Facilities

NREL provides industry, government, and university researchers with access to state-of-the-art facilities and equipment for analyzing a spectrum of building energy efficiency technologies and innovations.

Engineers and researchers at NREL work closely with industry partners to investigate and develop advanced technologies. NREL's facilities have been used to test and develop numerous award-winning building technologies and innovations that deliver significant energy savings in buildings. Several facilities further extend these capabilities and provide exciting additional research resources.

NREL's Research Support Facility Celebrates 10 Years

This facility showcases high-performance design features in a large, occupied office building with technologies and strategies that are a direct result of NREL's energy efficiency and renewable energy research efforts. The facility uses 50% less energy than a building built to current commercial code and achieves the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED Platinum rating. Researchers working in the RSF use real-time building performance data to study the building's energy use and adjust as needed.

Cafeteria

NREL's state-of-the-art cafeteria includes many energy efficiency strategies and uses about 25% less energy than a cafeteria built to current commercial code. NREL has achieved the Platinum LEED certification through the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED program.

Visual connection shown with blue lines between the OCL in the ESIF, the RTU in the TTF, and the grid.

Commercial Buildings Research Infrastructure

The Commercial Buildings Research Infrastructure, located within the Energy Systems Integration Facility, is dedicated to research and development to learn how commercial grid-interactive efficient buildings can provide load flexibility for the future grid.

Energy Systems Integration Facility

This state-of-the-art laboratory is the nation's first facility capable of conducting integrated megawatt-scale research and development of the components and strategies needed to move clean energy technologies onto the electrical grid. NREL and industry work together to develop and evaluate individual technologies on a controlled integrated energy system platform.

Outside view of NREL's multi-level parking garage.

Low-Energy Parking Structure

This structure's estimated energy use is 42 kilowatt-hours per parking stall, which is below NREL's original goal and represents a 90% reduction from the ASHRAE 90.1 2007 baseline. Ongoing monitoring and verification using end-use metering confirms energy use and allows researchers to tune systems to ensure long-term energy efficiency.

Two men looking down at a laptop while standing near kitchen appliances and a charging electric vehicle.

Systems Performance Laboratory

The Systems Performance Laboratory in the Energy Systems Integration Facility is a one-of-a-kind testing space that connects appliances, a home, and even a community in an end-to-end energy ecosystem.

Thermal Test Facility

Building researchers use the Thermal Test Facility for advanced heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning research and study of active solar PV systems. In addition to housing research facilities, the building itself was designed as a research model that provides data that can be applied to buildings designed in the future.