Charlie Culp, a professor at Texas A&M University, reported on a program for measuring how much emissions a home’s energy consumption is responsible for.

DALLAS - In the old (very old) days, you could tell how much fuel your neighbors were using by looking at how much smoke came out of their chimneys. Homes still use fuel, but its release isn’t quite so visible. It comes out of fossil fuel-based utility stacks and is released in coal mining processes.

What if there was a way to determine the amount of emissions a home or commercial building is responsible for? There already is, according to speakers at an American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) seminar, “Big Opportunities for Energy Savings and Emission Reduction.

Charlie Culp, Ph.D., of Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas; Paul Torcellini, Ph.D., of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NERL), Golden, Colo.; and Michael Deru, Ph.D., also of the NERL, pointed out that reducing the energy consumption of all types of buildings can reduce emissions of fossil fuel utilities and even reduce smog.