ICEE

Promoting mutual partnerships towards clean and efficient energy future for sustainability

Motivation

Participating Cities

U.S.: Atlanta, Chicago, Columbus, Denver, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and San Francisco

China: Beijing, Guangzhou, Hefei, Kunming, Ningbo, Shanghai and Tianjin

India: Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai and Surat

Focus Areas

The project promotes collaborations on programs like green and zero energy buildings, building codes, energy efficiency in industries and infrastructure, green and renewable power, alternative fuel vehicles, green government purchasing, consumer rebates, eco clubs, consumer education, awards/recognition, and others.

Contact Vatsal Bhatt for additional information: vbhatt@bnl.gov, +1-631-344-5453

Cities are responsible for nearly 75 percent of world’s greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time cities are at the forefront of taking most innovative initiatives that work. The purpose of this collaborative project is to share the technologies and lessons learned from every city’s experience to augment other participating cities capabilities to identify and respond to a range of barriers that limit implementation and management of sustainable urban energy practices and plans.

The Brookhaven National Laboratory coordinates the U.S. Department of Energy’s U.S.-China-India Cities Partnership for sharing best practices and technologies on energy and environment towards clean sustainable development.

Stakeholders

U.S. cities are paired with Chinese and Indian cities, by enhancing existing relations and structures of collaborations for dialogues on energy at various levels of city governments, businesses, academic/research institutions and citizens, with an aim to identify projects of mutual interests.

Atlanta-Ahmedabad MOU

The project facilitated signing a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the cities of Atlanta, GA, and Ahmedabad in India, initiating the first-ever U.S.-India cities partnership on energy, in March 2008. With the technical assistance from Atlanta and USDOE/BNL, Ahmedabad legislated energy audit for public water supply and waste water systems in April 2008 and is developing Green Guidelines for all new municipal buildings constructed by the City. Three upcoming city owned buildings will showcase green guidelines being developed.

Above Picture: At Atlanta City Hall after signing the MOU are: (from left) Ahmedabad Mayor Amit Shah, USDOE's Mark Ginsberg, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin and BNL's Vatsal Bhatt.

Hefei–Columbus MOU

The project facilitated signing a MOU between the regions of Hefei, Anhui Province, P. R. China and Columbus/Franklin County, Ohio, USA, on April 27, 2009. The MOU highlights collaboration on “green” initiatives such as water, solid waste and landfills, alternative energy concepts and projects, as well as promote co-ventures and technology exchanges which lead to the reduction in greenhouse gas and carbon footprints of the respective communities.

The Columbus/Franklin County delegation met with the Hefei Bureau of Environment Protection to discuss issues of mutual interest, and identified two renewable technologies for collaboration including, the solid waste methane conversion to compressed natural gas and the photovoltaics.

After returning from Hefei, the Columbus/Franklin County delegation is in a process of establishing a consortium of the public and private institutions, Universities and national laboratories to support the collaborative. The first collaborative initiative would promote transfer of the solid waste methane conversion to compressed natural gas for vehicle fuels technology to Hefei, the process first used at the commercial scale at the Franklin County landfill, operated by the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio’s Green Energy Center.

Chicago–Shanghai

Chicago and Shanghai are in a process of establishing an Eco Partnership for collaboration on geothermal, fuel cell, solar technologies and energy exhibition.

Academic institutions in both cities are working on establishing a hybrid geothermal/fuel cell project in each city. Chicago project, coordinated by the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the Illinois University of Technology (IIT), completed in July 2009, with knowledge transfer to Tongji University. Tongji University is in a process of identifying a suitable site and will coordinate with Chicago universities to replicate the project in Shanghai. Partners from Chicago and Shanghai will utilize the knowledge gained from this collaborative project to the proposed development at the former Chicago American Iron and Steel Company plant located in the South Lake.

Chicago will also be the first recipient of the Sister Cities International award for Innovation (Sustainable Development – Energy) that will be announced at the SCI Annual Conference in Belfast on July 31st. The award is sponsored by US Department of Energy and will be presented by Mark Ginsberg of DOE.

Chicago is coordinating the Solar Energy Forum between the Midwest United States and China in establishing a roadmap for sharing knowledge, technology and investment opportunities.

Chicago and San Francisco based science and technology museums are helping Shanghai Energy Conservation Center in developing a world class exhibition of nearly 3000 square meters for the World Expo 2010.

Philadelphia–Surat

DOE/BNL will provide technical assistance to the City of Surat, India (a progressive and sprawling city of ~4.5 million people with 326 sq km area, in the State of Gujarat) in developing; 1) Sustainable Energy Plan for the City for 2030, 2) Energy Policy for Municipal Operations for 2021, and 3) Green guidelines for municipal buildings. The project is helping Surat - one of the aspiring Solar Cities in India to form a sister city partnership with a US Department of Energy designated Solar City – Philadelphia.

Saving Energy & Emissions by Virtually Connecting Cities

DOE/BNL partnered with the Virtual Energy Forum, the world's premier online-only event for private and public sector energy executives, to showcase internationally-known experts and city leaders at the Virtual Energy Forum event held on December 10th and 11th, 2008 and June 24-25, 2009.

The presentations and live sessions organized in DOE's Global Green Cities Track brought many partnering cities of this project and focused on the implementation of energy efficient best practices and renewable energy solutions in some of the world’s largest metropolitan cities in front of over 5,500 attendees, speakers and exhibitors from nearly 140 countries around the world.

The Virtual Energy Forum is truly unique because it is a “sustainable” event in and of itself. It connects people across borders with no carbon footprint. According to the Virtual Energy Forum calculation, the past three events saved over 67 million pounds of CO2 in air, hotel, and transportation emissions.