Accurate facade feature extraction method for buildings from three-dimensional point cloud data considering structural information

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Yongzhi; Ma, Yuqing; Zhu, A.-xing; Zhao, Hui; Liao, Lixia

2018-05-01

Facade features represent segmentations of building surfaces and can serve as a building framework. Extracting facade features from three-dimensional (3D) point cloud data (3D PCD) is an efficient method for 3D building modeling. By combining the advantages of 3D PCD and two-dimensional optical images, this study describes the creation of a highly accurate building facade feature extraction method from 3D PCD with a focus on structural information. The new extraction method involves three major steps: image feature extraction, exploration of the mapping method between the image features and 3D PCD, and optimization of the initial 3D PCD facade features considering structural information. Results show that the new method can extract the 3D PCD facade features of buildings more accurately and continuously. The new method is validated using a case study. In addition, the effectiveness of the new method is demonstrated by comparing it with the range image-extraction method and the optical image-extraction method in the absence of structural information. The 3D PCD facade features extracted by the new method can be applied in many fields, such as 3D building modeling and building information modeling.

Proceedings of eSim 2006 : IBPSA-Canada's 4. biennial building performance simulation conference

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kesik, T.

2006-01-01

This conference was attended by professionals, academics and students interested in promoting the science of building performance simulation in order to optimize design, construction, operation and maintenance of new and existing buildings around the world. This biennial conference and exhibition covered all topics related to computerized simulation of a building's energy performance and energy efficiency. Computerized simulation is widely used to predict the environmental performance of buildings during all stages of a building's life cycle, from the design, commissioning, construction, occupancy and management stages. Newly developed simulation methods for optimal comfort in new and existing buildings were evaluated. The themes of the conference were: recent developments for modelling the physical processes relevant to buildings; algorithms for modelling conventional and innovative HVAC systems; methods for modelling whole-building performance; building simulation software development; the use of building simulation tools in code compliance; moving simulation into practice; validation of building simulation software; architectural design; and optimization approaches in building design. The conference also covered the modeling of energy supply systems with reference to renewable energy sources such as ground source heat pumps or hybrid systems incorporating solar energy. The conference featured 32 presentations, of which 28 have been catalogued separately for inclusion in this database. refs., tabs., figs

Metrics for building performance assurance

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Koles, G.; Hitchcock, R.; Sherman, M.

1996-07-01

This report documents part of the work performed in phase I of a Laboratory Directors Research and Development (LDRD) funded project entitled Building Performance Assurances (BPA). The focus of the BPA effort is to transform the way buildings are built and operated in order to improve building performance by facilitating or providing tools, infrastructure, and information. The efforts described herein focus on the development of metrics with which to evaluate building performance and for which information and optimization tools need to be developed. The classes of building performance metrics reviewed are (1) Building Services (2) First Costs, (3) Operating Costs, (4) Maintenance Costs, and (5) Energy and Environmental Factors. The first category defines the direct benefits associated with buildings; the next three are different kinds of costs associated with providing those benefits; the last category includes concerns that are broader than direct costs and benefits to the building owner and building occupants. The level of detail of the various issues reflect the current state of knowledge in those scientific areas and the ability of the to determine that state of knowledge, rather than directly reflecting the importance of these issues; it intentionally does not specifically focus on energy issues. The report describes work in progress and is intended as a resource and can be used to indicate the areas needing more investigation. Other reports on BPA activities are also available.

Are green building features safe for preventive maintenance workers? Examining the evidence.

Science.gov (United States)

Omar, Mohamed Shamun; Quinn, Margaret M; Buchholz, Bryan; Geiser, Ken

2013-04-01

Many newly constructed green buildings (GB) are certified using the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system for new construction and major renovation which focuses on architectural and mechanical design to conserve energy, reduce environmental harm, and enhance indoor quality for occupants. This study evaluated the preventive maintenance (PM) worker occupational safety and health (OSH) risks related to the design of GB. PM job hazard analyses (JHA) were performed on the tasks required to operate and maintain five GB features selected from 13 LEED certified GB. A 22-item JHA and OSH risk scoring system were developed. Potentially serious OSH hazards included: green roofs made of slippery material without fall protection; energy recovery wheels and storm water harvesting systems in confined spaces; skylights without guard rails; and tight geothermal well mechanical rooms constraining safe preventive practices. GB can present PM OSH risks and these should be eliminated in the building design phase. Copyright © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Nearly Zero Energy Buildings: An Overview of the Main Construction Features across Europe

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giulia Paoletti

2017-05-01

Full Text Available Nearly Zero Energy Buildings (nZEBs represent the backbone to achieve ambitious European goals in terms of energy efficiency and CO2 emissions reduction. As defined in the EPBD, by 31 December 2020, all of the new buildings will have to reach a target of nearly zero energy. This target encourages the adoption of innovative business models as well as the technology development in the building sector, aimed at reducing energy demand and exploiting local renewable energy sources (RES. Assessing the share of implementation and the performance of technologies in new or renovated nZEBs is strategic to identify the market trends and to define design guidelines with the most effective solutions according to the context. In this regard, this paper analyses the construction features of a set of nZEBs, collected in 17 European countries within the EU IEE ZEBRA2020 project, with a special focus on the influence of the boundary conditions on the technologies adopted. The results show a general high insulation level of the envelope and recurrent specific technologies in the Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning (HVAC system (i.e., heat pumps and mechanical ventilation, while the climatic conditions do not drive significantly the design approach and the nZEB features.

Features of Functioning the Integrated Building Thermal Model

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Morozov Maxim N.

2017-01-01

Full Text Available A model of the building heating system, consisting of energy source, a distributed automatic control system, elements of individual heating unit and heating system is designed. Application Simulink of mathematical package Matlab is selected as a platform for the model. There are the specialized application Simscape libraries in aggregate with a wide range of Matlab mathematical tools allow to apply the “acausal” modeling concept. Implementation the “physical” representation of the object model gave improving the accuracy of the models. Principle of operation and features of the functioning of the thermal model is described. The investigations of building cooling dynamics were carried out.

The Impact of Individual Differences, Types of Model and Social Settings on Block Building Performance among Chinese Preschoolers.

Science.gov (United States)

Tian, Mi; Deng, Zhu; Meng, Zhaokun; Li, Rui; Zhang, Zhiyi; Qi, Wenhui; Wang, Rui; Yin, Tingting; Ji, Menghui

2018-01-01

Children's block building performances are used as indicators of other abilities in multiple domains. In the current study, we examined individual differences, types of model and social settings as influences on children's block building performance. Chinese preschoolers ( N = 180) participated in a block building activity in a natural setting, and performance was assessed with multiple measures in order to identify a range of specific skills. Using scores generated across these measures, three dependent variables were analyzed: block building skills, structural balance and structural features. An overall MANOVA showed that there were significant main effects of gender and grade level across most measures. Types of model showed no significant effect in children's block building. There was a significant main effect of social settings on structural features, with the best performance in the 5-member group, followed by individual and then the 10-member block building. These findings suggest that boys performed better than girls in block building activity. Block building performance increased significantly from 1st to 2nd year of preschool, but not from second to third. The preschoolers created more representational constructions when presented with a model made of wooden rather than with a picture. There was partial evidence that children performed better when working with peers in a small group than when working alone or working in a large group. It is suggested that future study should examine other modalities rather than the visual one, diversify the samples and adopt a longitudinal investigation.

High Resolution SAR Imaging Employing Geometric Features for Extracting Seismic Damage of Buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Cui, L. P.; Wang, X. P.; Dou, A. X.; Ding, X.

2018-04-01

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) image is relatively easy to acquire but difficult for interpretation. This paper probes how to identify seismic damage of building using geometric features of SAR. The SAR imaging geometric features of buildings, such as the high intensity layover, bright line induced by double bounce backscattering and dark shadow is analysed, and show obvious differences texture features of homogeneity, similarity and entropy in combinatorial imaging geometric regions between the un-collapsed and collapsed buildings in airborne SAR images acquired in Yushu city damaged by 2010 Ms7.1 Yushu, Qinghai, China earthquake, which implicates a potential capability to discriminate collapsed and un-collapsed buildings from SAR image. Study also shows that the proportion of highlight (layover & bright line) area (HA) is related to the seismic damage degree, thus a SAR image damage index (SARDI), which related to the ratio of HA to the building occupation are of building in a street block (SA), is proposed. While HA is identified through feature extraction with high-pass and low-pass filtering of SAR image in frequency domain. A partial region with 58 natural street blocks in the Yushu City are selected as study area. Then according to the above method, HA is extracted, SARDI is then calculated and further classified into 3 classes. The results show effective through validation check with seismic damage classes interpreted artificially from post-earthquake airborne high resolution optical image, which shows total classification accuracy 89.3 %, Kappa coefficient 0.79 and identical to the practical seismic damage distribution. The results are also compared and discussed with the building damage identified from SAR image available by other authors.

School Buildings for the 21st Century Some Features of New School Buildings in Iceland

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anna Kristín Sigurðardóttir

2011-01-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study is to identify features of change in the recent design of school buildings in Iceland, and how they might affect teaching practices. Environmental and architectonic features characterising school buildings designed and built at the beginning of the 21st century are examined in light of challenges involving architecture, educational ideology, school policy and digital technology. The sample for the study consists of 20 schools located in four municipalities. Four of the school buildings were developed and built in this century, while the other 16 were designed in the 20th century. The design of all of the buildings was explored and reviewed by a multidisciplinary team. Data was collected by observations and photography at each school site, as well as by reviewing technical documents. The relationship between school design and school practices was studied through a questionnaire survey among all teachers, in order to find out whether teachers working in new environments differ from teachers in more traditional classroom settings. The results indicate a clear shift in the design of educational buildings. Flexibility, flow, openness and teamwork seem to guide recent school design. Clusters of classrooms or open spaces, transparent or movable boundaries, as well as shared spaces allowing for manifold interactions in flexible groups seem to be replacing traditional classrooms along confining corridors. Teachers working in open classroom environments collaborate more often than their counterparts. Teaching practices are also characterised by more opportunities for pupils to choose between tasks and enjoy more variation regarding group division and workspace arrangements.

Using passive cooling strategies to improve thermal performance and reduce energy consumption of residential buildings in U.A.E. buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hanan M. Taleb

2014-06-01

Full Text Available Passive design responds to local climate and site conditions in order to maximise the comfort and health of building users while minimising energy use. The key to designing a passive building is to take best advantage of the local climate. Passive cooling refers to any technologies or design features adopted to reduce the temperature of buildings without the need for power consumption. Consequently, the aim of this study is to test the usefulness of applying selected passive cooling strategies to improve thermal performance and to reduce energy consumption of residential buildings in hot arid climate settings, namely Dubai, United Arab Emirates. One case building was selected and eight passive cooling strategies were applied. Energy simulation software – namely IES – was used to assess the performance of the building. Solar shading performance was also assessed using Sun Cast Analysis, as a part of the IES software. Energy reduction was achieved due to both the harnessing of natural ventilation and the minimising of heat gain in line with applying good shading devices alongside the use of double glazing. Additionally, green roofing proved its potential by acting as an effective roof insulation. The study revealed several significant findings including that the total annual energy consumption of a residential building in Dubai may be reduced by up to 23.6% when a building uses passive cooling strategies.

Building Performance Simulation for Sustainable Energy Use in Buildings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hensen, J.L.M.

2010-01-01

This paper aims to provide a general view of the background and current state of building performance simulation, which has the potential to deliver, directly or indirectly, substantial benefits to building stakeholders and to the environment. However the building simulation community faces many

Building performance simulation for sustainable building design and operation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hensen, J.L.M.

2011-01-01

This paper aims to provide a general view of the background and current state of building performance simulation, which has the potential to deliver, directly or indirectly, substantial benefits to building stakeholders and to the environment. However the building simulation community faces many

Estimating Fallout Building Attributes from Architectural Features and Global Earthquake Model (GEM) Building Descriptions

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Dillon, Michael B. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States); Kane, Staci R. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

2017-03-01

A nuclear explosion has the potential to injure or kill tens to hundreds of thousands (or more) of people through exposure to fallout (external gamma) radiation. Existing buildings can protect their occupants (reducing fallout radiation exposures) by placing material and distance between fallout particles and individuals indoors. Prior efforts have determined an initial set of building attributes suitable to reasonably assess a given building’s protection against fallout radiation. The current work provides methods to determine the quantitative values for these attributes from (a) common architectural features and data and (b) buildings described using the Global Earthquake Model (GEM) taxonomy. These methods will be used to improve estimates of fallout protection for operational US Department of Defense (DoD) and US Department of Energy (DOE) consequence assessment models.

The Impact of Individual Differences, Types of Model and Social Settings on Block Building Performance among Chinese Preschoolers

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mi Tian

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Children’s block building performances are used as indicators of other abilities in multiple domains. In the current study, we examined individual differences, types of model and social settings as influences on children’s block building performance. Chinese preschoolers (N = 180 participated in a block building activity in a natural setting, and performance was assessed with multiple measures in order to identify a range of specific skills. Using scores generated across these measures, three dependent variables were analyzed: block building skills, structural balance and structural features. An overall MANOVA showed that there were significant main effects of gender and grade level across most measures. Types of model showed no significant effect in children’s block building. There was a significant main effect of social settings on structural features, with the best performance in the 5-member group, followed by individual and then the 10-member block building. These findings suggest that boys performed better than girls in block building activity. Block building performance increased significantly from 1st to 2nd year of preschool, but not from second to third. The preschoolers created more representational constructions when presented with a model made of wooden rather than with a picture. There was partial evidence that children performed better when working with peers in a small group than when working alone or working in a large group. It is suggested that future study should examine other modalities rather than the visual one, diversify the samples and adopt a longitudinal investigation.

Contrasting the capabilities of building energy performance simulation programs

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Crawley, Drury B. [US Department of Energy, Washington, DC (United States); Hand, Jon W. [University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland (United Kingdom). Energy Systems Research Unit; Kummert, Michael [University of Wisconsin-Madison (United States). Solar Energy Laboratory; Griffith, Brent T. [National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, CO (United States)

2008-04-15

For the past 50 years, a wide variety of building energy simulation programs have been developed, enhanced and are in use throughout the building energy community. This paper is an overview of a report, which provides up-to-date comparison of the features and capabilities of twenty major building energy simulation programs. The comparison is based on information provided by the program developers in the following categories: general modeling features; zone loads; building envelope and daylighting and solar; infiltration, ventilation and multizone airflow; renewable energy systems; electrical systems and equipment; HVAC systems; HVAC equipment; environmental emissions; economic evaluation; climate data availability, results reporting; validation; and user interface, links to other programs, and availability. (author)

Human Factors in Green Office Building Design: The Impact of Workplace Green Features on Health Perceptions in High-Rise High-Density Asian Cities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fei Xue

2016-10-01

Full Text Available There is a growing concern about human factors in green building, which is imperative in high-rise high-density urban environments. This paper describes our attempts to explore the influence of workplace green features (such as green certification, ventilation mode, and building morphology on health perceptions (personal sensation, sensorial assumptions, healing performance based on a survey in Hong Kong and Singapore. The results validated the relationship between green features and health perceptions in the workplace environment. Remarkably, participants from the air-conditioned offices revealed significant higher concerns about health issues than those participants from the mixed-ventilated offices. The mixed-ventilation design performs as a bridge to connect the indoor environment and outdoor space, which enables people to have contact with nature. Additionally, the preferred building morphology of the workplace is the pattern of a building complex instead of a single building. The complex form integrates the configuration of courtyards, podium gardens, green terrace, public plaza, and other types of open spaces with the building clusters, which contributes to better health perceptions. This research contributes to the rationalization and optimization of passive climate-adaptive design strategies for green buildings in high-density tropical or subtropical cities.

Research on Optimal Observation Scale for Damaged Buildings after Earthquake Based on Optimal Feature Space

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, J.; Chen, W.; Dou, A.; Li, W.; Sun, Y.

