The flow of heat from one area to another by conduction, convection, and/or radiation. Heat flows naturally from a warmer to a cooler material or space.

A device that converts heat or sunlight directly to electricity, invented by Standford Ovshinsky, that has a unique glass composition that changes from an electrically non-conducting state to a semiconducting state.

Alternating current is carried by conductors and a ground to residential, commercial, or industrial consumers. The waveform of the phase power appears as a single continuous sine wave at the system frequency whose amplitude is the rated voltage of the pow ...

The standard method for calculating residential cooling loads developed by the Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Institute (ARI) and the Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA) based largely on the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration, and A ...

A building design that uses structural elements of a building to heat and cool a building, without the use of mechanical equipment, which requires careful consideration of the local climate and solar energy resource, building orientation, and landscape fe ...

Any coefficient used to calculate heat transmission by conduction, convection, or radiation through materials or structures.

A wall to prevent the spread of fire; usually made of non-combustible material.

The absolute centimeter-gram-second unit of force; that force that will impart to a free mass of one gram an acceleration of one centimeter per second per second.

A type of motor designed to operate precisely at the synchronous speed with no slip in the full-load speeds (rpm).

Site planning that accounts for natural solar heating and cooling processes and their relationship to building shape, orientation, and siting.

The rate at which electricity is delivered to or by a system, part of a system, or piece of equipment expressed in kilowatts, kilovoltamperes, or other suitable unit, at a given instant or averaged over a specified period of time.

The alignment of a building along a given axis to face a specific geographical direction. The alignment of a solar collector, in number of degrees east or west of true south.

The regular periodic arrangement of atoms or molecules in a crystal of semiconductor material.

The change in heat content that occurs with a change in phase and without change in temperature.

A measure of the efficiency of an appliance's energy efficiency.

A passive solar heating system in which the sun warms a heat storage element, and the heat is distributed to the interior space by convection, conduction, and radiation.

A company or individual that is not directly regulated as a utility. These entities produce power for their own use and/or sell it to regulated utilities.

A WECS designed to produce electricity.

A type of window glass that contains special tints that cause the window to absorb as much as 45% of incoming solar energy, to reduce heat gain in an interior space. Part of the absorbed heat will continue to be passed through the window by conduction and ...

Alternating current in which three separate pulses are present, identical in frequency and voltage, but separated 120 degrees in phase.