosure of climate risk, anti-fragile(link is external) strategy, circular economy, advanced manufacturing and water technology and policy. Prior to joining Berkeley Lab, Nihar worked at the California Public Utilities Commission’s Office of Ratepayer Advocates. He received a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, an M.Tech. in Thermal and Fluids Engineering and a B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering, both from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. He is a licensed Professional Mechanical Engineer in the State of California."

Deb Hall, PhD, Chair
Energy Management and Controls Technology
Valencia College, Orlando, FL

Since January 2001, Dr. Hall has taught at Valencia College within its Division of Engineering, Computer Programming, and Technology. Dr. Hall has been teaching courses which fall under Valencia’s Electronics Engineering Technology Associate in Science Degree Program, Pre-Major Engineering Associate in Arts Degree Program, and Bachelor of Science in Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology Degree Program. She is currently Valencia College’s Energy Management and Controls Technology Associate in Science Degree Program Chair and Professor of Electronics Engineering Technology. Dr. Hall is also a National Visiting Committee Member of the Center for Renewable Energy Advanced Technological Education (CREATE). Prior to Valencia College, she worked as an electrical engineer for seven years with theme park ride and show control, electric vehicle battery testing, and solar power feasibility studies. Dr. Hall earned both her Master of Science in Electrical Engineering and her Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Central Florida and earned her Doctor of Education in Higher Education Leadership from Nova Southeastern University. She also has served within the Central Florida community as the 2018 IEEE Orlando Section Executive Committee Chair and is currently involved in many engineering technology related hands-on outreach programs to encourage 4th through 12th grade female students to pursue STEM related careers.

Raphael Vitti
Senior Energy and Data Engineer

Raphael Vitti, PE is a Senior Energy and Data Engineer at Berkeley Lab. He is part of the Sustainable Berkeley Lab team working to minimize the Lab’s greenhouse gas emissions and environmental impact. He leads and supports activities to improve energy, water and operational performance in buildings at Berkeley Lab. He also develops analytics to identify energy and water savings opportunities, investigate building operations, support the implementation of improvements, and verify savings. Raphael previously was an energy efficiency engineer at kW Engineering. He is a licensed Professional Mechanical Engineer in California and earned his M.S. in Electronics and Communications Engineering from École nationale supérieure d’électronique, informatique et radiocommunications de Bordeaux (France).

Ronnen Levinson
Staff Scientist and Leader of the Heat Island Group

Dr. Ronnen Levinson is a Staff Scientist and Leader of the Heat Island Group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) in Berkeley, California. Within his research portfolio he develops cool roof, wall, and pavement materials; improves methods for the measurement of solar reflectance; and quantifies the energy and environmental benefits of cool surfaces. He serves on the boards and technical committees of the Cool Roof Rating Council and the Global Cool Cities Alliance, and advises policymakers, code officials, utilities, and building rating programs about cool surfaces. He holds a B.S. in engineering physics from Cornell University and an M.S. and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. He has authored or co-authored over 100 publications, and serves on the editorial boards of Energy & Buildings, Solar Energy, Solar Energy Advances, and Scientific Reports. He received the 2016 Marty Hastings Award for outstanding contributions to the Cool Roof Rating Council, and a 2016 R&D 100 Award for invention of the Cool Roof Time Machine.

Spencer Dutton
Principal Scientific Engineering Associate

Spencer Maxwell Dutton, PHD, completed his doctorate at the University of Nottingham, UK, on the topic of balancing energy use and IAQ in naturally ventilated commercial buildings, which included a school-based study of occupant window use behavior and IAQ. He worked as a building energy and daylighting consultant in London, before returning to Berkeley in 2010. His research at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory includes modeling the potential energy savings of low energy cooling strategies, including natural ventilation; assessing how ventilation strategies affect human health outcomes; and model development of various novel HVAC systems and control strategies.

Therese Peffer
Associate Director, CITRIS

"She works on demand response, smart grid and building-to-grid research projects based at CITRIS and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Her current areas of focus are energy consumption displays, thermostats, and consumer behavior, including developing metrics for the EPA’s EnergyStar specifications on climate controls and other user interface usability research. Therese has a Ph.D. in Architecture with an emphasis on building science at UC Berkeley, a master’s degree in Architecture at the University of Oregon, and a B.A. in neurobiology and psychology from UC Berkeley."

William Bahnfleth
Professor of Architectural Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University

William Bahnfleth is a professor of architectural engineering at the Pennsylvania State University. He held previous positions as Senior Consultant for ZBA, Inc. in Cincinnati, OH and Principal Investigator at the U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratory in Champaign, IL. He holds BS, MS, and PhD degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois and is a registered professional engineer. At Penn State, Dr. Bahnfleth teaches undergraduate courses in HVAC fundamentals and system design, and graduate courses in district cooling systems and indoor air quality. His research interests cover a wide variety of indoor environmental control topics including chilled water pumping systems, stratified thermal energy storage, protection of building occupants from indoor bioaerosol releases, and ultraviolet germicidal irradiation systems. He is the author or co-author of more than 170 technical papers and articles and 14 books and book chapters. Dr. Bahnfleth is a fellow of ASHRAE, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the International Society for Indoor Air Quality and Climate (ISIAQ). He served as President of ASHRAE in 2013-2014. His ASHRAE honors include the Louise and Bill Holladay Distinguished Fellow Award, E.K. Campbell Award, and F. Paul Anderson Award. He is also a recipient of the Penn State Engineering Alumni Society’s World-Class Engineering Faculty Award.