2018-04-01

A new information extraction method of damaged buildings rooted in optimal feature space is put forward on the basis of the traditional object-oriented method. In this new method, ESP (estimate of scale parameter) tool is used to optimize the segmentation of image. Then the distance matrix and minimum separation distance of all kinds of surface features are calculated through sample selection to find the optimal feature space, which is finally applied to extract the image of damaged buildings after earthquake. The overall extraction accuracy reaches 83.1 %, the kappa coefficient 0.813. The new information extraction method greatly improves the extraction accuracy and efficiency, compared with the traditional object-oriented method, and owns a good promotional value in the information extraction of damaged buildings. In addition, the new method can be used for the information extraction of different-resolution images of damaged buildings after earthquake, then to seek the optimal observation scale of damaged buildings through accuracy evaluation. It is supposed that the optimal observation scale of damaged buildings is between 1 m and 1.2 m, which provides a reference for future information extraction of damaged buildings.

Energy-Performance-Based Design-Build Process: Strategies for Procuring High-Performance Buildings on Typical Construction Budgets: Preprint

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Scheib, J.; Pless, S.; Torcellini, P.

2014-08-01

NREL experienced a significant increase in employees and facilities on our 327-acre main campus in Golden, Colorado over the past five years. To support this growth, researchers developed and demonstrated a new building acquisition method that successfully integrates energy efficiency requirements into the design-build requests for proposals and contracts. We piloted this energy performance based design-build process with our first new construction project in 2008. We have since replicated and evolved the process for large office buildings, a smart grid research laboratory, a supercomputer, a parking structure, and a cafeteria. Each project incorporated aggressive efficiency strategies using contractual energy use requirements in the design-build contracts, all on typical construction budgets. We have found that when energy efficiency is a core project requirement as defined at the beginning of a project, innovative design-build teams can integrate the most cost effective and high performance efficiency strategies on typical construction budgets. When the design-build contract includes measurable energy requirements and is set up to incentivize design-build teams to focus on achieving high performance in actual operations, owners can now expect their facilities to perform. As NREL completed the new construction in 2013, we have documented our best practices in training materials and a how-to guide so that other owners and owner's representatives can replicate our successes and learn from our experiences in attaining market viable, world-class energy performance in the built environment.

Building envelope influence on the annual energy performance in office buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Harmati Norbert L.

2016-01-01

Full Text Available The objective of the research is to determine the quantitative influence of building envelope on the annual heating and cooling energy demand in office buildings demonstrated on a reference office-tower building located in Novi Sad, Serbia. The investigation intended to find preferable and applicable solutions for energy performance improvement in currently inefficient office buildings. A comparative and evaluative analysis was performed among the heating energy expenses and simulated values from the multi-zone model designed in EnergyPlus engine. The research determines an improved window to wall ratio using dynamic daylight simulation and presents the influence of glazing parameters (U-value, Solar heat gain coefficient - SHGC on the annual energy performance. Findings presented window to wall ratio reduction down to 30% and point out the significance of the SHGC parameter on the overall energy performance of buildings with high internal loads. The calculation of the air-ventilation energy demand according to EN 15251 is included respectively. Results offer effective methods for energy performance improvement in temperate climate conditions.

Energy performance of building fabric - Comparing two types of vernacular residential houses

Science.gov (United States)

Draganova, Vanya Y.; Matsumoto, Hiroshi; Tsuzuki, Kazuyo

2017-10-01

Notwithstanding apparent differences, Japanese and Bulgarian traditional residential houses share a lot of common features - building materials, building techniques, even layout design. Despite the similarities, these two types of houses have not been compared so far. The study initiates such comparison. The focus is on houses in areas with similar climate in both countries. Current legislation requirements are compared, as well as the criteria for thermal comfort of people. Achieving high energy performance results from a dynamic system of 4 main key factors - thermal comfort range, heating/cooling source, building envelope and climatic conditions. A change in any single one of them can affect the final energy performance. However, it can be expected that a combination of changes in more than one factor usually occurs. The aim of this study is to evaluate the correlation between the thermal performance of building envelope designed under current regulations and a traditional one, having in mind the different thermal comfort range in the two countries. A sample building model is calculated in Scenario 1 - Japanese traditional building fabric, Scenario 2 - Bulgarian traditional building fabric and Scenario 3 - meeting the requirements of the more demanding current regulations. The energy modelling is conducted using EnergyPlus through OpenStudio cross-platform of software tools. The 3D geometry for the simulation is created using OpenStudio SketchUp Plug-in. Equal number of inhabitants, electricity consumption and natural ventilation is assumed. The results show that overall low energy consumption can be achieved using traditional building fabric as well, when paired with a wider thermal comfort range. Under these conditions traditional building design is still viable today. This knowledge can reestablish the use of traditional building fabric in contemporary design, stimulate preservation of local culture, building traditions and community identity.

Building Face Composites Can Harm Lineup Identification Performance

Science.gov (United States)

Wells, Gary L.; Charman, Steve D.; Olson, Elizabeth A.

2005-01-01

Face composite programs permit eyewitnesses to build likenesses of target faces by selecting facial features and combining them into an intact face. Research has shown that these composites are generally poor likenesses of the target face. Two experiments tested the proposition that this composite-building process could harm the builder's memory…

Exploring Socio-Technical Features of Green Interior Design of Residential Buildings: Indicators, Interdependence and Embeddedness

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yan Ning

2016-12-01

Full Text Available This research aims to develop indicators for assessing green interior design of new residential buildings in China, grounded in the socio-technical systems approach. The research was carried out through a critical literature review and two focus group studies. The results show that the boundaries of green interior design were identified with respect to three dimensions, namely performance, methodology and stakeholders. The socio-technical systems approach argues for the recognition of the interdependence between the systems elements and the feature of embeddedness. The interdependence of the systems elements exists within each of these three dimensions and across them. It is also found that the socio-technical systems of green interior design are embedded in the social, regulatory and geographic context. Taking interior design of residential buildings as the empirical setting, this study contributes to the literature of green building assessment by presenting a socio-technical systems approach.

High-performance commercial building facades

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lee, Eleanor; Selkowitz, Stephen; Bazjanac, Vladimir; Inkarojrit, Vorapat; Kohler, Christian

2002-06-01

This study focuses on advanced building facades that use daylighting, sun control, ventilation systems, and dynamic systems. A quick perusal of the leading architectural magazines, or a discussion in most architectural firms today will eventually lead to mention of some of the innovative new buildings that are being constructed with all-glass facades. Most of these buildings are appearing in Europe, although interestingly U.S. A/E firms often have a leading role in their design. This ''emerging technology'' of heavily glazed fagades is often associated with buildings whose design goals include energy efficiency, sustainability, and a ''green'' image. While there are a number of new books on the subject with impressive photos and drawings, there is little critical examination of the actual performance of such buildings, and a generally poor understanding as to whether they achieve their performance goals, or even what those goals might be. Even if the building ''works'' it is often dangerous to take a design solution from one climate and location and transport it to a new one without a good causal understanding of how the systems work. In addition, there is a wide range of existing and emerging glazing and fenestration technologies in use in these buildings, many of which break new ground with respect to innovative structural use of glass. It is unclear as to how well many of these designs would work as currently formulated in California locations dominated by intense sunlight and seismic events. Finally, the costs of these systems are higher than normal facades, but claims of energy and productivity savings are used to justify some of them. Once again these claims, while plausible, are largely unsupported. There have been major advances in glazing and facade technology over the past 30 years and we expect to see continued innovation and product development. It is critical in this process to be able to

Cost and effectiveness of radon-resistant features in new school buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Craig, A.B.; Leovie, K.W.

1991-01-01

Recent concerns over elevated levels of radon in existing buildings have prompted the design and construction of a number of school buildings that either are radon resistant or incorporate features that facilitate post-construction mitigation if needed. This paper described initial results of a study of several schools with radon-resistant features that were recently constructed in the northeastern U.S. These designs are generally based on experience with radon mitigation in existing houses and schools and radon-resistant new house construction. The study was limited to slab-on-grade schools, where the most common radon-resistant school design is active subslab depressurization (ASD). The additional construction costs for eight schools built with ASD ranged from $3 to $11 per square meter of slab area. The radon contractors who designed these systems have tended to overdesign the radon-reduction systems in the absence of specific written guidance to follow to lessen potential liability in the event of system failure. Design features include detailed sealing of all slab cracks, multiple exhaust stacks, and extensive subslab piping

Super-structure and building performance

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Van Wyk, Llewellyn V

2010-11-01

Full Text Available The super-structure consists predominantly of the load- and no-load-bearing walls-including all doors and windows and suspended floor slabs. The building envelope plays a significant role in the performance of a building, especially with regard...

Cost and effectiveness of radon-resistant features in new school buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Craig, A.B.; Leovic, K.W.; Saum, D.W.

1991-01-01

Recent concerns over elevated levels of radon in existing buildings have prompted the design and construction of a number of school buildings that either are radon resistant or incorporate features that facilitate post-construction mitigation if needed. This paper describes initial results of a study of several schools with radon-resistant features that were recently constructed in the northeastern US. These designs are generally based on experience with radon mitigation in existing houses and schools and radon-resistant new house construction. The study was limited to slab-on-grade schools, where the most common radon-resistant school design is active subslab depressurization (ASD). The additional construction costs for eight schools built with ASD ranged from $3 to $11 per square meter of slab area. The radon contractors who designed these systems have tended to overdesign the radon-reduction systems in the absence of specific written guidance to follow to lessen potential liability in the event of system failure. Design features include detailed sealing of all stab cracks, multiple exhaust stacks, and extensive subslab piping. Recent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) research on radon mitigation suggests that simpler ASD systems may provide sufficient radon resistance in new large buildings at lower costs. Components of a specification for radon-resistant school construction are discussed, based on comments from radon system designers. Another school being studied was built with a heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning (HVAC) pressurization radon control system, and considerations for this type of system are examined

Policy Pathways: Energy Performance Certification of Buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2010-07-01

Improving energy efficiency is one of the most effective measures to address energy security, climate change and economic objectives. The Policy Pathways series can help countries capture this potential by assisting with the implementation of the 25 energy efficiency policy recommendations that were published by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in 2008. This policy pathway on energy performance certification of buildings is the second in the series. It aims to provide a 'how-to' guide to policy makers and relevant stakeholders on the essential elements in implementing energy performance certification of buildings programmes. Energy performance certification of buildings is a way to rate the energy efficiency of individual buildings -- whether they be residential, commercial or public. It is a key policy instrument that can assist governments in reducing energy consumption in buildings. This policy pathway showcases experiences from countries around the world to show examples of good practice and delivers a pathway of ten critical steps to implement energy performance certification of buildings programmes.

Unintended anchors: Building rating systems and energy performance goals for U.S. buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Klotz, Leidy; Mack, Daniel; Klapthor, Brent; Tunstall, Casey; Harrison, Jennilee

2010-01-01

In the U.S., where buildings account for 40% of energy use, commercial buildings use more energy per unit area than ever before. However, exemplary buildings demonstrate the feasibility of much better energy performance at no additional first cost. This research examines one possible explanation for this inconsistency. The aim is to investigate whether the anchoring bias, which refers to our tendency to gravitate towards a pre-defined standard regardless of its relevance, influences energy performance goals in building design. The scope examines professionals who help set energy performance goals for U.S. buildings. Prior to being asked to set an energy performance goal, these professionals were randomly directed to one of three series of questions. One series set an anchor of 90% energy reduction beyond standard practice, one set a 30% anchor, and one set no anchor. Respondents exposed to the 90% anchor, and respondents exposed to no anchor at all, set higher energy performance goals than respondents exposed to the 30% anchor. These results suggest that building rating systems that only reward incremental energy improvements may inadvertently create anchors, thereby discouraging more advanced energy performance goals and inhibiting energy performance that is technically and economically feasible.

77 FR 43084 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Federal Buildings Personnel Training Act...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-07-23

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Federal Buildings Personnel Training Act; Notification of... High- Performance Green Buildings, Office of Governmentwide Policy, General Services Administration... download from the Office of Federal High-Performance Green Building Web site Library at-- http://www.gsa...

77 FR 24494 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-04-24

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee; Notification of Upcoming... agenda for the May 9, 2012, meeting of the Green Building Advisory Committee Meeting (the Committee). The... Sandler, Designated Federal Officer, Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings, Office of...

Commercial Buildings Energy Performance within Context

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lazarova-Molnar, Sanja; Kjærgaard, Mikkel Baun; Shaker, Hamid Reza

2015-01-01

Existing commercial buildings represent a challenge in the energy efficiency domain. Energy efficiency of a building, very often equalized to a building’s performance should not be observed as a standalone issue. For commercial buildings, energy efficiency needs to be observed and assessed within...

Multidisciplinary Energy Assessment of Tertiary Buildings: Automated Geomatic Inspection, Building Information Modeling Reconstruction and Building Performance Simulation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Faustino Patiño-Cambeiro

2017-07-01

Full Text Available There is an urgent need for energy efficiency in buildings within the European framework, considering its environmental implications, and Europe’s energy dependence. Furthermore, the need for enhancing and increasing productivity in the building industry turns new technologies and building energy performance simulation environments into extremely interesting solutions towards rigorous analysis and decision making in renovation within acceptable risk levels. The present work describes a multidisciplinary approach for the estimation of the energy performance of an educational building. The research involved data acquisition with advanced geomatic tools, the development of an optimized building information model, and energy assessment in Building Performance Simulation (BPS software. Interoperability issues were observed in the different steps of the process. The inspection and diagnostic phases were conducted in a timely, accurate manner thanks to automated data acquisition and subsequent analysis using Building Information Modeling based tools (BIM-based tools. Energy simulation was performed using Design Builder, and the results obtained were compared with those yielded by the official software tool established by Spanish regulations for energy certification. The discrepancies between the results of both programs have proven that the official software program is conservative in this sense. This may cause the depreciation of the assessed buildings.

Organization Features and School Performance

OpenAIRE

Atkins, Lois Major

2005-01-01

The purpose of this study was to determine the odds of school organization features predicting schools meeting district or state performance goals. The school organization features were organizational complexity, shared decision making, and leadership behavior. The dependent variable was school performance, operationally defined as a principalâ s yes response or no response to the question, â did your school meet district or state performance goals.â The independent variables representing...

Building performance simulation as a design tool for refurbishment of buildings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hensen, J.L.M.; Bartak, M.; Drkal, F.; Dunovska, T.; Lain, M.; Matuska, T.; Schwarzer, J.; Sourek, B.; Bednar, T.

2004-01-01

This paper attempts to outline the current state-of-the-art regarding the use of building performance simulation as a design tool for refurbishment of buildings. This is illus-trated by means of three recent studies for conversion of historical buildings (an early 20th century factory, and a water

Structural and compositional features of high-rise buildings: experimental design in Yekaterinburg

Science.gov (United States)

Yankovskaya, Yulia; Lobanov, Yuriy; Temnov, Vladimir

2018-03-01

The study looks at the specifics of high-rise development in Yekaterinburg. High-rise buildings are considered in the context of their historical development, structural features, compositional and imaginative design techniques. Experience of Yekaterinburg architects in experimental design is considered and analyzed. Main issues and prospects of high-rise development within the Yekaterinburg structure are studied. The most interesting and significant conceptual approaches to the structural and compositional arrangement of high-rise buildings are discussed.

