What is a fume hood, and why should I care about it?
Research laboratory buildings are well known to be tremendous consumers of energy, typically using 4–5 times as much as commercial buildings. 1 Though largely unheard of outside of the research community, a common feature in laboratory buildings is the fume hood, which is a workstation that protects users from hazardous substances (see box). Fume hoods account for a major component of the energy consumption of laboratories: a typical fume hood consumes over three times the energy of an average American house.
