Energy - Energy efficient jobs

Hundreds of new jobs are expected to result from production of a super-efficient water heater developed under an Oak Ridge National Laboratory-General Electric partnership. GE will be the first major brand to have a commercially available product that meets the 2009 Department of Energy "Energy Star" standards for electric water heaters. GE has announced that it will begin making the hybrid electric water heaters „ which are 50 percent more energy efficient than standard models „ at its Louisville, Ky., plant in 2011, creating about 400 jobs. The ORNL technology behind the water heater was funded by DOE's Building Technologies Program, which enabled the ORNL-GE cooperative research and development agreement that led to the new product. Much of the work was conducted at ORNL's Building Technologies Research and Integration Center. Tests show energy savings of $250 annually over a standard 50-gallon water heater.