Building Trust in High-Performing Teams

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aki Soudunsaari

2012-06-01

Full Text Available Facilitation of growth is more about good, trustworthy contacts than capital. Trust is a driving force for business creation, and to create a global business you need to build a team that is capable of meeting the challenge. Trust is a key factor in team building and a needed enabler for cooperation. In general, trust building is a slow process, but it can be accelerated with open interaction and good communication skills. The fast-growing and ever-changing nature of global business sets demands for cooperation and team building, especially for startup companies. Trust building needs personal knowledge and regular face-to-face interaction, but it also requires empathy, respect, and genuine listening. Trust increases communication, and rich and open communication is essential for the building of high-performing teams. Other building materials are a shared vision, clear roles and responsibilities, willingness for cooperation, and supporting and encouraging leadership. This study focuses on trust in high-performing teams. It asks whether it is possible to manage trust and which tools and operation models should be used to speed up the building of trust. In this article, preliminary results from the authors’ research are presented to highlight the importance of sharing critical information and having a high level of communication through constant interaction.

Specific features of modern multifunctional high-rise building construction

Science.gov (United States)

Manukhina, Lyubov; Samosudova, Natal'ja

2018-03-01

The article analyzes the main reasons for the development of high-rise building construction the most important of which-is a limitation of the urban areas and, consequently, the high price of land reserved for construction. New engineering and compositional solutions for the creation of new types of buildings are considered - complex technical designs of a large number of storeys completely meet the new requirements for safety and comfort. Some peculiarities of designing high-rise buildings and searching for optimal architectural and planning solutions are revealed since, with external architectural simplicity, high-rise buildings have complex structural and technological and space-planning solutions. We consider the specific features of a high-rise housing in various countries around the world, including Russia, such as the layout of the multi-storey residential buildings, depending on the climatic characteristics of the regions, assessment of the geological risk of the construction site, the choice of parameters and functional purpose of the sections of the territory of high-rise construction, location of the town-planning object for substantiating the overall dimensions of the building, assessment of changes aeration and engineering and hydrological conditions of the site. A special place in the article on the problems of improvement of the territory, the device of courtyards, landscaping, the device of playing and sports grounds. The main conclusion in the article is the following problem - when developing high-rise housing construction, the development of high-rise housing, and an increase in the population density in the territory of large cities of Russia, necessary to create a comfortable and safe level of residents living and not a decrease, but an improvement in the quality of the urban environment.

77 FR 2296 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; the Green Building Advisory Committee...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-01-17

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; the Green Building Advisory Committee; Notification of Upcoming... teleconference meetings of the Green Building Advisory Committee (the Committee). The teleconference meetings are... Federal High Performance Green Buildings, Office of Governmentwide Policy, General Services Administration...

Characterisation of representative building typologies for social housing projects in Brazil and its energy performance

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Triana, Maria Andrea; Lamberts, Roberto; Sassi, Paola

2015-01-01

In Brazil the housing deficit is around 5.5 million houses. To address this need, the government created a programme called “My house, My life”. The main subsidies of the programme are for families earning up to three times the minimum wage. In order to formulate strategies for more energy efficiency buildings, it is necessary to understand the thermal and energy performance of what is being built. This article defines representative projects for typologies being built in the Brazilian social housing sector through the analysis of 108 projects considering two groups of income levels and investigates the thermal and energy performance of the representative projects in relation to the Regulation for Energy Efficiency Labelling of Residential Buildings in Brazil for two bioclimatic zones. Five representative building models were defined. Considering the most common features found on the sample, the study suggests the importance of addresing energy efficiency measures on the sector since current building techniques for social housing shows a tendency towards a low performance in relation to the thermal and energy performance criteria of the Energy Labelling especially for lower income projects. This provides a basis for future policy and allows for more in depth studies within the sector. - Highlights: • Characterisation of representative typologies built for social housing in Brazil. • More recurrent building physics characteristics considered. • Energy efficiency and thermal performance of Brazilian social housing analysed. • Regulation for Energy Efficiency Labelling of Residential Buildings in Brazil used for analysis.

High-performance commercial building systems

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Selkowitz, Stephen

2003-10-01

This report summarizes key technical accomplishments resulting from the three year PIER-funded R&D program, ''High Performance Commercial Building Systems'' (HPCBS). The program targets the commercial building sector in California, an end-use sector that accounts for about one-third of all California electricity consumption and an even larger fraction of peak demand, at a cost of over $10B/year. Commercial buildings also have a major impact on occupant health, comfort and productivity. Building design and operations practices that influence energy use are deeply engrained in a fragmented, risk-averse industry that is slow to change. Although California's aggressive standards efforts have resulted in new buildings designed to use less energy than those constructed 20 years ago, the actual savings realized are still well below technical and economic potentials. The broad goal of this program is to develop and deploy a set of energy-saving technologies, strategies, and techniques, and improve processes for designing, commissioning, and operating commercial buildings, while improving health, comfort, and performance of occupants, all in a manner consistent with sound economic investment practices. Results are to be broadly applicable to the commercial sector for different building sizes and types, e.g. offices and schools, for different classes of ownership, both public and private, and for owner-occupied as well as speculative buildings. The program aims to facilitate significant electricity use savings in the California commercial sector by 2015, while assuring that these savings are affordable and promote high quality indoor environments. The five linked technical program elements contain 14 projects with 41 distinct R&D tasks. Collectively they form a comprehensive Research, Development, and Demonstration (RD&D) program with the potential to capture large savings in the commercial building sector, providing significant economic benefits to

Real estate market and building energy performance: Data for a mass appraisal approach.

Science.gov (United States)

Bonifaci, Pietro; Copiello, Sergio

2015-12-01

Mass appraisal is widely considered an advanced frontier in the real estate valuation field. Performing mass appraisal entails the need to get access to base information conveyed by a large amount of transactions, such as prices and property features. Due to the lack of transparency of many Italian real estate market segments, our survey has been addressed to gather data from residential property advertisements. The dataset specifically focuses on property offer prices and dwelling energy efficiency. The latter refers to the label expressed and exhibited by the energy performance certificate. Moreover, data are georeferenced with the highest possible accuracy: at the neighborhood level for a 76.8% of cases, at street or building number level for the remaining 23.2%. Data are related to the analysis performed in Bonifaci and Copiello [1], about the relationship between house prices and building energy performance, that is to say, the willingness to pay in order to benefit from more efficient dwellings.

Driving forces and barriers to improved energy performance of buildings: an analysis of energy performance of Swedish buildings, 2000-2006

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fuglseth, Bente Beckstroem

2008-06-15

The building sector is responsible for a substantial part of energy use and green house gas emissions in Europe. This report explores driving forces and barriers to improved energy performance of buildings, using the Swedish building sector as a case. The development of energy performance of buildings in Sweden from 2000 until 2006 is explored by applying a threefold understanding of energy performance of buildings: substitution from fossil fuels to renewable energy, conversion from electrical heating to thermal energy and reduction in energy demand. Three explanatory approaches are used to analyse driving forces and barriers to improved energy performance: the techno-economic approach stresses the physical aspects of infrastructure and technologies, the institutional approach emphasizes the role of institutional factors, while the regulative approach focuses on formal rules and laws. The study concludes that all factors have promoted substitution of fossil fuels with renewable energy, while they have prevented conversion from electrical heating to thermal energy and reduction in energy demand. (author). 95 refs

Integrating advanced facades into high performance buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Selkowitz, Stephen E.

2001-01-01

Glass is a remarkable material but its functionality is significantly enhanced when it is processed or altered to provide added intrinsic capabilities. The overall performance of glass elements in a building can be further enhanced when they are designed to be part of a complete facade system. Finally the facade system delivers the greatest performance to the building owner and occupants when it becomes an essential element of a fully integrated building design. This presentation examines the growing interest in incorporating advanced glazing elements into more comprehensive facade and building systems in a manner that increases comfort, productivity and amenity for occupants, reduces operating costs for building owners, and contributes to improving the health of the planet by reducing overall energy use and negative environmental impacts. We explore the role of glazing systems in dynamic and responsive facades that provide the following functionality: Enhanced sun protection and cooling load control while improving thermal comfort and providing most of the light needed with daylighting; Enhanced air quality and reduced cooling loads using natural ventilation schemes employing the facade as an active air control element; Reduced operating costs by minimizing lighting, cooling and heating energy use by optimizing the daylighting-thermal tradeoffs; Net positive contributions to the energy balance of the building using integrated photovoltaic systems; Improved indoor environments leading to enhanced occupant health, comfort and performance. In addressing these issues facade system solutions must, of course, respect the constraints of latitude, location, solar orientation, acoustics, earthquake and fire safety, etc. Since climate and occupant needs are dynamic variables, in a high performance building the facade solution have the capacity to respond and adapt to these variable exterior conditions and to changing occupant needs. This responsive performance capability

Optimal control and performance of photovoltachromic switchable glazing for building integration in temperate climates

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Favoino, Fabio; Fiorito, Francesco; Cannavale, Alessandro; Ranzi, Gianluca; Overend, Mauro

2016-01-01

Highlights: • The features and properties of photovoltachromic switchable glazing are presented. • The different possible control strategies for the switchable glazing are presented. • Thermal and daylight performance are co-simulated for rule-based and optimal control. • A novel building performance simulation framework is developed for this aim. • Switchable glazing performance is compared for different controls and climates. - Abstract: The development of adaptive building envelope technologies, and particularly of switchable glazing, can make significant contributions to decarbonisation targets. It is therefore essential to quantify their effect on building energy use and indoor environmental quality when integrated into buildings. The evaluation of their performance presents new challenges when compared to conventional “static” building envelope systems, as they require design and control aspects to be evaluated together, which are also mutually interrelated across thermal and visual physical domains. This paper addresses these challenges by presenting a novel simulation framework for the performance evaluation of responsive building envelope technologies and, particularly, of switchable glazing. This is achieved by integrating a building energy simulation tool and a lighting simulation one, in a control optimisation framework to simulate advanced control of adaptive building envelopes. The performance of a photovoltachromic glazing is evaluated according to building energy use, Useful Daylight Illuminance, glare risk and load profile matching indicators for a sun oriented office building in different temperate climates. The original architecture of photovoltachromic cell provides an automatic control of its transparency as a function of incoming solar irradiance. However, to fully explore the building integration potential of photovoltachromic technology, different control strategies are evaluated, from passive and simple rule based controls, to

Performance Based Building and its application to Healthy Buildings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Loomans, M.G.L.C.; Bluyssen, P.M.

2005-01-01

The European funded Project PeBBu, Performance Based Building, is a Thematic network under the Competitive and Sustainable Growth program, which started September 1st, 2001 andwill run for 4 years. In one of the domains of PeBBu, the domain Indoor Environment, a stateof-the-art on the Performance

BUILDING DESIGN INFLUENCE ON THE ENERGY PERFORMANCE

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Moga Ligia

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Energy efficient design is a high priority in the national energy strategy of European countries considering the latest requirements of the European Directive on the Energy Performance of Buildings. The residential sector is responsible for a significant quantity of energy consumptions from the total amount of consumptions on a worldwide level. In residential building most of the energy consumptions are given mainly by heating, domestic hot water and lighting. Retrofitting the existing building stock offers great opportunities for reducing global energy consumptions and greenhouse gas emissions. The first part of the paper will address the need of thermal and energy retrofit of existing buildings. The second part will provide an overview on how various variables can influence the energy performance of a building that is placed in all four climatic zones from Romania. The paper is useful for specialist and designers from the construction field in understanding that buildings behave differently from the energy point of view in different climatic regions, even if the building characteristic remain the same.

76 FR 35894 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Establishment of the Green Building Advisory...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-06-20

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Establishment of the Green Building Advisory Committee AGENCY... announces the establishment of the Green Building Advisory Committee (the Committee), pursuant to Section... strategic plans, products and activities of the Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings and...

Use of building typologies for energy performance assessment of national building stocks. Existent experiences in European Countries and common approach. First TABULA synthesis report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Loga, Tobias; Diefenbach, Nikolaus (eds.)

2010-06-15

The present study examines the experiences with building typologies in the European countries. The objective is to learn how to structure the variety of energy-related features of existing build-ings. As a result of the enquiry it can be stated that there are a lot of different activities which are based on typological criteria. Some of them are concentrating on providing information material and conducting energy advice. On the other hand, building types are used for a better understand-ing of the energy performance of building portfolios on different levels: from the strategic planning of housing companies up to the evaluation of national policies and measures in the building sector. On the basis of these experiences a common approach for building typologies has been devel-oped. The core elements of this harmonised approach are a classification systematic, a structure for building and supply system data and a coherent energy balance method. Furthermore a uni-form classification of statistical data enables a concerted approach for designing national building stock models. Finally, a concise itinerary is described which allows experts to develop step by step a national or regional building typology which are compatible with the common TABULA approach. (orig.)

Research Support Facility (RSF): Leadership in Building Performance (Brochure)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

2011-09-01

This brochure/poster provides information on the features of the Research Support Facility including a detailed illustration of the facility with call outs of energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies. Imagine an office building so energy efficient that its occupants consume only the amount of energy generated by renewable power on the building site. The building, the Research Support Facility (RSF) occupied by the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) employees, uses 50% less energy than if it were built to current commercial code and achieves the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED{reg_sign}) Platinum rating. With 19% of the primary energy in the U.S. consumed by commercial buildings, the RSF is changing the way commercial office buildings are designed and built.

The European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Petersen, Steffen; Hviid, Christian Anker

This paper investigates the actual energy use for building operation with the calculated energy use according to the Danish implementation of the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD). This is important to various stakeholders in the building industry as the calculated energy...... performance is used for estimating investment security, operating budgets and for policy making. A case study shows that the actual and calculated energy use is practically the same in an average scenario. In the worst-case uncertainty scenario, the actual energy use is 20 % higher than the corrected...

Exploring variance in residential electricity consumption: Household features and building properties

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bartusch, Cajsa; Odlare, Monica; Wallin, Fredrik; Wester, Lars

2012-01-01

Highlights: ► Statistical analysis of variance are of considerable value in identifying key indicators for policy update. ► Variance in residential electricity use is partly explained by household features. ► Variance in residential electricity use is partly explained by building properties. ► Household behavior has a profound impact on individual electricity use. -- Abstract: Improved means of controlling electricity consumption plays an important part in boosting energy efficiency in the Swedish power market. Developing policy instruments to that end requires more in-depth statistics on electricity use in the residential sector, among other things. The aim of the study has accordingly been to assess the extent of variance in annual electricity consumption in single-family homes as well as to estimate the impact of household features and building properties in this respect using independent samples t-tests and one-way as well as univariate independent samples analyses of variance. Statistically significant variances associated with geographic area, heating system, number of family members, family composition, year of construction, electric water heater and electric underfloor heating have been established. The overall result of the analyses is nevertheless that variance in residential electricity consumption cannot be fully explained by independent variables related to household and building characteristics alone. As for the methodological approach, the results further suggest that methods for statistical analysis of variance are of considerable value in indentifying key indicators for policy update and development.

77 FR 66616 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-11-06

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee; Notification of Upcoming... and agenda for the November 27, 2012, meeting of the Green Building Advisory Committee Meeting (the... Green Buildings, Office of Government-wide Policy, General Services Administration, 1275 First Street NE...

78 FR 21368 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee...

Science.gov (United States)

2013-04-10

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee; Notification of Upcoming... and agenda for the May 1, 2013, meeting of the Green Building Advisory Committee Meeting (the... Green Buildings, Office of Government-wide Policy, General Services Administration, 1275 First Street NE...

Seismic Performance of Masonry Buildings in Algeria

OpenAIRE

F. Lazzali; S. Bedaoui

2012-01-01

Structural performance and seismic vulnerability of masonry buildings in Algeria are investigated in this paper. Structural classification of such buildings is carried out regarding their structural elements. Seismicity of Algeria is briefly discussed. Then vulnerability of masonry buildings and their failure mechanisms in the Boumerdes earthquake (May, 2003) are examined.

