BITES

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The Buildings Industry Transportation Electricity Scenarios (BITES) Tool is a scenario-based tool for analyzing how changes in energy demand and supply by economic sector can impact carbon dioxide emissions. BITES permits the rapid screening and exploration of energy options and technologies that can lead to major reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and reductions in oil dependence.

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This tool is included in the Development Impacts Assessment (DIA) Toolkit from the LEDS Global Partnership.

Approach

Uses the EIA Annual Energy Outlook as a baseline. Allows the user to control up to 300 inputs (in advanced mode) as well as modify key assumptions such as emissions factors to explore the impact on emissions, energy, and petroleum use.

When to Use This Tool

This tool is most useful for development impacts assessments focused on:

Social

Economic

Environmental

Learn more about the topics for assessing the impacts of low-emission development strategies (LEDS).

Key Outputs

Energy-related CO2 emissions, energy use, and petroleum use by sector and overall. More detailed outputs by sector, such as energy demand by end use.

How to Use This Tool

Training Available
No formal training. Some informal training and educational activities.

Level of Expertise
Moderate

Key Inputs

Buildings: Efficiency improvements by appliance, building codes, retrofits. Industry: efficiency improvements and fuel switching by subsector. Transportation: vehicle fleet composition and efficiency, efficiency improvement for trucks, rail, marine, and air. Biofuel quantity by type. Electricity: generation by type

Case Studies

Examples of how BITES has helped people assessing the impacts of low-emission development strategies in countries and regions:

Several "featured scenarios" are included as examples. These are based on more detailed studies and allow the user to view and modify the results.

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Buildings Industry Transportation & Electricity Scenarios (BITES)

About

The Buildings Industry Transportation Electricity Scenarios (BITES) tool is an interactive framework that lets users explore the energy and carbon implications of altering the current U.S. energy profile. Using 'what-if' scenarios, users are able to adjust inputs to the electricity generation, buildings, industry and transportation sectors in order to compare outcomes to baseline reference cases. BITES permits the rapid screening and exploration of energy options and technologies that can lead to major reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and reductions in oil dependence.

Scenarios were originally developed to help examine strategic planning opportunities for the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE). The U.S. Department of Energy is interested in identifying research priorities where potential technical advances will have the greatest impact in achieving national energy goals. BITES was adapted for the Web to give users the opportunity to investigate potential future pathways for the U.S. energy economy. As the scenarios demonstrate, significant technology and policy deployment in every sector is required to meet U.S. climate and energy security goals.

Education

BITES can also be a useful tool for students and educators who focus on how research, policy, or other forms of national action can impact U.S. energy use. Future plans for BITES include hosting online discussion forums on the scenarios created in the tool and delivering BITES as a learning module on the National Training and Education Resource (NTER). These efforts are part of the Energy Department's broader energy education and energy literacy initiative to help U.S. families and businesses make informed energy decisions.