High-performance school buildings that are designed to save energy can cost significantly less to operate than traditionally designed schools. More importantly, studies have shown that optimized school environments that include natural daylight and a connection to the outdoors can enhance students' ability to learn

Using energy-efficient design and technologies in new office buildings can cut energy costs significantly. But strategies for connecting a facility with its exterior environment have the potential to also enhance the interior environment, resulting in much more valuable employee productivity increases.

Energy-efficient homes can be more comfortable, cost less to operate, and have higher resale value than their 'standard' counterparts. Today there are a wealth of new materials, skilled professionals, and analytic techniques to help new and existing homeowners in California and across the country green their homes and enjoy the benefits.

Single-story manufacturing, warehouse, and distribution facilities, whether conditioned or not, are prime candidates for the use of natural skylighting systems to reduce the amount of lighting required during the day. Additionally, manufacturing process and space conditioning systems sometimes can provide opportunities for integration leading to energy savings.

Hospital, laboratory, and medical/dental office energy use is dominated by the need to condition air for proper temperature and humidity conditions and to maintain safe and healthy environments by exhausting potentially hazardous air. Integrated energy efficiency design can reduce the high energy costs associated with these systems while meeting the demands of these specialized building types.

Libraries offer the opportunity to demonstrate energy efficiency design strategies in a place that is a literal and symbolic gateway to knowledge in the community. Public assembly buildings such as auditoriums and arenas have very specific and oftentimes intensive energy requirements tied closely to time of use.

Growers, dairies, packers, and other food and beverage producers all runs operations that can benefit from the latest energy management best practices. To keep their costs down, savvy operators use rate analyses, pump tests and process optimization audits to identify their best options,  Audit recommendations often include re-scheduling operations to take advantage of a demand response program or a time-of-use rate, and making hardware improvements like installing advanced irrigation equipment, high efficacy lighting, or premium efficiency motors and HVAC equipment (e.g., variable speed drives, plate coolers, compressor heat recovery units, scroll compressors, time clocks, ventilation controls) and more.

Hotels and other guest-oriented facilities often have complicated operations and extensive campuses, with many different types of energy end uses. These may include sophisticated lighting and mechanical systems, pools, elevators, and  sizable hot water loads. Modern energy management practices include using infrared motion sensors and door contacts to control the heating and air conditioning systems (HVAC) when guests leave the room or open windows, as well as behavioral contributions by the guests themselves.

Image: USGBC

Restaurants and other facilites with commercial kitchens are well known to have high energy intensity per square foot. In a typical Calfornia restaurant, cooking, water heating, refrigeration, and interior lighting represent around 80 percent of total energy bill making these systems the best targets for energy savings.

Data centers can consume 100 to 200 times as much electricity as standard office spaces. With such large power consumption, they are prime targets for energy efficient design measures that can save money and reduce electricity use. However, the critical nature of data center loads means that efficiency must compete with many other design criteria -- chiefly reliability and high power density capacity. The most efficient and effective data center designs use relatively new design fundamentals to create the required high energy density, high reliability environment. Emerging best practices capture many of the new 'standard' approaches used as a starting point by successful and efficient data centers.