The absolute environmental performance of buildings

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Brejnrod, Kathrine Nykjær; Kalbar, Pradip; Petersen, Steffen

2017-01-01

Our paper presents a novel approach for absolute sustainability assessment of a building's environmental performance. It is demonstrated how the absolute sustainable share of the earth carrying capacity of a specific building type can be estimated using carrying capacity based normalization factors....... A building is considered absolute sustainable if its annual environmental burden is less than its share of the earth environmental carrying capacity. Two case buildings – a standard house and an upcycled single-family house located in Denmark – were assessed according to this approach and both were found...... to exceed the target values of three (almost four) of the eleven impact categories included in the study. The worst-case excess was for the case building, representing prevalent Danish building practices, which utilized 1563% of the Climate Change carrying capacity. Four paths to reach absolute...

Achieving informed decision-making for net zero energy buildings design using building performance simulation tools

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Attia, S.G.; Gratia, E.; De Herde, A.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2013-01-01

Building performance simulation (BPS) is the basis for informed decision-making of Net Zero Energy Buildings (NZEBs) design. This paper aims to investigate the use of building performance simulation tools as a method of informing the design decision of NZEBs. The aim of this study is to evaluate the

78 FR 56703 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee...

Science.gov (United States)

2013-09-13

... Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; Green Building Advisory Committee; Notification of Upcoming... Green Building Advisory Committee Meeting (the Committee) and the schedule for a series of conference..., Designated Federal Officer, [[Page 56704

Project materials [Commercial High Performance Buildings Project

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

None

2001-01-01

The Consortium for High Performance Buildings (ChiPB) is an outgrowth of DOE'S Commercial Whole Buildings Roadmapping initiatives. It is a team-driven public/private partnership that seeks to enable and demonstrate the benefit of buildings that are designed, built and operated to be energy efficient, environmentally sustainable, superior quality, and cost effective.

Energy Performance Indicators in the Swedish Building Procurement Process

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ingrid Allard

2017-10-01

Full Text Available In Sweden, all new buildings need to comply with the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning’s requirement on specific purchased energy (kWh/m2. Accordingly, this indicator is often used to set design criteria in the building procurement process. However, when energy use is measured in finished buildings, the measurements often deviate significantly from the design calculations. The measured specific purchased energy does not necessarily reflect the responsibility of the building contractor, as it is influenced by the building operation, user behavior and climate. Therefore, Swedish building practitioners may prefer other indicators for setting design criteria in the building procurement process. The aim of this study was twofold: (i to understand the Swedish building practitioners’ perspectives and opinions on seven building energy performance indicators (envelope air leakage, U-values for different building parts, average U-value, specific heat loss, heat loss coefficient, specific net energy, and specific purchased energy; and (ii to understand the consequences for the energy performance of multi-family buildings of using the studied indicators to set criteria in the procurement process. The study involved a Delphi approach and simulations of a multi-family case study building. The studied indicators were discussed in terms of how they may meet the needs of the building practitioners when used to set building energy performance criteria in the procurement process.

Guidelines to perform Life Cycle Analysis of Buildings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Blok, R.; Gervasio, H.; Braganca, L.; Koukkari, H.; Blok, R.

2008-01-01

This paper gives a short introduction and attempts to give guidelines on how to perform a life Cycle Analysis (LCA) of a Building. Because a building is a complex system with many subsystems with building elements out of different materials, each fulfilling different functions the LCA of a building

Computational Fluid Dynamics and Building Energy Performance Simulation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Peter V.; Tryggvason, Tryggvi

An interconnection between a building energy performance simulation program and a Computational Fluid Dynamics program (CFD) for room air distribution will be introduced for improvement of the predictions of both the energy consumption and the indoor environment. The building energy performance...

Numerical methods for optimizing the performance of buildings

OpenAIRE

Pedersen, Frank

2008-01-01

The many different parties that influence design and control decisions for buildings, such as building owners, users, architects, consulting engineers, contractors, etx. may have different and to some extent conradicting requirements to buildings. Furthermore, national building regulations specify requirements to (among others) the energy performance and quality of the indoor climate.

High Performance Building Mockup in FLEXLAB

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

McNeil, Andrew [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Kohler, Christian [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Lee, Eleanor S. [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Selkowitz, Stephen [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)

2017-08-30

Genentech has ambitious energy and indoor environmental quality performance goals for Building 35 (B35) being constructed by Webcor at the South San Francisco campus. Genentech and Webcor contracted with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) to test building systems including lighting, lighting controls, shade fabric, and automated shading controls in LBNL’s new FLEXLAB facility. The goal of the testing is to ensure that the systems installed in the new office building will function in a way that reduces energy consumption and provides a comfortable work environment for employees.

An Examination of the Performance Based Building Code on the Design of a Commercial Building

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

John Greenwood

2012-11-01

Full Text Available The Building Code of Australia (BCA is the principal code under which building approvals in Australia are assessed. The BCA adopted performance-based solutions for building approvals in 1996. Performance-based codes are based upon a set of explicit objectives, stated in terms of a hierarchy of requirements beginning with key general objectives. With this in mind, the research presented in this paper aims to analyse the impact of the introduction of the performance-based code within Western Australia to gauge the effect and usefulness of alternative design solutions in commercial construction using a case study project. The research revealed that there are several advantages to the use of alternative designs and that all parties, in general, are in favour of the performance-based building code of Australia. It is suggested that change in the assessment process to streamline the alternative design path is needed for the greater use of the performance-based alternative. With appropriate quality control measures, minor variations to the deemed-to-satisfy provisions could easily be managed by the current and future building surveying profession.

How much information disclosure of building energy performance is necessary?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hsu, David

2014-01-01

Many different governments have begun to require disclosure of building energy performance, in order to allow owners and prospective buyers to incorporate this information into their investment decisions. These policies, known as disclosure or information policies, require owners to benchmark their buildings and sometimes conduct engineering audits. However, given substantial variation in the cost to disclose different types of information, it is natural to ask: how much and what kind of information about building energy performance should be disclosed, and for what purposes? To answer this question, this paper assembles and cleans a comprehensive panel dataset of New York City multifamily buildings, and analyzes its predictive power using a Bayesian multilevel regression model. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) reveals that building-level variation is the most important factor in explaining building energy use, and that there are few, if any, relationships of building systems to observed energy use. This indicates that disclosure laws requiring benchmarking data may be relatively more useful than engineering audits in explaining the observed energy performance of existing buildings. These results should inform the further development of information disclosure laws. - Highlights: • A comprehensive panel dataset of energy performance and building characteristics was assembled and cleaned. • The effectiveness of the disclosed information to predict building energy performance was tested using a regression model. • Building-level variation has a greater effect than any building characteristic or systems. • Benchmarking data alone predicts energy performance equally as well as both benchmarking and engineering audit data together, and better than audit data alone

Analysis of Factors Influencing Building Refurbishment Project Performance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ishak Nurfadzillah

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Presently, the refurbishment approach becomes favourable as it creates opportunities to incorporate sustainable value with other building improvement. In this regard, this approach needs to be implemented due to the issues on overwhelming ratio of existing building to new construction, which also can contribute to the environmental problem. Refurbishment principles imply to minimize the environmental impact and upgrading the performance of an existing building to meet new requirements. In theoretically, building project’s performance has a direct bearing on related to its potential for project success. However, in refurbishment building projects, the criteria for measure are become wider because the projects are a complex and multi-dimensional which encompassing many factors which reflect to the nature of works. Therefore, this impetus could be achieve by examine the direct empirical relationship between critical success factors (CSFs and complexity factors (CFs during managing the project in relation to delivering success on project performance. The research findings will be expected as the basis of future research in establish appropriate framework that provides information on managing refurbishment building projects and enhancing the project management competency for a better-built environment.

Analysis of Factors Influencing Building Refurbishment Project Performance

Science.gov (United States)

Ishak, Nurfadzillah; Aswad Ibrahim, Fazdliel; Azizi Azizan, Muhammad

2018-03-01

Presently, the refurbishment approach becomes favourable as it creates opportunities to incorporate sustainable value with other building improvement. In this regard, this approach needs to be implemented due to the issues on overwhelming ratio of existing building to new construction, which also can contribute to the environmental problem. Refurbishment principles imply to minimize the environmental impact and upgrading the performance of an existing building to meet new requirements. In theoretically, building project's performance has a direct bearing on related to its potential for project success. However, in refurbishment building projects, the criteria for measure are become wider because the projects are a complex and multi-dimensional which encompassing many factors which reflect to the nature of works. Therefore, this impetus could be achieve by examine the direct empirical relationship between critical success factors (CSFs) and complexity factors (CFs) during managing the project in relation to delivering success on project performance. The research findings will be expected as the basis of future research in establish appropriate framework that provides information on managing refurbishment building projects and enhancing the project management competency for a better-built environment.

Impacts of climate change performance on building in New Zealand

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Camilleri, M.; Jaques, R.; Isaacs, N.

2001-07-01

Climate change is expected to impact on many aspects of building performance, with much of the existing and future building stock likely to be affected. Potential impacts of climate change on buildings are identified, evaluated as to how serious they might be, and actions are considered to ensure that future building performance is not compromised. Climate change scenarios for New Zealand defined the scale of climate changes considered for building performance. For each climate variable, relevant aspects of building performance were examined to determine if there is likely to be a significant impact. Where significant impacts were indicated, they were studied in detail and quantified where possible. A risk-profiling tool was formulated to cover the risk/severity of the most significant climate change impacts, which include flooding, tropical cyclones and overheating. Adaptation strategies were developed for each climate change impact, with different responses appropriate for each impact. Mitigation of greenhouse emissions is also addressed. For those risks where delaying action has serious consequences, it may be appropriate to consider changes in building or zoning regulations to anticipate the future impacts of climate change. Some implications for future building performance, design, standards and regulation are discussed. (author)

Investigation of Educational Buildings in Terms of Daylighting Performance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

İlknur ERLALELİTEPE

2011-01-01

Full Text Available Educational buildings have the priority among other building types in daylight performance studies. There are several reasons for this. Classrooms which are used during the whole day should have sufficient and homogeneously distributed daylight. In insufficient daylight conditions, the use of electrical lighting increases energy consumption. Users’ visual comfort should also be assured, and design incorporating natural light requires the analysis of sun protection devices in order to avoid glare and excessive heat. Also, atriums and skylights can be included in the building design with the aim of distributing light equally and in a relatively balanced manner throughout the building. However, lighting schemes are often proposed by architects and professionals who tend to make use of different design tools, and it would be pertinent to investigate whether these tools perform as desired. This study analyses daylight design principles and design elements in educational buildings. It outlines the method which has been used to analyse the daylight performance of buildings. A university building was selected for the field study. Measurements were taken in sample spaces to determine daylight performance. Utilising comparison between standard values and measured values, findings are presented in the form of tables, drawings and figures.

Strategic Behavior in Certifying Green Buildings: An Inquiry of the Non-building Performance Value.

Science.gov (United States)

Chiang Hsieh, Lin-Han; Noonan, Douglas

2017-08-01

This study determines the magnitude of the market signaling effect arising from Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification for green buildings and explores the mechanisms behind the signaling effect. Previous studies have shown that signaling or marketability plays an important role in the pursuit for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and equivalent green-building certification. By analyzing all new construction projects receiving Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification from 2000 to 2012 in the US, this study estimates the relative importance of 'green' signaling. This broad perspective using project-level data enables an analysis of some drivers of signaling and the pursuit of marketing benefits. The roles of local competition and market conditions, as well as municipal regulations are examined, especially as they differ between types of building owners (e.g., for-profit firms, governments, nonprofits). The results indicate that the non-building performance value-value captured by Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design signals above and beyond the specific building attributes that Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certifies-dominates the attainment of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design scores around certification tier thresholds. Further, strong evidence of spatial clustering of this non-building performance value for some owner types indicates that for-profit owners may be more responsive to local competition than non-profit owners. Local legislative mandates predict greater signaling intensity by government-owned buildings, as expected, but for-profit-owned projects tend to signal less, even after controls for local conditions. The results highlight the importance of local conditions, including peer effects and regulations, in driving non-building performance values across a wide range of green buildings.

Computational Fluid Dynamics and Building Energy Performance Simulation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Peter Vilhelm; Tryggvason, T.

1998-01-01

An interconnection between a building energy performance simulation program and a Computational Fluid Dynamics program (CFD) for room air distribution will be introduced for improvement of the predictions of both the energy consumption and the indoor environment. The building energy performance...... simulation program requires a detailed description of the energy flow in the air movement which can be obtained by a CFD program. The paper describes an energy consumption calculation in a large building, where the building energy simulation program is modified by CFD predictions of the flow between three...... zones connected by open areas with pressure and buoyancy driven air flow. The two programs are interconnected in an iterative procedure. The paper shows also an evaluation of the air quality in the main area of the buildings based on CFD predictions. It is shown that an interconnection between a CFD...

Creating high performance buildings: Lower energy, better comfort

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Brager, Gail; Arens, Edward

2015-01-01

Buildings play a critical role in the challenge of mitigating and adapting to climate change. It is estimated that buildings contribute 39% of the total U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions [1] primarily due to their operational energy use, and about 80% of this building energy use is for heating, cooling, ventilating, and lighting. An important premise of this paper is about the connection between energy and comfort. They are inseparable when one talks about high performance buildings. Worldwide data suggests that we are significantly overcooling buildings in the summer, resulting in increased energy use and problems with thermal comfort. In contrast, in naturally ventilated buildings without mechanical cooling, people are comfortable in much warmer temperatures due to shifting expectations and preferences as a result of occupants having a greater degree of personal control over their thermal environment; they have also become more accustomed to variable conditions that closely reflect the natural rhythms of outdoor climate patterns. This has resulted in an adaptive comfort zone that offers significant potential for encouraging naturally ventilated buildings to improve both energy use and comfort. Research on other forms for providing individualized control through low-energy personal comfort systems (desktop fans, foot warmed, and heated and cooled chairs) have also demonstrated enormous potential for improving both energy and comfort performance. Studies have demonstrated high levels of comfort with these systems while ambient temperatures ranged from 64–84°F. Energy and indoor environmental quality are inextricably linked, and must both be important goals of a high performance building

Performance Evaluation of Feature Sets of Minutiae Quadruplets ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The features proposed in this paper are derived from minutiae quadruplets and are applicable in matching and indexing ngerprint images. In this work nineteen different possibilities of features were explored for indexing and the performances of some of the feature sets were mixed: some giving good performances on ...

Procedure for Measuring and Reporting Commercial Building Energy Performance

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Barley, D.; Deru, M.; Pless, S.; Torcellini, P.

2005-10-01

This procedure is intended to provide a standard method for measuring and characterizing the energy performance of commercial buildings. The procedure determines the energy consumption, electrical energy demand, and on-site energy production in existing commercial buildings of all types. The performance metrics determined here may be compared against benchmarks to evaluate performance and verify that performance targets have been achieved.

Key Performance Indicator of Building Maintenance and Its Effect on the Building Life Cycle

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M.A. Othuman Mydin

2014-07-01

Full Text Available Building maintenance is considered as one of the national agenda. Multitude barriers received by the services providers have undergone various difficulties in satisfying public interest have been progressively resolved as a sign towards becoming a more developed country. In real practice, building maintenance is the thing which we mostly tolerate. If the building is able to weather the elements, we may with delay taking action on it. Most buildings are always treated with ‘ad-hoc’ maintenance. In some instances, the building disrepair will wait until complaints are made before any repair work is done. It shows that the situation is not considered critical as it may. Maintenance is still being practiced in improper procedure by the maintenance managers which subsequently caused bad impacts to the facilities and the services provided. It can be seen that the managers prefer carrying out reactive maintenance works rather than proactive works and at times do not consider the clients satisfaction and also the performance of services. This paper will focus on some important elements of building maintenance and its relation to building performance holistically.

