Lab Conducts Smart
Meter Pilot Program
By Paul Davidson

Piette

Smart meters that allow electricity customers to pay fluctuating power prices may be new for residential customers, but they have long saved businesses billions of dollars in energy costs. Traditionally, such programs have targeted industrial customers. Chains such as Target and Ikea are taking part in smart-meter trials in California in which Web-based systems automatically curtail lights and air conditioning in stores when midday summer electric rates rise. "The fact that it's automatic makes it more repeatable and reliable," says Mary Ann Piette of Berkeley Lab, which is conducting the pilot program. Full story.

EH&S Employee
Profiled in Local Paper
By Dane Golden

White

When Marty White received a “very good” ranking for her Lazy Kat Black Lager at last year’s nationwide all-female Queen of Beers contest, she probably had one thing going for her that most other entrants didn’t — a master’s degree in chemical engineering. Not that White has a lot of time to spend making beer. She keeps quite busy keeping people safe in her job as an environmental health and safety professional at Berkeley Lab. Full story.

Berkeley Energy Speakers
Urge Control of Emissions
By Rick DelVecchio

A successful attack on carbon emissions will require leaps in energy efficiencies at home, at work and in the car, as well as technological breakthroughs in alternative fuels and painful political choices, speakers said Monday at a UC Berkeley conference that drew 400 people from academia, government and industry. The conference, hosted by the Berkeley Energy Resources Collaborative, was a chance for UC Berkeley and Berkeley Lab to show off the breadth of energy research under way at the two institutions. Lab Director Steve Chu, among the speakers, told the audience, "We seek solutions. We don't seek -- dare I say this -- just scientific papers any more." Full story. Read a related story on UC Berkeley energy analyst Dan Kammen here.

'The Bag': a 9/11 Story
With ALS as a Player

When Esquire writer Eric Gillin discovered in his closet a black messenger bag that he had been carrying near the World Trade Center when terrorists attacked it in 2001, he wondered what toxic substances might still exist within the bag. So the magazine contacted Tom Cahill of the University of California, Davis, who had already analyzed post-9/11 air samples using Berkeley Lab's Advanced Light Source. The story of Gillin's bag, sealed shut for more than five years, is told by its owner in this month's Esquire, including the day Cahill brought it to the ALS for study. Go here to read it.