Energy Department Recognizes Oak Ridge National Laboratory for 50001 Ready Achievement

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) 50001 Ready program, managed by the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Office, recognized Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), the largest of DOE's open science laboratories, for attaining 50001 Ready status across 65 buildings under the Facilities Management Division in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. 50001 Ready provides a self-paced, no-cost way for organizations to build a culture of structured energy improvement that leads to deeper and more sustained energy savings.

ORNL used the 50001 Ready Navigator guidance and tools to formally document its energy management processes and procedures and organize data records. The modestly sized ORNL energy team particularly appreciated the efficiencies of a central system for storing its plans, policies, work breakdown structure, energy data, and conversion equations. The formalized system took about one year to implement and has surpassed expectations for identifying relevant variables and accelerating energy analyses through the emphasis of life-cycle energy analysis and staff engagement.

“Due to the complexity and mission-specific nature of our facilities, obtaining DOE 50001 Ready recognition is an impressive achievement that came after a lot of effort and collaboration among ORNL associates,” said Ann Weaver, Director of the ORNL Facilities Management Division. “The resources provided by the 50001 Ready Navigator helped us to initiate a systemic and organized approach to document the ORNL energy efficiency program.”

The energy team met early with ISO 14001 (environmental management) compliance associates who provided useful advice on the tasks, planning steps, and strategies for meeting these goals while maintaining conformance to contract requirements. Being able to draw on the success of previous experience with ISO program structures accelerated the adoption of the 50001 Ready systems.

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