Saving energy through an intelligent infrastructure

Science : Buildings use 40% of the primary energy supplied in the US, and more than 70% of all generated electricity, primarily for heating, cooling, and lighting.About 20% of the energy used by buildings can potentially be saved by correcting faults, including malfunctions and unnecessary operation. Another 10 to 20% can be saved by deploying advanced control systems to regulate temperature and air flow inside the buildings.The energy efficiency resource recoverable through such improved building controls and fault detection corresponds to the output from hundreds of power plants, equivalent to more than one-third of US coal-fired power production.Realizing these substantial savings will require introducing intelligence into the infrastructure of buildings, to distribute the optimization of their operation and detection of their faults say Neil Gershenfeld, Stephen Samouhos, and Bruce Nordman .