Performative Microforests: Investigating the potential benefits of integrating spatial vegetation environments into buildings, in regards to the performance of buildings, their occupants + local ecosystems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giancarlo Mangone

2015-09-01

Full Text Available The design of office buildings can substantially improve the building, social, and ecological performance of office building projects. However, existing research on improving the performance of work environments has primarily focused on identifying and evaluating methods to make work environments less bad, rather than focusing on how to develop work environments that are positively performing. Moreover, the potential of building projects to perform positively, in terms of economic, social, and ecological performance, remains relatively unexplored in existing research and building projects. To this end, this PhD research project is focused on exploring the positive economic, social, and ecological performance potential of buildings. Specifically, this research project identifies and evaluates the potential economic, social, and ecological performance benefits of integrating microforests into office buildings. Microforests are defined in this book as dynamic, stimulating, cohesive spatial environments that are composed of vegetation and soil layers that mimic the structural, perceptual, and ecological composition of a forest ecosystem, yet are not large enough to reliably provide the myriad of functions of a robust, mature forest ecosystem. This design research focus is based on findings from existing literature that suggest that natural environments and stimuli can provide a diverse range of economic, social, and ecological performance benefits. The Design Research Methodology [DRM], an established research methodology that facilitates the use of diverse research methods in a rigorous, effective manner, is used in this research project to explore and evaluate the performance potential of microforests, by investigating the following sub research questions: • How can microforests improve the performance of office buildings? • How can microforests improve employee performance + comfort? • How can microforests improve the ecological performance

Saliency image of feature building for image quality assessment

Science.gov (United States)

Ju, Xinuo; Sun, Jiyin; Wang, Peng

2011-11-01

The purpose and method of image quality assessment are quite different for automatic target recognition (ATR) and traditional application. Local invariant feature detectors, mainly including corner detectors, blob detectors and region detectors etc., are widely applied for ATR. A saliency model of feature was proposed to evaluate feasibility of ATR in this paper. The first step consisted of computing the first-order derivatives on horizontal orientation and vertical orientation, and computing DoG maps in different scales respectively. Next, saliency images of feature were built based auto-correlation matrix in different scale. Then, saliency images of feature of different scales amalgamated. Experiment were performed on a large test set, including infrared images and optical images, and the result showed that the salient regions computed by this model were consistent with real feature regions computed by mostly local invariant feature extraction algorithms.

High-Performance Buildings – Value, Messaging, Financial and Policy Mechanisms

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

McCabe, Molly

2011-02-22

At the request of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, an in-depth analysis of the rapidly evolving state of real estate investments, high-performance building technology, and interest in efficiency was conducted by HaydenTanner, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Building Technologies Program. The analysis objectives were • to evaluate the link between high-performance buildings and their market value • to identify core messaging to motivate owners, investors, financiers, and others in the real estate sector to appropriately value and deploy high-performance strategies and technologies across new and existing buildings • to summarize financial mechanisms that facilitate increased investment in these buildings. To meet these objectives, work consisted of a literature review of relevant writings, examination of existing and emergent financial and policy mechanisms, interviews with industry stakeholders, and an evaluation of the value implications through financial modeling. This report documents the analysis methodology and findings, conclusion and recommendations. Its intent is to support and inform the DOE Building Technologies Program on policy and program planning for the financing of high-performance new buildings and building retrofit projects.

Performance evaluation of existing building structure with pushover analysis

Science.gov (United States)

Handana, MAP; Karolina, R.; Steven

2018-02-01

In the management of the infrastructure of the building, during the period of buildings common building damage as a result of several reasons, earthquakes are common. The building is planned to work for a certain service life. But during the certain service life, the building vulnerable to damage due to various things. Any damage to cultivate can be detected as early as possible, because the damage could spread, triggering and exacerbating the latest. The newest concept to earthquake engineering is Performance Based Earthquake Engineering (PBEE). PBEE divided into two, namely Performance Based Seismic Design (PBSD) and Performance Based Seismic Evaluation (PBSE). Evaluation on PBSE one of which is the analysis of nonlinear pushover. Pushover analysis is a static analysis of nonlinear where the influence of the earthquake plan on building structure is considered as burdens static catch at the center of mass of each floor, which it was increased gradually until the loading causing the melting (plastic hinge) first within the building structure, then the load increases further changes the shapes of post-elastic large it reached the condition of elastic. Then followed melting (plastic hinge) in the location of the other structured.

Energy Performance of Three Residential College Buildings in University of Malaya Campus, Kuala Lumpur

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Adi Ainurzaman Jamaludin

2011-12-01

Full Text Available Three residential colleges located in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, were selected for energy performance analysis in regards to its implementation of bioclimatic design strategies. Specifically, passive design strategies on daylighting and natural ventilation were examined. In Malaysia, the residential college or hostel is a multi-residential building providing accommodation to university students. The three residential colleges in this study, namely C1, C2 and C3, were built in different years with different designs and forms, particularly with regards to enclosure and facade design, solar control devices, passive daylight concepts, and natural ventilation strategies. The building designs were carefully studied and an electric consumption analysis was carried out in each residential college. This study revealed that the wide-scale implementation of bioclimatic design strategies in college C2 help reduced the annual energy consumption. The building bioclimatic design features that are accountable to reduce energy consumption are the internal courtyard and balconies on each unit of floor area, as shown in C3.Results from this study highly recommend internal courtyard and balcony building combination for multi residential building design, especially in tropical urban regions.

The performance of energy efficient residential building envelope systems

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Proskiw, G.

1996-08-01

The adequacy and durability of residential building envelope systems under actual field conditions were evaluated. A building envelope offers protection from cold, heat, moisture, wind and noise. However, they are exposed to thermal, structural, and moisture stresses and their performance can degrade over time. Envelope performance was evaluated at 20 energy efficient and four conventional, detached modern homes in Winnipeg, Canada. The three complementary measurement tools were wood moisture content (WMC) of framing members, thermographic examinations, and airtightness tests. As expected, energy efficient building envelope systems performed better than the conventional systems. No evidence of envelope degradation was found in any of the energy efficient houses. The building envelopes using polyethylene air barriers performed slightly better than those which used the airtight drywall approach, although both were considered satisfactory. WMC levels were a bit lower in the polyethylene-clad house. 1 ref., 1 tab.

Data and analytics to inform energy retrofit of high performance buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hong, Tianzhen; Yang, Le; Hill, David; Feng, Wei

2014-01-01

Highlights: • High performance buildings can be retrofitted using measured data and analytics. • Data of energy use, systems operating and environmental conditions are needed. • An energy data model based on the ISO Standard 12655 is key for energy benchmarking. • Three types of analytics are used: energy profiling, benchmarking, and diagnostics. • The case study shows 20% of electricity can be saved by retrofit. - Abstract: Buildings consume more than one-third of the world’s primary energy. Reducing energy use in buildings with energy efficient technologies is feasible and also driven by energy policies such as energy benchmarking, disclosure, rating, and labeling in both the developed and developing countries. Current energy retrofits focus on the existing building stocks, especially older buildings, but the growing number of new high performance buildings built around the world raises a question that how these buildings perform and whether there are retrofit opportunities to further reduce their energy use. This is a new and unique problem for the building industry. Traditional energy audit or analysis methods are inadequate to look deep into the energy use of the high performance buildings. This study aims to tackle this problem with a new holistic approach powered by building performance data and analytics. First, three types of measured data are introduced, including the time series energy use, building systems operating conditions, and indoor and outdoor environmental parameters. An energy data model based on the ISO Standard 12655 is used to represent the energy use in buildings in a three-level hierarchy. Secondly, a suite of analytics were proposed to analyze energy use and to identify retrofit measures for high performance buildings. The data-driven analytics are based on monitored data at short time intervals, and cover three levels of analysis – energy profiling, benchmarking and diagnostics. Thirdly, the analytics were applied to a high

Real-time supervision of building HVAC system performance

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Djuric, Natasa

2008-07-01

This thesis presents techniques for improving building HVAC system performance in existing buildings generated using simulation-based tools and real data. Therefore, one of the aims has been to research the needs and possibilities to assess and improve building HVAC system performance. In addition, this thesis aims at an advanced utilization of building energy management system (BEMS) and the provision of useful information to building operators using simulation tools. Buildings are becoming more complex systems with many elements, while BEMS provide many data about the building systems. There are, however, many faults and issues in building performance, but there are legislative and cost-benefit forces induced by energy savings. Therefore, both BEMS and the computer-based tools have to be utilized more efficiently to improve building performance. The thesis consists of four main parts that can be read separately. The first part explains the term commissioning and the commissioning tool work principal based on literature reviews. The second part presents practical experiences and issues introduced through the work on this study. The third part deals with the computer-based tools application in design and operation. This part is divided into two chapters. The first deals with improvement in the design, and the second deals with the improvement in the control strategies. The last part of the thesis gives several rules for fault diagnosis developed using simulation tools. In addition, this part aims at the practical explanation of the faults in the building HVAC systems. The practical background for the thesis was obtained though two surveys. The first survey was carried out with the aim to find the commissioning targets in Norwegian building facilities. In that way, an overview of the most typical buildings, HVAC equipment, and their related problems was obtained. An on-site survey was carried out on an example building, which was beneficial for introducing the

Earthquake Building Damage Mapping Based on Feature Analyzing Method from Synthetic Aperture Radar Data

Science.gov (United States)

An, L.; Zhang, J.; Gong, L.

2018-04-01

Playing an important role in gathering information of social infrastructure damage, Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) remote sensing is a useful tool for monitoring earthquake disasters. With the wide application of this technique, a standard method, comparing post-seismic to pre-seismic data, become common. However, multi-temporal SAR processes, are not always achievable. To develop a post-seismic data only method for building damage detection, is of great importance. In this paper, the authors are now initiating experimental investigation to establish an object-based feature analysing classification method for building damage recognition.

Wireless sensor network performance metrics for building applications

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Jang, W.S. (Department of Civil Engineering Yeungnam University 214-1 Dae-Dong, Gyeongsan-Si Gyeongsangbuk-Do 712-749 South Korea); Healy, W.M. [Building and Fire Research Laboratory, 100 Bureau Drive, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8632 (United States)

2010-06-15

Metrics are investigated to help assess the performance of wireless sensors in buildings. Wireless sensor networks present tremendous opportunities for energy savings and improvement in occupant comfort in buildings by making data about conditions and equipment more readily available. A key barrier to their adoption, however, is the uncertainty among users regarding the reliability of the wireless links through building construction. Tests were carried out that examined three performance metrics as a function of transmitter-receiver separation distance, transmitter power level, and obstruction type. These tests demonstrated, via the packet delivery rate, a clear transition from reliable to unreliable communications at different separation distances. While the packet delivery rate is difficult to measure in actual applications, the received signal strength indication correlated well with the drop in packet delivery rate in the relatively noise-free environment used in these tests. The concept of an equivalent distance was introduced to translate the range of reliability in open field operation to that seen in a typical building, thereby providing wireless system designers a rough estimate of the necessary spacing between sensor nodes in building applications. It is anticipated that the availability of straightforward metrics on the range of wireless sensors in buildings will enable more widespread sensing in buildings for improved control and fault detection. (author)

Whole Building Cost and Performance Measurement: Data Collection Protocol Revision 2

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fowler, Kimberly M.; Spees, Kathleen L.; Kora, Angela R.; Rauch, Emily M.; Hathaway, John E.; Solana, Amy E.

2009-03-27

This protocol was written for the Department of Energy’s Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) to be used by the public as a tool for assessing building cost and performance measurement. The primary audiences are sustainable design professionals, asset owners, building managers, and research professionals within the Federal sector. The protocol was developed based on the need for measured performance and cost data on sustainable design projects. Historically there has not been a significant driver in the public or private sector to quantify whole building performance in comparable terms. The deployment of sustainable design into the building sector has initiated many questions on the performance and operational cost of these buildings.

Building America House Performance Analysis Procedures

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hendron, R.; Farrar-Nagy, S.; Anderson, R.; Judkoff, R.

2001-10-29

As the Building America Program has grown to include a large and diverse cross section of the home building industry, accurate and consistent analysis techniques have become more important to help all program partners as they perform design tradeoffs and calculate energy savings for prototype houses built as part of the program. This document illustrates some of the analysis concepts proven effective and reliable for analyzing the transient energy usage of advanced energy systems as well as entire houses. The analysis procedure described here provides a starting point for calculating energy savings of a prototype house relative to two base cases: builder standard practice and regional standard practice. Also provides building simulation analysis to calculate annual energy savings based on side-by-side short-term field testing of a prototype house.

Investigation Into Informational Compatibility Of Building Information Modelling And Building Performance Analysis Software Solutions

OpenAIRE

Hyun, S.; Marjanovic-Halburd, L.; Raslan, R.

2015-01-01

There are significant opportunities for Building Information Modelling (BIM) to address issues related to sustainable and energy efficient building design. While the potential benefits associated with the integration of BIM and BPA (Building Performance Analysis) have been recognised, its specifications and formats remain in their early infancy and often fail to live up to the promise of seamless interoperability at various stages of design process. This paper conducts a case study to investi...

Procedure for Measuring and Reporting the Performance of Photovoltaic Systems in Buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Pless, S.; Deru, M.; Torcellini, P.; Hayter, S.

2005-10-01

This procedure provides a standard method for measuring and characterizing the long-term energy performance of photovoltaic (PV) systems in buildings and the resulting implications to the building's energy use. The performance metrics determined here may be compared against benchmarks for evaluating system performance and verifying that performance targets have been achieved. Uses may include comparison of performance with the design intent; comparison with other PV systems in buildings; economic analysis of PV systems in buildings; and the establishment of long-term performance records that enable maintenance staff to monitor trends in energy performance.

Energy Performance of Buildings - The European Approach to Sustainability

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Heiselberg, Per

2006-01-01

This paper presents the European approach to improve sustainability in the building sector, which has a very high potential for considerable reduction of energy consumption in the coming years. By approving the Energy Performance in Buildings Directive the European Union has taken a strong...... leadership role in promoting energy efficiency in buildings in Europe, that will be the most powerful instrument developed to date for the building sector in Europe....

Dataset on the energy performance of atrium type hotel buildings.

Science.gov (United States)

Vujosevic, Milica; Krstic-Furundzic, Aleksandra

2018-04-01

The data presented in this article are related to the research article entitled "The Influence of Atrium on Energy Performance of Hotel Building" (Vujosevic and Krstic-Furundzic, 2017) [1], which describes the annual energy performance of atrium type hotel building in Belgrade climate conditions, with the objective to present the impact of the atrium on the hotel building's energy demands for space heating and cooling. This dataset is made publicly available to show energy performance of selected hotel design alternatives, in order to enable extended analyzes of these data for other researchers.

Best Practices Guide for High-Performance Indian Office Buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Singh, Reshma [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Sartor, Dale [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Ghatikar, Girish [Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)

2013-04-01

This document provides best practice guidance and energy- efficiency recommendations for the design, construction, and operation of high-­performance office buildings in India. Through a discussion of learnings from exemplary projects and inputs from experts, it provides recommendations that can potentially help achieve (1) enhanced working environments, (2) economic construction/faster payback, (3) reduced operating costs, and (4) reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. It also provides ambitious (but achievable) energy performance benchmarks, both as adopted targets during building modeling (design phase) and during measurement and verification (operations phase). These benchmarks have been derived from a set of representative best-in-class office buildings in India. The best practices strategies presented in this guide would ideally help in delivering high-­performance in terms of a triad—of energy efficiency, cost efficiency, and occupant comfort and well-­being. These best practices strategies and metrics should be normalized—that is, corrected to account for building characteristics, diversity of operations, weather, and materials and construction methods.

MEMORY OPERATION AND ATTENTION CONCENTRATION FEATURES OF BUILDING PROFESSIONALLY ORIENTED FOREIGN LANGUAGE COMMUNICATIVE STRATEGIES IN PERSPECTIVE PROGRAMMERS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ірина Семеряк

2015-09-01

Full Text Available Memory operation and attention concentration features of building professionally oriented foreign language communicative strategies in perspective programmers have been analyzed in the article. The features of functioning and role of short-term, sensory, operational, long-term, semantic memory in the process of building foreign language professionally oriented communicative strategies in students majoring in programming have been in the spotlight of the author’s attention. Special conditions for successful memorizing of studying material by students have been identified. In the course of the pilot study it has been proven that active methods of teaching / learning enchance high concentration and makes it possible to activate long-term memory and, as a result, reflect necessary studying material in it. The impact of concentration on the efficiency of building professionally oriented foreign language communicative strategies in perspective programmers has been grounded. Mechanisms of concentration of students majoring in programming on studying activity have been analyzed.

