Honoring an Energy Efficiency Giant

March 18, 2010 - Without a doubt, one of the most active proponents of energy efficiency during the last 40 years has been Art Rosenfeld who recently retired as a commissioner at the California Energy Commission (CEC). Rosenfeld is a distinguished physicist, earning his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago under Nobel Laureate Enrico Fermi, and in 2006 was honored with the Enrico Fermi award for scientific achievement by President Bush. But it was his response to the OPEC oil embargo and energy crisis in the early 1970’s, while working at Lawrence Berkeley National Labs (LBNL), which turned his focus towards energy-efficiency and sealed his destiny as the “father of energy-efficiency.” It was then that he realized the importance of attacking wasteful energy use as a way to combat the energy crisis, and began a life-long career focusing on making buildings and appliances more efficient.

Last week at the University of California at Davis, Rosenfeld was involved in more efficiency discussions, but this time it was at a symposium and an invitation-only celebratory dinner in his honor. (Mr. Green was lucky enough to attend the symposium and be on the dinner’s “invitee” list.)

The day’s symposium included presentations from a wide range of organizations involved in the field of energy efficiency, including people from Stanford University, UC Davis, Ecos Consulting, LBNL, the CEC, the US Department of Energy, and the Office of the Governor of California. Art’s impact on this field was evident - many of the speakers revealed that they were mentored by him, either as students or co-workers.

At the end of the symposium, it was announced that a paper had been published in the journal Environmental Research Papers, proposing that a new metric for electricity savings, "the Rosenfeld,” be adopted by the scientific community. The Rosenfeld would be defined as the amount of electricity savings needed to replace the annual generation of a 500-megawatt coal-fired power plant (equal to 3 billion kilowatt-hours per year while reducing emissions by 3 million metric tons at the same time). The significance of the definition is that Rosenfeld has often used power plant avoidance when explaining energy efficiency benefits to lawmakers and students.

Will the Rosenfeld become a globally accepted unit of measurement like the watt, farad, or volt (also named after scientists)? Maybe. But one thing is certain – Art Rosenfeld’s accomplishments as the “father of energy efficiency” will continue to be recognized for years to come.

For a copy of the Environmental Research Letters journal paper proposing the Rosenfeld, go to:
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/5/1/014017/pdf/1748-9326_5_1_014017.pdf