How the Government Is Redesigning Your Living Room

The next time you replace an appliance or upgrade your home's exterior, the technology inside might look completely different. The federal government is quietly funding a massive overhaul of everyday household staples. They are moving past minor efficiency tweaks and backing entirely new ways to keep our homes comfortable.

Rethinking the windowpane

Let's start with the glass in your living room. Windows are wonderful for letting in daylight and fresh air, but they are terrible at holding in temperature. According to the Department of Energy, they are responsible for a massive chunk of all building energy use. They dictate a huge portion of the power a home consumes.

The government wants to change that math. Researchers are developing glass that insulates just as well as a solid wall. The goal is a window that actively works with your climate. In the winter, it traps warmth inside. During the summer, it blocks the sun's heat to keep your living space cool.

Magnets in the kitchen

But the most fascinating change is happening in the kitchen. For a century, refrigerators have relied on chemical coolants and vapor compression to keep groceries cold. Now, Oak Ridge National Laboratory has teamed up with General Electric to build a refrigerator powered by magnets.

Supported by a grant from the Department of Energy, this new design uses an environmentally friendly alloy instead of traditional fluorocarbons. It relies on the magnetocaloric effect to drastically cut power consumption compared to today's baseline standards. They are completely reinventing the hardest-working box in your house. The new design also eliminates the need for coolants that contribute to global warming.

Why the government is designing appliances

It might sound strange that the federal government is designing home appliances. But the network of national laboratories has a long history of creating technology that trickles down to daily life. These are the same facilities that discovered dozens of elements on the periodic table and installed the very first web server in North America.

Now they are pointing that massive scientific weight at the mundane problem of household energy loss. When top scientists stop looking at space and start looking at your living room, things change. Tomorrow's appliances will be quieter. They will also ditch the chemical processes of the past century.