Trust building electronic services as a crucial self-regulation feature of Digital Business Ecosystems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Radoslav Delina

2012-04-01

Full Text Available In the field of digital business ecosystem, the self-regulation feature plays crucial role. ICT supports biological and sociological phenomena through efficient electronic services. One of the main roles is building and enhancing efficient relationships between actors within the ecosystem. Problem of interaction between commercial subjects depends on expected benefits. These expectations are predictors of successful result from realized transaction with potential partner. And this predictor is based on trust and trustworthiness. The paper presents trust as crucial factor for cooperation and discusses specifics of several trust building mechanisms to increase the level of trust in e-cooperation within digital business ecosystems. Based on results provided by questionnaire survey in Slovak business environment, the paper discusses the relationship between the level of respondents´ electronic business experience and their preferences for the portfolio of trust building mechanisms.

Proceedings of the CIB World Building Congress 2004 : Building for the future. CD-ROM ed.

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2004-07-01

This conference provided an opportunity to exchange information on recent building and construction research. The main issues were arranged into the following sessions: building techniques; buildings and the environment; building processes; sustainable construction; performance based buildings and regulatory systems; revaluing construction; and, construction in developing countries. The presentations evaluated best practices in construction with reference to a wide range of topics, including heat, air and moisture transfer in buildings, roofing materials, energy conservation, building economics, urban sustainability and the future needs of the construction industry. The conference featured 40 presentations, of which 6 have been indexed separately for inclusion in this database. refs., tabs. ,figs.

High Performance Building Facade Solutions - PIER Final Project Report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lee, Eleanor; Selkowitz, Stephen

2009-12-31

Building facades directly influence heating and cooling loads and indirectly influence lighting loads when daylighting is considered, and are therefore a major determinant of annual energy use and peak electric demand. Facades also significantly influence occupant comfort and satisfaction, making the design optimization challenge more complex than many other building systems.This work focused on addressing significant near-term opportunities to reduce energy use in California commercial building stock by a) targeting voluntary, design-based opportunities derived from the use of better design guidelines and tools, and b) developing and deploying more efficient glazings, shading systems, daylighting systems, facade systems and integrated controls. This two-year project, supported by the California Energy Commission PIER program and the US Department of Energy, initiated a collaborative effort between The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and major stakeholders in the facades industry to develop, evaluate, and accelerate market deployment of emerging, high-performance, integrated facade solutions. The LBNL Windows Testbed Facility acted as the primary catalyst and mediator on both sides of the building industry supply-user business transaction by a) aiding component suppliers to create and optimize cost effective, integrated systems that work, and b) demonstrating and verifying to the owner, designer, and specifier community that these integrated systems reliably deliver required energy performance. An industry consortium was initiated amongst approximately seventy disparate stakeholders, who unlike the HVAC or lighting industry, has no single representative, multi-disciplinary body or organized means of communicating and collaborating. The consortium provided guidance on the project and more importantly, began to mutually work out and agree on the goals, criteria, and pathways needed to attain the ambitious net zero energy goals defined by California and

Seismic performance of existing R.C. framed buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sameh A. El-Betar

2017-08-01

Full Text Available The earthquakes disasters basically occur due to buildings damage not because of the earth shaking. Therefore, the countries have being updated the seismic codes. The seismic loads for buildings design in Egyptian Code have been changed from (EC-1994 to (ECP-201, 2012. On the other hand, the need is raised to study the vulnerability of existing buildings, which can be divided into the buildings designed to resist the gravity loads only (GLD and the buildings designed according to Egyptian code (EC-1994. Comparison between forces due to Egyptian code for loads (EC-1994 and (ECP-201, 2012 is carried out on the multi-stories R.C. framed buildings which are the most common type of existing buildings in Egypt. To investigate the vulnerability of existing buildings, nonlinear static pushover analysis is conducted to evaluate the real strength of the existing buildings. Moreover, it is considered a useful and effective tool for the performance of three framed buildings: 3, 6 and 10 stories due to expected future earthquakes. Finally, it is found that the vulnerability of existing GLD buildings occurs at expected ground accelerations (ag greater than 0.125 g in Egyptian seismic map, while the EC-94 designed buildings behave elastically up to (ag equals to 0.2 g and above that a slight damage may occur.

A performance evaluation of point pair features

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kiforenko, Lilita; Drost, Bertram; Tombari, Federico

2018-01-01

have low resolution data, where local histogram features show a higher performance than PPFs. We also found that PPFs compared to most local histogram features degrade faster under disturbances such as occlusion and clutter, however, PPFs still remain more descriptive on an absolute scale. The main...

Effect of Unprofessional Supervision on Durability of Buildings.

Science.gov (United States)

Yahaghi, Javad

2018-02-01

The durability of buildings which depends on the nature of the supervisory system used in their construction is an important feature of the construction industry. This article tries to draw the readers' attention to the effect of untrained and unprofessional building supervisors and their unethical performance on the durability of buildings.

Performance indices and evaluation of algorithms in building energy efficient design optimization

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Si, Binghui; Tian, Zhichao; Jin, Xing; Zhou, Xin; Tang, Peng; Shi, Xing

2016-01-01

Building energy efficient design optimization is an emerging technique that is increasingly being used to design buildings with better overall performance and a particular emphasis on energy efficiency. To achieve building energy efficient design optimization, algorithms are vital to generate new designs and thus drive the design optimization process. Therefore, the performance of algorithms is crucial to achieving effective energy efficient design techniques. This study evaluates algorithms used for building energy efficient design optimization. A set of performance indices, namely, stability, robustness, validity, speed, coverage, and locality, is proposed to evaluate the overall performance of algorithms. A benchmark building and a design optimization problem are also developed. Hooke–Jeeves algorithm, Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithm II, and Multi-Objective Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm are evaluated by using the proposed performance indices and benchmark design problem. Results indicate that no algorithm performs best in all six areas. Therefore, when facing an energy efficient design problem, the algorithm must be carefully selected based on the nature of the problem and the performance indices that matter the most. - Highlights: • Six indices of algorithm performance in building energy optimization are developed. • For each index, its concept is defined and the calculation formulas are proposed. • A benchmark building and benchmark energy efficient design problem are proposed. • The performance of three selected algorithms are evaluated.

Lessons Learned from Field Evaluation of Six High-Performance Buildings: Preprint

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Torcellini, P.; Deru, M.; Griffith, B.; Long, N.; Pless, S.; Judkoff, R.; Crawley, D. B.

2004-07-01

The energy performance of six high-performance buildings around the United States was monitored in detail. The six buildings include the Visitor Center at Zion National Park; the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Thermal Test Facility; the Chesapeake Bay Foundation's Merrill Center; The BigHorn Home Improvement Center; the Cambria DEP Office Building; and the Oberlin College Lewis Center. This paper discusses the design energy targets and actual performance.

Distributed dynamic simulations of networked control and building performance applications

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Yahiaoui, Azzedine

2018-01-01

The use of computer-based automation and control systems for smart sustainable buildings, often so-called Automated Buildings (ABs), has become an effective way to automatically control, optimize, and supervise a wide range of building performance applications over a network while achieving the

Evaluating building performance in healthcare facilities: an organizational perspective.

Science.gov (United States)

Steinke, Claudia; Webster, Lynn; Fontaine, Marie

2010-01-01

Using the environment as a strategic tool is one of the most cost-effective and enduring approaches for improving public health; however, it is one that requires multiple perspectives. The purpose of this article is to highlight an innovative methodology that has been developed for conducting comprehensive performance evaluations in public sector health facilities in Canada. The building performance evaluation methodology described in this paper is a government initiative. The project team developed a comprehensive building evaluation process for all new capital health projects that would respond to the aforementioned need for stakeholders to be more accountable and to better integrate the larger organizational strategy of facilities. The Balanced Scorecard, which is a multiparadigmatic, performance-based business framework, serves as the underlying theoretical framework for this initiative. It was applied in the development of the conceptual model entitled the Building Performance Evaluation Scorecard, which provides the following benefits: (1) It illustrates a process to link facilities more effectively to the overall mission and goals of an organization; (2) It is both a measurement and a management system that has the ability to link regional facilities to measures of success and larger business goals; (3) It provides a standardized methodology that ensures consistency in assessing building performance; and (4) It is more comprehensive than traditional building evaluations. The methodology presented in this paper is both a measurement and management system that integrates the principles of evidence-based design with the practices of pre- and post-occupancy evaluation. It promotes accountability and continues throughout the life cycle of a project. The advantage of applying this framework is that it engages health organizations in clarifying a vision and strategy for their facilities and helps translate those strategies into action and measurable performance

Approaching Sentient Building Performance Simulation Systems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Negendahl, Kristoffer; Perkov, Thomas; Heller, Alfred

2014-01-01

Sentient BPS systems can combine one or more high precision BPS and provide near instantaneous performance feedback directly in the design tool, thus providing speed and precision of building performance in the early design stages. Sentient BPS systems are essentially combining: 1) design tools, 2......) parametric tools, 3) BPS tools, 4) dynamic databases 5) interpolation techniques and 6) prediction techniques as a fast and valid simulation system, in the early design stage....

Development of a building performance laboratory for South Africa

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Parsons, S

2009-05-01

Full Text Available The CSIR Building Science and Technology Competence area is currently in the process of establishing a Building Performance Laboratory (BPL). The BPL is aimed at becoming a centre at which the knowledge generation and technology development...

Building Cost and Performance Metrics: Data Collection Protocol, Revision 1.0

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fowler, Kimberly M.; Solana, Amy E.; Spees, Kathleen L.

2005-09-29

This technical report describes the process for selecting and applying the building cost and performance metrics for measuring sustainably designed buildings in comparison to traditionally designed buildings.

How reliable are geometry-based building indices as thermal performance indicators?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rodrigues, Eugénio; Amaral, Ana Rita; Gaspar, Adélio Rodrigues; Gomes, Álvaro

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Geometry-based building indices are tested in different European climate regions. • Building design programs are used to randomly generate sets of simulation models. • Some indices correlate in specific climates and design programs. • Shape-based Relative Compactness presented the best correlation of all indices. • Window-to-Surface Ratio was the window-based index with best correlation. - Abstract: Architects and urban planners have been relying on geometry-based indices to design more energy efficient buildings for years. The advantage of such indices is their ease of use and capability to capture the relation of a few geometric variables with the building’s performance. However, such relation is usually found using only a few simple building models and considering only a few climate regions. This paper presents the analysis of six geometry-based building indices to determine their adequacy in eight different climate regions in Europe. For each location, three residential building design programs were used as building specifications. Two algorithms were employed to randomly generate and assess the thermal performance of three sets of 500 alternative building models. The results show that geometry-based indices only correlate with the buildings’ thermal performance according to specific climate regions and building design programs

The impact of roofing material on building energy performance

Science.gov (United States)

Badiee, Ali

The last decade has seen an increase in the efficient use of energy sources such as water, electricity, and natural gas as well as a variety of roofing materials, in the heating and cooling of both residential and commercial infrastructure. Oil costs, coal and natural gas prices remain high and unstable. All of these instabilities and increased costs have resulted in higher heating and cooling costs, and engineers are making an effort to keep them under control by using energy efficient building materials. The building envelope (that which separates the indoor and outdoor environments of a building) plays a significant role in the rate of building energy consumption. An appropriate architectural design of a building envelope can considerably lower the energy consumption during hot summers and cold winters, resulting in reduced HVAC loads. Several building components (walls, roofs, fenestration, foundations, thermal insulation, external shading devices, thermal mass, etc.) make up this essential part of a building. However, thermal insulation of a building's rooftop is the most essential part of a building envelope in that it reduces the incoming "heat flux" (defined as the amount of heat transferred per unit area per unit time from or to a surface) (Sadineni et al., 2011). Moreover, more than 60% of heat transfer occurs through the roof regardless of weather, since a roof is often the building surface that receives the largest amount of solar radiation per square annually (Suman, and Srivastava, 2009). Hence, an argument can be made that the emphasis on building energy efficiency has influenced roofing manufacturing more than any other building envelope component. This research project will address roofing energy performance as the source of nearly 60% of the building heat transfer (Suman, and Srivastava, 2009). We will also rank different roofing materials in terms of their energy performance. Other parts of the building envelope such as walls, foundation

Development of a Mobile Application for Building Energy Prediction Using Performance Prediction Model

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yu-Ri Kim

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Recently, the Korean government has enforced disclosure of building energy performance, so that such information can help owners and prospective buyers to make suitable investment plans. Such a building energy performance policy of the government makes it mandatory for the building owners to obtain engineering audits and thereby evaluate the energy performance levels of their buildings. However, to calculate energy performance levels (i.e., asset rating methodology, a qualified expert needs to have access to at least the full project documentation and/or conduct an on-site inspection of the buildings. Energy performance certification costs a lot of time and money. Moreover, the database of certified buildings is still actually quite small. A need, therefore, is increasing for a simplified and user-friendly energy performance prediction tool for non-specialists. Also, a database which allows building owners and users to compare best practices is required. In this regard, the current study developed a simplified performance prediction model through experimental design, energy simulations and ANOVA (analysis of variance. Furthermore, using the new prediction model, a related mobile application was also developed.

Towards measurement and verification of energy performance under the framework of the European directive for energy performance of buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Burman, Esfand; Mumovic, Dejan; Kimpian, Judit

2014-01-01

Directive 2002/91/EC of the European Parliament and Council on the Energy Performance of Buildings has led to major developments in energy policies followed by the EU Member States. The national energy performance targets for the built environment are mostly rooted in the Building Regulations that are shaped by this Directive. Article 3 of this Directive requires a methodology to calculate energy performance of buildings under standardised operating conditions. Overwhelming evidence suggests that actual energy performance is often significantly higher than this standardised and theoretical performance. The risk is national energy saving targets may not be achieved in practice. The UK evidence for the education and office sectors is presented in this paper. A measurement and verification plan is proposed to compare actual energy performance of a building with its theoretical performance using calibrated thermal modelling. Consequently, the intended vs. actual energy performance can be established under identical operating conditions. This can help identify the shortcomings of construction process and building procurement. Once energy performance gap is determined with reasonable accuracy and root causes identified, effective measures could be adopted to remedy or offset this gap. - Highlights: • Building energy performance gap is a negative externality that must be addressed. • A method is proposed to link actual performance to building compliance calculation. • Energy performance gap is divided into procurement and operational gaps. • This framework enables policy makers to measure and address procurement gap. • Building fine-tuning by construction teams could also narrow operational gap

Evaluating energy performance in non-domestic buildings : a review

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Borgstein, E.H.; Lamberts, R.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2016-01-01

Evaluation methods can be used to determine what constitutes good energy performance in a building. With an increasing focus on energy use of buildings worldwide, this evaluation assumes a fundamental importance. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the available methods for analysing,

Building a sense of virtual community: the role of the features of social networking sites.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Chi-Wen; Lin, Chiun-Sin

2014-07-01

In recent years, social networking sites have received increased attention because of the potential of this medium to transform business by building virtual communities. However, theoretical and empirical studies investigating how specific features of social networking sites contribute to building a sense of virtual community (SOVC)-an important dimension of a successful virtual community-are rare. Furthermore, SOVC scales have been developed, and research on this issue has been called for, but few studies have heeded this call. On the basis of prior literature, this study proposes that perceptions of the three most salient features of social networking sites-system quality (SQ), information quality (IQ), and social information exchange (SIE)-play a key role in fostering SOVC. In particular, SQ is proposed to increase IQ and SIE, and SIE is proposed to enhance IQ, both of which thereafter build SOVC. The research model was examined in the context of Facebook, one of the most popular social networking sites in the world. We adopted Blanchard's scales to measure SOVC. Data gathered using a Web-based questionnaire, and analyzed with partial least squares, were utilized to test the model. The results demonstrate that SIE, SQ, and IQ are the factors that form SOVC. The findings also suggest that SQ plays a fundamental role in supporting SIE and IQ in social networking sites. Implications for theory, practice, and future research directions are discussed.

