Climate Neutral Research Campus Tools
Otto van Geet, P.E., LEED AP®, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Many tools exist to help campuses identify their carbon footprint and evaluate the potential for various climate actions to reduce their climate impact. Online tools available through the Climate Neutral Research Campuses Web resource will be presented. A new Climate Action Planning Tool (CAPT) will be presented for the first time publically. This tool allows the user to input the components of a greenhouse gas inventory for a campus, community, or a single building. Various climate actions can then be selected from a series of pull-down options. Based on selected climate actions the future carbon impact chart for the campus is plotted which includes a "Baseline" (business as usual) and the climate impact reductions from each measure graphed as a "wedge diagram." The purpose of this tool is to illustrate what the areas of major impact are for a specific campus and demonstrate the degree of measure that must be taken to achieve climate neutrality.
Biographies:
Otto van Geet is a senior engineer at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Most of Mr. van Geet's work is in the Federal Energy Management Program. Prior to this assignment, Mr. van Geet was the senior mechanical engineer in the Site Operations group at NREL, and a mechanical engineer at Sandia National Laboratories. Mr. van Geet has been involved in the design, construction, and operation of energy-efficient research facilities, such as laboratories and data centers, as well as office and general use facilities. Mr. van Geet was one of the founding members of the Labs21 program and provides technical guidance for the program. Mr. van Geet's experience also includes renewables screening and assessment, passive solar building design, use of design tools, photovoltaic (PV) system design for on- and off-grid applications, energy audits, and minimizing energy use. Mr. van Geet has authored numerous technical reports and conference papers and has been recognized with several awards from professional associations, including the 2007 Presidential Award for Leadership in Federal Energy Management. On a personal note, Mr. van Geet and his family live in an off grid passive solar house with a 1.2 kilowatt PV/wind/hybrid power system and solar water heating that he designed and built in 1999. Mr. van Geet is a registered professional engineer, certified energy manager, LEED® Accredited Professional, and a project management professional. Mr. van Geet is a member of ASHRAE and the American Solar Energy Society.