How do you motivate the Greater Boston area, home to 4.5 million people, to engage in making energy consumption improvements to their homes and businesses?This Friday, Boston Mayor Thomas Menino will announce a project aimed at helping to raise awareness among Boston residents about their energy consumption and waste by identify building heat loss with a city-wide infrared scan.
Infrared scanning technology is a tool used by energy efficiency auditors to identify heat loss in buildings.
“The images can be quite striking,” said Galen Nelson, the city’s Green Technology Business Manager. “We are a visual culture; these images will help us to spur action.”
The program will consist of two aerial scans of the City of Boston. The first scan, happening later this summer, will provide a lens into the Urban Heat Island effect, which refers to the heat that remains in an urban area vs. a suburban or rural area in summer months due to more buildings, darker surfaces, running cars etc. A second scan will take place in the winter, focusing on roof-based heat loss.
These two aerial scans are being privately funded by the Boston-based Barr Foundation and will essentially provide an energy audit for every building in Boston. “This will allow us to paint a picture of energy consumption in the city,” said Nelson. “We will be able to identify the places where we really need to focus our efforts and prioritize action.
So, knowing this information, how does an individual take action and change their energy consumption behavior?
Massachusetts has several programs already in place, including Mass Save and Mayor Menino’s “Renew Boston” project. While many other U.S. cities invested their Recovery Act money into city property, Boston has dedicated theirs to Boston homes and businesses. When people retrofit their home or business and make them more energy efficient, they are eligible for significant aid from both of these programs.
The information from the infrared project brings the city of Boston one step closer to being able to support initiatives such as energy labeling on homes at the point of sale, thereby informing home buyers about whether their home-to-be is an energy hog or thoroughbred. Nelson also said, “No guarantees, but we’d also like to put together an iPhone app so that people can download the infrared image of their home, or any building in the city.”
More details about tomorrow’s announcement can be found here.
Tags: City of Boston, Edu, Gov2.0, Mayor Thomas Menino