Rapid prototyping in order to improve building performance simulation for detailed design support

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hopfe, C.J.; Hensen, J.L.M.; Stankov, P.

2006-01-01

Building performance simulation (BPS) is a powerful tool to support building and system designers in emulating how orientation, building type, HVAC system etc. interacts the overall building performance. Currently BPS is used only for code compliance in the detailed design, neither to make informed

An applied artificial intelligence approach towards assessing building performance simulation tools

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yezioro, Abraham [Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion IIT (Israel); Dong, Bing [Center for Building Performance and Diagnostics, School of Architecture, Carnegie Mellon University (United States); Leite, Fernanda [Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University (United States)

2008-07-01

With the development of modern computer technology, a large amount of building energy simulation tools is available in the market. When choosing which simulation tool to use in a project, the user must consider the tool's accuracy and reliability, considering the building information they have at hand, which will serve as input for the tool. This paper presents an approach towards assessing building performance simulation results to actual measurements, using artificial neural networks (ANN) for predicting building energy performance. Training and testing of the ANN were carried out with energy consumption data acquired for 1 week in the case building called the Solar House. The predicted results show a good fitness with the mathematical model with a mean absolute error of 0.9%. Moreover, four building simulation tools were selected in this study in order to compare their results with the ANN predicted energy consumption: Energy{sub 1}0, Green Building Studio web tool, eQuest and EnergyPlus. The results showed that the more detailed simulation tools have the best simulation performance in terms of heating and cooling electricity consumption within 3% of mean absolute error. (author)

High-Resolution Remote Sensing Image Building Extraction Based on Markov Model

Science.gov (United States)

Zhao, W.; Yan, L.; Chang, Y.; Gong, L.

2018-04-01

With the increase of resolution, remote sensing images have the characteristics of increased information load, increased noise, more complex feature geometry and texture information, which makes the extraction of building information more difficult. To solve this problem, this paper designs a high resolution remote sensing image building extraction method based on Markov model. This method introduces Contourlet domain map clustering and Markov model, captures and enhances the contour and texture information of high-resolution remote sensing image features in multiple directions, and further designs the spectral feature index that can characterize "pseudo-buildings" in the building area. Through the multi-scale segmentation and extraction of image features, the fine extraction from the building area to the building is realized. Experiments show that this method can restrain the noise of high-resolution remote sensing images, reduce the interference of non-target ground texture information, and remove the shadow, vegetation and other pseudo-building information, compared with the traditional pixel-level image information extraction, better performance in building extraction precision, accuracy and completeness.

Infrared survey of 50 buildings constructed during 100 years: thermal performances and damage conditions

Science.gov (United States)

Ljungberg, Sven-Ake

1995-03-01

Different building constructions and craftsmanship give rise to different thermal performance and damage conditions. The building stock of most industrial countries consists of buildings of various age, and constructions, from old historic buildings with heavy stone or wooden construction, to new buildings with heavy or light concrete construction, or modern steel or wooden construction. In this paper the result from a detailed infrared survey of 50 buildings from six Swedish military camps is presented. The presentation is limited to a comparison of thermal performance and damage conditions of buildings of various ages, functions, and constructions, of a building period of more than 100 years. The result is expected to be relevant even to civilian buildings. Infrared surveys were performed during 1992-1993, with airborne, and mobile short- and longwave infrared systems, out- and indoor thermography. Interpretation and analysis of infrared data was performed with interactive image and analyzing systems. Field inspections were carried out with fiber optics system, and by ocular inspections. Air-exchange rate was measured in order to quantify air leakages through the building envelope, indicated in thermograms. The objects studied were single-family houses, barracks, office-, service-, school- and exercise buildings, military hotels and restaurants, aircraft hangars, and ship factory buildings. The main conclusions from this study are that most buildings from 1880 - 1940 have a solid construction with a high quality of craftsmanship, relatively good thermal performance, due to extremely thick walls, and adding insulation at the attic floor. From about 1940 - 1960 the quality of construction, thermal performance and craftsmanship seem to vary a lot. Buildings constructed during the period of 1960 - 1990 have in general the best thermal performance due to a better insulation capacity, however, also one finds here the greatest variety of problems. The result from this

Building Maintenance. Performance Objectives. Basic Course.

Science.gov (United States)

Taylor, Ernest

Several intermediate performance objectives and corresponding criterion measures are listed for each of the 13 terminal objectives for a basic high school building maintenance course (the first year of a 3-year program). The materials were developed for a 36-week course (2 hours daily) designed to enable 10th grade students to develop competencies…

Impact of Air Tightness on the Evaluation of Building Energy Performance in Lithuania

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jolanta Šadauskienė

2014-08-01

Full Text Available In order to fulfil the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD requirements for the reduction of energy consumption, European national requirements have been created for building envelope thermal properties and calculation methodology to determine if building energy efficiency is created. This is however not true in all methodologies. The necessity of building air tightness appears only for new A class buildings, and there are no requirements for air tightness for other building classes. Therefore, the aim of this work is to improve the methodology for the calculation of energy efficiency of buildings, while taking into account the air tightness of the buildings. In order to achieve this aim, the sum energy consumption of investigated buildings was calculated, energy efficiency classes were determined, air tightness of the buildings was measured, and reasons for insufficient air tightness were analyzed. Investigation results show that the average value of air tightness of A energy efficiency class buildings is 0.6 h−1. The results of other investigated buildings, corresponding to B and C energy efficiency classes, show insufficient air tightness (the average n50 value is 6 h−1; herewith, energy consumption for heating is higher than calculated, according to the energy efficiency methodology. This paper provides an energy performance evaluation scheme, under which performed evaluation of energy performance of buildings ensures high quality construction work, building durability, and the reliability of heat-loss calculations.

Distributed dynamic simulations of networked control and building performance applications.

Science.gov (United States)

Yahiaoui, Azzedine

2018-02-01

The use of computer-based automation and control systems for smart sustainable buildings, often so-called Automated Buildings (ABs), has become an effective way to automatically control, optimize, and supervise a wide range of building performance applications over a network while achieving the minimum energy consumption possible, and in doing so generally refers to Building Automation and Control Systems (BACS) architecture. Instead of costly and time-consuming experiments, this paper focuses on using distributed dynamic simulations to analyze the real-time performance of network-based building control systems in ABs and improve the functions of the BACS technology. The paper also presents the development and design of a distributed dynamic simulation environment with the capability of representing the BACS architecture in simulation by run-time coupling two or more different software tools over a network. The application and capability of this new dynamic simulation environment are demonstrated by an experimental design in this paper.

Towards Smart Buildings Performance Testing as a Service

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Markoska, Elena; Lazarova-Molnar, Sanja

2018-01-01

Energy consumption in buildings accounts for ca. 40% of the world’s total energy consumption, yielding a call for attention to their performance and improvement of their behavior. The concept of performance testing has been developed as an approach to control, potentially lower, and bring awarene...

Towards Smart Buildings Performance Testing as a Service

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Markoska, Elena; Lazarova-Molnar, Sanja

2018-01-01

to buildings’ energy consumption. In this paper we propose a methodology for continuous performance testing of smart buildings as a service. We discuss the automatic discovery and instantiation of performance tests, as well as usage of results for discovery of potential faults and ways to improve buldings...

DOE's Public Database for Green Building Case Studies: Preprint

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Torcellini, P. A.; Crawley, D. B.

2003-11-01

To help capture valuable information on''green building'' case studies, the U.S. Department of Energy has created an online database for collecting, standardizing, and disseminating information about high-performance, green projects. Type of information collected includes green features, design processes, energy performance, and comparison to other high-performance, green buildings.

Performance analysis of air source heat pump system for office building

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Han, Dong Won; KIm, Yong Chan [Korea University, Seoul (Korea, Republic of); Chang, Young Soo [School of Mechanical System Engineering, Kookmin University, Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

2016-11-15

In this study, the performance of an air source heat pump system installed in a commercial building is analyzed using the developed heat pump performance model and building load simulation data of several regions in Korea. The performance test of an air source heat pump system with a variable speed compressor is tested to develop model that considers changes in the performance characteristics of the heat pump system under various operating conditions. The heat pump system is installed in an environmental chamber, and the experimental equipment is set up according to the manufacturer' specifications as well as the AHRI 1230 test specifications. The performance test conditions of the heat pump system are selected using a central composite design method, in which 29 points for each cooling and heating mode are selected. The developed performance model based on experimental data predicts experimental values with an error of ±5 %. Building cooling and heating loads in three regions in Korea are analyzed using TRNSYS software, which includes standard building and weather data from Seoul, Daejeon and Busan in Korea. The effects of outdoor air temperature and part load ratio on the performance and regional monthly average power consumption of the heat pump system are analyzed.

Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis in building performance simulation for decision support and design optimization

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hopfe, C.J.

2009-01-01

Building performance simulation (BPS) uses computer-based models that cover performance aspects such as energy consumption and thermal comfort in buildings. The uptake of BPS in current building design projects is limited. Although there is a large number of building simulation tools available, the

A study of building structural features associated with high indoor air concentrations of organochlorine termiticides.

Science.gov (United States)

Pisaniello, D L; Gun, R T; Tkaczuk, M N; Hann, C; Crea, J

1993-09-01

As part of a two-year study of post-treatment residential exposure to the termiticide, aldrin, the building structural features of ten houses with crawl-space-type floors were assessed by an independent inspector. Building attributes recorded on a checklist included the age of the dwelling, room characteristics, floor details and the nature of subfloor ventilation. At the end of each inspection, the inspector, who was blinded to data on airborne aldrin concentrations, provided a rating of expected indoor air contamination. Several of the building attributes, including the age of the house, the area of exterior subfloor vents, as well as the inspector's rating, were significantly correlated with airborne aldrin values. No single building variable, however, was highly correlated with every measure of aldrin concentration over a 12-month period. The observed data are consistent with poor subfloor ventilation and a 'leaky' floor being important contributors to indoor air pollution. It is recommended that pest control companies advise householders about any obvious floor and ventilation deficiencies before soil treatment work is undertaken. Pesticide exposure (by analogy with geological radon exposure) may be reduced by sealing gaps in floors and/or by improving subfloor ventilation.

A Model for Sustainable Building Energy Efficiency Retrofit (BEER) Using Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) Mechanism for Hotel Buildings in China

Science.gov (United States)

Xu, Pengpeng

Hotel building is one of the high-energy-consuming building types, and retrofitting hotel buildings is an untapped solution to help cut carbon emissions contributing towards sustainable development. Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) has been promulgated as a market mechanism for the delivery of energy efficiency projects. EPC mechanism has been introduced into China relatively recently, and it has not been implemented successfully in building energy efficiency retrofit projects. The aim of this research is to develop a model for achieving the sustainability of Building Energy Efficiency Retrofit (BEER) in hotel buildings under the Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) mechanism. The objectives include: • To identify a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for measuring the sustainability of BEER in hotel buildings; • To identify Critical Success Factors (CSFs) under EPC mechanism that have a strong correlation with sustainable BEER project; • To develop a model explaining the relationships between the CSFs and the sustainability performance of BEER in hotel building. Literature reviews revealed the essence of sustainable BEER and EPC, which help to develop a conceptual framework for analyzing sustainable BEER under EPC mechanism in hotel buildings. 11 potential KPIs for sustainable BEER and 28 success factors of EPC were selected based on the developed framework. A questionnaire survey was conducted to ascertain the importance of selected performance indicators and success factors. Fuzzy set theory was adopted in identifying the KPIs. Six KPIs were identified from the 11 selected performance indicators. Through a questionnaire survey, out of the 28 success factors, 21 Critical Success Factors (CSFs) were also indentified. Using the factor analysis technique, the 21 identified CSFs in this study were grouped into six clusters to help explain project success of sustainable BEER. Finally, AHP/ANP approach was used in this research to develop a model to

Model and tool requirements for co-simulation of building performance

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Trcka, M.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2006-01-01

The use of building performance simulation (BPS) can substantially help in improving building design towards higher occupant comfort and lower fuel consumption, while reducing emission of greenhouse gasses. Unfortunately, current BPS tools do not allow inter-tool communication and thus limit a

Building America Performance Analysis Procedures: Revision 1

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hendron, R.; Anderson, R.; Judkoff, R.; Christensen, C.; Eastment, M.; Norton, P.; Reeves, P.; Hancock, E.

2004-06-01

To measure progress toward multi-year Building America research goals, cost and performance trade-offs are evaluated through a series of controlled field and laboratory experiments supported by energy analysis techniques that use test data to''calibrate'' energy simulation models. This report summarizes the guidelines for reporting such analytical results using the Building America Research Benchmark (Version 3.1) in studies that also include consideration of current Regional and Builder Standard Practice. Version 3.1 of the Benchmark is generally consistent with the 1999 Home Energy Rating System (HERS) Reference Home, with additions that allow evaluation of all home energy uses.

Predicting energy performance of a net-zero energy building: A statistical approach

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kneifel, Joshua; Webb, David

2016-01-01

Highlights: • A regression model is applied to actual energy data from a net-zero energy building. • The model is validated through a rigorous statistical analysis. • Comparisons are made between model predictions and those of a physics-based model. • The model is a viable baseline for evaluating future models from the energy data. - Abstract: Performance-based building requirements have become more prevalent because it gives freedom in building design while still maintaining or exceeding the energy performance required by prescriptive-based requirements. In order to determine if building designs reach target energy efficiency improvements, it is necessary to estimate the energy performance of a building using predictive models and different weather conditions. Physics-based whole building energy simulation modeling is the most common approach. However, these physics-based models include underlying assumptions and require significant amounts of information in order to specify the input parameter values. An alternative approach to test the performance of a building is to develop a statistically derived predictive regression model using post-occupancy data that can accurately predict energy consumption and production based on a few common weather-based factors, thus requiring less information than simulation models. A regression model based on measured data should be able to predict energy performance of a building for a given day as long as the weather conditions are similar to those during the data collection time frame. This article uses data from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Net-Zero Energy Residential Test Facility (NZERTF) to develop and validate a regression model to predict the energy performance of the NZERTF using two weather variables aggregated to the daily level, applies the model to estimate the energy performance of hypothetical NZERTFs located in different cities in the Mixed-Humid Climate Zone, and compares these

Energy performance requirements for new buildings in 11 countries from Central Europe. Exemplary comparison of three buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Loga, Tobias; Knissel, Jens; Diefenbach, Nikolaus

2008-12-05

The objective of the present comparison study is to show which energy efficiency require-ments have to be complied in different European countries when a new building is going to be constructed. For this purpose three Model Buildings were defined: a single-family house, a multi-family house and a school building. For each involved country (or region) the energy quality of the thermal envelope was determined which is necessary in order to just comply with the building code. Due to requirements on the overall energy performance the requested envelope quality usually depends also on the type of heat supply system or energy carrier. Therefore the systems were varied in a parameter study. The main result for each of the three Model Buildings is a comparison table which shows the heat transfer coefficient by transmission (a sort of mean U-value) for the different countries differenti-ated by supply system types. In a final step the primary energy demand according to the German regulation (EnEV 2007) was calculated for every envelope/system combination of the different countries. This allows a comparison of buildings with different supply systems. The study was performed by experts from 11 European member states: Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Sweden, Denmark, UK, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and France. (orig.)

