About IMPEL
IMPEL: Incubating Market-Propelled Entrepreneurial Mindset at the Labs and Beyond
IMPEL is a technology commercialization program funded by the Department of Energy's Building Technologies Office.
We are based at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Who do we serve?
Entrepreneurs & Small Businesses who work in the built environment space such as engineering, architecture, urban design, facilities and real estate, healthy buildings, energy services, microgrids, data science etc.
National Lab Staff who conduct building and energy research
Non-Lab Awardees who have won Federal Opportunity Announcement Awards, Small Business Awards etc.
Faculty & Graduate Students who conduct building science R&D, or from BTO-affiliated university programs such as Solar Decathlon, JUMP into STEM, and others
Building Professionals who have new building innovation program ideas
Hear IMPEL Program Director Reshma Singh talk about the IMPEL engine that accelerates climate tech in buildings and energy by recruiting and fostering a dynamic Innovator community, mentoring them to develop strong entrepreneurial skill sets, and enabling access to powerful public and private tech-to-market pipelines.
Our Theory of Change
Support technological transformations for a zero-carbon built infrastructure that promotes equitable wellness and resilience for all.
To this end, the program is based on the three tracks below, across stakeholders influencing five levers:
R&D/Innovation
Technology
Human Capital
Policy
Investments
Decarbonize
For projects and ideas that radically reduce emissions for a zero-carbon built environment
Reduce embodied carbon
Carbon capture and storage in buildings
Nature bases solutions and alternative biogenic materials
Energy savings opportunities during extraction, manufacturing, transport, and installation of building materials and assemblies, including locally sourced and re-utilized/up-cycled materials
Reduce operational carbon
Technologies that reduce energy demand for space/water heating/cooling, lighting, and appliances
Improved energy equipment and controls
Provide energy from decarbonizing sources and implement flexible building-to-grid management.
Embrace radical circularity
Closed loop energy and water systems
Construction and demolition/agricultural/industrial waste as material banks
Life Cycle Carbon Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) methods
Digitalize
For projects and ideas that connect buildings, distributed energy resources, grid, and communities
Digitalize the building lifecycle
Digital design and construction, digital supply chains
Smart equipment, building, and community scale sensors and controls
Advanced data analytics
Building-to-grid load flexibility
Integration of building, renewables/ thermal and electrochemical batteries/electric vehicle /grid
Harness unique regional contexts
Machine learning on building and urban image/text/novel sources of data
Digitization and scientific scrutiny of traditional climate-suitable methods/ materials
Democratize
For projects and ideas that provide equitable access to wellness in a resilient, living environment
Healthier environments
Ventilation/filtration+energy efficient equipment
Health and environment safe materials (e.g. Low volatile organic compounds, non-endocrine-disrupting materials, etc.)
Thermal comfort and wellness technologies: Inside the building (energy/wellness technologies), Whole building (passive and active systems), Community level (urban heat/pollution mitigation)
Equitable Resilience
Improve access to low-carbon and resilient energy for all communities
Enhance hard infrastructure, and nature-based infrastructure
Technologies to counter urban heat, pollution, and provide enhanced durability to natural disasters
Advance sustainable behaviors and capacity building
Up-skilling, re-skilling, training, attitude/awareness programs
Diverse, equitable, and inclusive
We prioritize our principles of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accountability (IDEA) to build thriving innovator teams that produce world-class building technology and deepen community impact.