energy

White House Showcases Cool Tools For Public Safety

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It’s not easy following Todd Park, the federal government’s chief technology officer, and his breathless on-stage enthusiasm for promoting technical innovation in government and the virtues of collaboration.

Park clearly found an avid proponent, however, in Seth Harris, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Labor, who made a persuasive case last week in describing the inherent logic for government and the private sector to work jointly in turning information into useful tools for the American public and the U.S. economy. Keep reading →

 /  Published September 17, 2012 at 2:00 PM

Big Data For The Public Good

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Lately it seems that everyone is talking about “big data,” and for good reason – the potential to gain greater insight into the way decisions are made has implications throughout businesses, governments and societies the world over. Capitol Hill just took a deep dive into the big data pool, to look at what this relatively new concept really means and how we can leverage it to address the greatest challenges of our day.

Last week, IBM joined government leaders on Capitol Hill to discuss how we can apply new technologies – called analytics – to big data so that we make critical decisions to improve and better the lives of the citizens we serve. Keep reading →

 /  Published July 6, 2012 at 10:01 AM

Transforming American Governance

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Our nation faces a large — and growing — long-term fiscal imbalance driven by an aging population, which will dramatically increase health care and retirement costs. And while it is just one of many challenges, it is central to a question of whether the nation’s government will adapt new approaches to the management of government itself.

“The government is on an unstable path,” says the recently released Federal Government’s Financial Health. This report, prepared by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and Office of Management and Budget (with the assistance of the Government Accountability Office), puts the challenge in stark terms: Keep reading →

 /  Published April 17, 2012 at 10:02 AM

Senate Cybersecurity Bill Could Revive Kill Switch, Crush Innovation

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COMMENTARY – Some lawmakers on Capitol Hill are hell bent on implementing the recommendations of President Barack Obama’s Cyberspace Policy Review, in which the administration argued for a greater role for the Department of Homeland Security in securing the nation’s critical infrastructure from cyber attack.

And to prove how serious and misguided they are, some of these lawmakers like Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) and Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) are about to introduce legislation that arguably will hurt innovation and jobs, and which may actually grant the DHS extraordinary regulatory powers that extend to the Internet. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 9, 2012 at 10:35 AM

State Department Power Initiative To Cut Carbon Emissions

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The State Department is eliminating 21,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually– and looking for more — as part of its worldwide power and systems management initiative to eliminate power waste across 100 percent of its workstation computers.

Projected to save millions annually when fully implemented, the initiative is designed to comply with OMB sustainability and energy management mandates, plus support the Department’s Greening Diplomacy Initiative. Currently State has 88,986 desktops at 468 worldwide sites – comprised of domestic facilities, embassies, consulates, and passport agencies. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 10, 2012 at 12:00 PM

DOE Lab Seeks To Boost Battery R&D With Multiple Partnerships

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Batteries are the basis of almost all futuristic energy visions: they will be used to power cars and store energy from intermittent renewables.

In an effort to improve battery technology, DOE research center Argonne National Laboratory has partnered with the Dow Chemical Company to conduct collaborative research on advanced battery technologies using several new materials that could improve battery performance and lower costs. On Wednesday it announced it will also partner with Western Lithium, a company that produces lithium carbonate for batteries. Keep reading →

 /  Published October 5, 2011 at 2:35 PM

The Top Five Energy Regulators

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It’s a tough time to be an energy regulator in Washington.

The value of all federal regulation is being challenged on the political front as “job-killing,” but the legal requirements remain in place. Regulators must enforce laws while debate rages. Conversations with Washington observers evoked not only vociferous criticism and fervent praise for those on the spot to keep energy regulation functioning, but also a general respect for the barriers regulators face. Keep reading →

 /  Published September 16, 2011 at 12:05 PM

How Super ESPC Contracts Are Producing Super Savings for Energy Department

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If you like saving taxpayer money — to the tune of $13.1 billion to date and counting – then you already love Energy Savings Performance Contracts or ESPCs.

ESPCs are a super deal for American taxpayers and federal agencies alike. But despite the impressive savings they have produced, ESPCs are not well known in the IT world. Keep reading →

 /  Published September 15, 2011 at 3:14 PM

Seven Strategies To Cut Costs And Improve Performance

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The seventh in a series of “Seven Management Imperatives” for government leaders, based on the insights provided by some 300 senior government officials and more than 300 research reports, courtesy of IBM Center of The Business of Government.

The federal government faces an estimated annual structural deficit of $500 billion to $700 billion. A deficit of this magnitude represents a major threat to the economic health of the nation. The structural deficit is defined as the portion of the total annual deficit that results from a fundamental imbalance in receipts and expenditures, not just one-time occurrences or changes in the economic cycle. Steps to reduce and eliminate this structural deficit are urgently needed. Keep reading →

 /  Published August 29, 2011 at 10:01 AM

Cutting Federal Energy Costs: Power Up Your Strategy

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Reducing energy costs at federal agencies will take a lot more than getting employees to power down their computers at night and installing motion sensors to control the office lights.

It requires planning and a very specific strategy, says Rebecca Ranich, co-lead of Deloitte Consulting LLP’s Federal Government Energy Management initiative. Keep reading →

 /  Published July 27, 2011 at 11:01 AM
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