Energy Performance Certificate of building and confidence interval in assessment: An Italian case study

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tronchin, Lamberto; Fabbri, Kristian

2012-01-01

The Directive 2002/91/CE introduced the Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), an energy policy tool. The aim of the EPC is to inform building buyers about the energy performance and energy costs of buildings. The EPCs represent a specific energy policy tool to orient the building sector and real-estate markets toward higher energy efficiency buildings. The effectiveness of the EPC depends on two factors: •The accuracy of energy performance evaluation made by independent experts. •The capability of the energy classification and of the scale of energy performance to control the energy index fluctuations. In this paper, the results of a case study located in Italy are shown. In this example, 162 independent technicians on energy performance of building evaluation have studied the same building. The results reveal which part of confidence intervals is dependent on software misunderstanding and that the energy classification ranges are able to tolerate the fluctuation of energy indices. The example was chosen in accordance with the legislation of the Emilia-Romagna Region on Energy Efficiency of Buildings. Following these results, some thermo-economic evaluation related to building and energy labelling are illustrated, as the EPC, which is an energy policy tool for the real-estate market and building sector to find a way to build or retrofit an energy efficiency building. - Highlights: ► Evaluation of the accuracy of energy performance of buildings in relation with the knowledge of independent experts. ► Round robin test based on 162 case studies on the confidence intervals expressed by independent experts. ► Statistical considerations between the confidence intervals expressed by independent experts and energy simulation software. ► Relation between “proper class” in energy classification of buildings and confidence intervals of independent experts.

Performance evaluation of gas-power strategies for building energy conservation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gabbar, Hossam A.; Runge, Jason; Bondarenko, Daniel; Bower, Lowell; Pandya, Devarsh; Musharavati, Farayi; Pokharel, Shaligram

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Comparison of natural gas and hydrogen fuels for energy conservation in buildings. • Comparison between hydrogen and natural gas fuel cell is performed. • Simulations of building energy supply. • Performance evaluation of two potential gas-power supply scenarios in buildings. • Natural gas fuel cell showed better performance over hydrogen fuel cell. - Abstract: The work provided herein involves a comparison of natural gas and hydrogen fuels for the purpose of energy conservation for buildings via alternative energy generation methodologies. A case study simulation was developed for an average type of commercial building, a nine storey hotel located in Toronto. The two alternative energy source case studies involved the generation of hydrogen via the wind turbine for the fuel cell, and the use of natural gas directly in the steam reforming fuel cell. The simulations for both scenarios were run and the recorded results were compared to the original case study, as well as between the scenarios. To supply for the base load of the building the fuel cells were given the same kW rating for both scenarios. The identification of all existing technologies for hydrogen gas and natural gas has been carried out, and the similar technologies between the two gases were found. For the purpose of realism, only existing purchasable technologies were considered in this paper. Due to the lack of commercially available technologies for hydrogen gas, only a comparison of fuel cell systems could be accomplished. Over the course of the investigative work it was found that when there is no direct supply of hydrogen to the site of utilization, the natural gas fuel cell is beneficial to the building due to its greater efficiency and lower cost. The major drawback for the hydrogen gas fuel cell, when the on-site generation is involved, is that no thermal power extraction systems currently exist for purchase and utilization in the buildings

Effect of capacity building on organizational performance of ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Effect of capacity building on organizational performance of multipurpose ... is need for re-orientation and sensitization of members and the employees of the ... assist by making cooperative extension services compulsory and accessible to all ...

Improving the energy performance of historic buildings with architectural and cultural values

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hansen, Ernst Jan de Place

2017-01-01

The thermal performance of solid walls of historic buildings can be improved by external or internal insulation. External insulation is preferred from a technical perspective, but is often disregarded as many such buildings have architectural or cultural values leaving internal insulation.......g. improvement of thermal indoor climate. The paper discusses different motivating factors for improving the thermal performance of solid walls in historic buildings with architectural and cultural values. It is argued that internal insulation, provided that it can be done without resulting in critical moisture...... as the only possible solution. As internal insulation is considered a risky way of improving the thermal performance from a moisture perspective, technically feasible solutions are needed. Further, other arguments than energy saving could convince a building owner to carry out internal insulation, e...

Energy and architecture: improvement of energy performance in existing buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Haase, Matthias; Wycmans, Annemie; Solbraa, Anne; Grytli, Eir

2011-07-01

This book aims to give an overview of different aspects of retrofitting existing buildings. The target group is students of architecture and building engineering as well as building professionals. Eight out of ten buildings which we will inhabit in 2050 already exist. This means that a great potential for reducing our carbon footprint lies in the existing building stock. Students from NTNU have used the renovation of a 1950s school building at Linesoeya in Soer-Trondelag as a case to increase their awareness and knowledge about the challenges building professionals need to overcome to unite technical details and high user quality into good environmental performance. The students were invited by the building owners and initiators of LIPA Eco Project to contribute to its development: By retrofitting an existing building to passive house standards and combining this with energy generated on site, LIPA Eco Project aims to provide a hands-on example with regard to energy efficiency, architectural design and craftsmanship for a low carbon society. The overall goal for this project is to raise awareness regarding resource efficiency measures in architecture and particularly in existing building mass.(au)

Progress towards the specification of embodied energy performance criteria for New Zealand buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Baird, G.; Alcorn, A.; Wood, P.; Storey, J. B. [Victoria Univ., Wellington (New Zealand). School of Architecture; Jaques, R. [Building Research Association of New Zealand, Inc. (New Zealand)

1998-11-01

Incorporation of embodied energy performance criteria into New Zealand`s recently adopted performance-based building code is discussed. The paper also describes the concept of the Building Code and its energy related clauses and standards, work done to date to update the building materials` energy coefficients, and the progress made in using an embodied energy database. The purpose, desirability and likely pitfalls of such criteria, ways of specifying minimum performance, and relationships with operating energy criteria are also reviewed.

Building Energy and Cost Performance: An Analysis of Thirty Melbourne Case Studies

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yu Lay Langston

2012-11-01

Full Text Available This study investigates the energy and cost performance of thirty recent buildings in Melbourne, Australia. Commonly, building design decisions are based on issues pertaining to construction cost, and consideration of energy performance is made only within the context of the initial project budget. Even where energy is elevated to more importance, operating energy is seen as the focus and embodied energy is nearly always ignored. For the first time, a large sample of buildings has been assembled and analyzed to improve the understanding of both energy and cost performance over their full life cycle, which formed the basis of a wider doctoral study into the inherent relationship between energy and cost. The aim of this paper is to report on typical values for embodied energy, operating energy, capital cost and operating cost per square metre for a range of building functional types investigated in this research. The conclusion is that energy and cost have quite different profiles across projects, and yet the mean GJ/m2 or cost/m2 have relatively low coefficients of variation and therefore may be useful as benchmarks of typical building performance.  

Computer-aided global breast MR image feature analysis for prediction of tumor response to chemotherapy: performance assessment

Science.gov (United States)

Aghaei, Faranak; Tan, Maxine; Hollingsworth, Alan B.; Zheng, Bin; Cheng, Samuel

2016-03-01

Dynamic contrast-enhanced breast magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) has been used increasingly in breast cancer diagnosis and assessment of cancer treatment efficacy. In this study, we applied a computer-aided detection (CAD) scheme to automatically segment breast regions depicting on MR images and used the kinetic image features computed from the global breast MR images acquired before neoadjuvant chemotherapy to build a new quantitative model to predict response of the breast cancer patients to the chemotherapy. To assess performance and robustness of this new prediction model, an image dataset involving breast MR images acquired from 151 cancer patients before undergoing neoadjuvant chemotherapy was retrospectively assembled and used. Among them, 63 patients had "complete response" (CR) to chemotherapy in which the enhanced contrast levels inside the tumor volume (pre-treatment) was reduced to the level as the normal enhanced background parenchymal tissues (post-treatment), while 88 patients had "partially response" (PR) in which the high contrast enhancement remain in the tumor regions after treatment. We performed the studies to analyze the correlation among the 22 global kinetic image features and then select a set of 4 optimal features. Applying an artificial neural network trained with the fusion of these 4 kinetic image features, the prediction model yielded an area under ROC curve (AUC) of 0.83+/-0.04. This study demonstrated that by avoiding tumor segmentation, which is often difficult and unreliable, fusion of kinetic image features computed from global breast MR images without tumor segmentation can also generate a useful clinical marker in predicting efficacy of chemotherapy.

Key Performance Indicators for Maintenance Management Effectiveness of Public Hospital Building

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Farhana Omar Mardhiah

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Effectiveness of management in maintenance aspect holds the key element in influencing the performance of overall maintenance management. Similarly, public hospital building needs an effective maintenance management as this type of building in nature is one of the most complex issues in the field of maintenance. Improper building maintenance management adopted by the organization significantly will interrupt the overall operation of the building. Therefore, this paper is aim to identifying the key performance indicator (KPI of effectiveness of maintenance management for the public hospital building. A total of 32 set of questionnaires were distributed to the maintenance manager for each hospital in the northern region of peninsular Malaysia by using self-administration strategy. The survey answer was analyzed by performing descriptive analysis in SPSS. Overall, the result of descriptive analysis shows that all the ten factors of effectiveness of maintenance management are accepted as KPI since the mean value is at least 3.93 which classified as important and significant. The most significant factor of effectiveness of maintenance management is task planning and scheduling with the mean score of 4.35. While less significant factor is identify as maintenance approach with the value of mean score is 3.93. The both results indicates that the management need to have well-structured planning for the maintenance works and also need to embrace the exact strategy of maintenance approach in order to achieved better overall performance of maintenance management. This study may draw a standard practice for the government in assessing the performance of public facilities in terms of maintenance management.

Building Performance Simulation tools for planning of energy efficiency retrofits

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mondrup, Thomas Fænø; Karlshøj, Jan; Vestergaard, Flemming

2014-01-01

Designing energy efficiency retrofits for existing buildings will bring environmental, economic, social, and health benefits. However, selecting specific retrofit strategies is complex and requires careful planning. In this study, we describe a methodology for adopting Building Performance...... to energy efficiency retrofits in social housing. To generate energy savings, we focus on optimizing the building envelope. We evaluate alternative building envelope actions using procedural solar radiation and daylight simulations. In addition, we identify the digital information flow and the information...... Simulation (BPS) tools as energy and environmentally conscious decision-making aids. The methodology has been developed to screen buildings for potential improvements and to support the development of retrofit strategies. We present a case study of a Danish renovation project, implementing BPS approaches...

Integrating Features of Islamic Traditional Home and Smart Home

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mona El Basyouni

2017-06-01

Full Text Available Architecture is a mirror that reflects the various elements of its environment and surroundings, such as climate, geographical characteristics, standard architectural principles, and social, cultural and scientific developments. Muslims of different regions were able, through architecture, to portray their temperaments and environments, free of external influence and guarantee life goals for users. Every day, building owners and occupants experience the constant challenges of comfort, convenience, cost, productivity, performance and sustainability. Owners, designers, builders, and operators are continuously faced with new processes, technologies and offerings to help them achieve better building performance. Since an intelligent building is run by a “system of systems” that is integrated to deliver a higher level of operational efficiency and an improved set of user-interface tools than are usually found in traditional building automation; at the other hand Arab homes with Islamic Identity guarantee all life goals for use.. Hence, this research focus on the smart environmental treatments of Islamic features for traditional architecture in Arabs homes, features of smart home and life goals for resident users.Trying to achieve a methodology combining them for enriching Arab experience of traditional architecture and its architectural results, with the modern trends of smart architecture. This combination aims at creating a residential model combining the benefits and features of Arab Islamic identity and intelligent design.

High Performance Home Building Guide for Habitat for Humanity Affiliates

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lindsey Marburger

2010-10-01

This guide covers basic principles of high performance Habitat construction, steps to achieving high performance Habitat construction, resources to help improve building practices, materials, etc., and affiliate profiles and recommendations.

Custodial Services and Building Maint: Performance Objectives.

Science.gov (United States)

Downing, Charles; And Others

Several intermediate performance objectives and corresponding criterion measures are listed for each of 14 terminal objectives for high school custodial service and building maintenance course (the third year of a 3-year program). The materials were developed for a 36-week course (3 hours daily) designed to prepare 12th graders with entry level…

Intelligent Facades for High Performance Green Buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Dyson, Anna [Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst., Troy, NY (United States)

2017-03-01

Progress Towards Net-Zero and Net-Positive-Energy Commercial Buildings and Urban Districts Through Intelligent Building Envelope Strategies Previous research and development of intelligent facades systems has been limited in their contribution towards national goals for achieving on-site net zero buildings, because this R&D has failed to couple the many qualitative requirements of building envelopes such as the provision of daylighting, access to exterior views, satisfying aesthetic and cultural characteristics, with the quantitative metrics of energy harvesting, storage and redistribution. To achieve energy self-sufficiency from on-site solar resources, building envelopes can and must address this gamut of concerns simultaneously. With this project, we have undertaken a high-performance building integrated combined-heat and power concentrating photovoltaic system with high temperature thermal capture, storage and transport towards multiple applications (BICPV/T). The critical contribution we are offering with the Integrated Concentrating Solar Façade (ICSF) is conceived to improve daylighting quality for improved health of occupants and mitigate solar heat gain while maximally capturing and transferring onsite solar energy. The ICSF accomplishes this multi-functionality by intercepting only the direct-normal component of solar energy (which is responsible for elevated cooling loads) thereby transforming a previously problematic source of energy into a high quality resource that can be applied to building demands such as heating, cooling, dehumidification, domestic hot water, and possible further augmentation of electrical generation through organic Rankine cycles. With the ICSF technology, our team is addressing the global challenge in transitioning commercial and residential building stock towards on-site clean energy self-sufficiency, by fully integrating innovative environmental control systems strategies within an intelligent and responsively dynamic building

Intelligent Facades for High Performance Green Buildings. Final Technical Report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Dyson, Anna [Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst., Troy, NY (United States)

2017-03-01

Intelligent Facades for High Performance Green Buildings: Previous research and development of intelligent facades systems has been limited in their contribution towards national goals for achieving on-site net zero buildings, because this R&D has failed to couple the many qualitative requirements of building envelopes such as the provision of daylighting, access to exterior views, satisfying aesthetic and cultural characteristics, with the quantitative metrics of energy harvesting, storage and redistribution. To achieve energy self-sufficiency from on-site solar resources, building envelopes can and must address this gamut of concerns simultaneously. With this project, we have undertaken a high-performance building- integrated combined-heat and power concentrating photovoltaic system with high temperature thermal capture, storage and transport towards multiple applications (BICPV/T). The critical contribution we are offering with the Integrated Concentrating Solar Façade (ICSF) is conceived to improve daylighting quality for improved health of occupants and mitigate solar heat gain while maximally capturing and transferring on- site solar energy. The ICSF accomplishes this multi-functionality by intercepting only the direct-normal component of solar energy (which is responsible for elevated cooling loads) thereby transforming a previously problematic source of energy into a high- quality resource that can be applied to building demands such as heating, cooling, dehumidification, domestic hot water, and possible further augmentation of electrical generation through organic Rankine cycles. With the ICSF technology, our team is addressing the global challenge in transitioning commercial and residential building stock towards on-site clean energy self-sufficiency, by fully integrating innovative environmental control systems strategies within an intelligent and responsively dynamic building envelope. The advantage of being able to use the entire solar spectrum for

Early decision support for net zero energy buildings design using building performance simulation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Attia, S.G.; Gratia, E.; De Herde, A.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2013-01-01

This paper aims to investigate the use of building performance simulation tools as a method of informing the design decision of NZEBs. The aim of this study is to evaluate the effect of a simulation-based decision aid, ZEBO, on informed decision-making using sensitivity analysis. The objective is to

High-Performance Green Building: Towards a Conceptual Framework

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Van Wyk, Llewellyn

2016-10-01

Full Text Available consumption is building performance design targets (AIA 2005:2). Kibert notes that “a unique vocabulary is emerging to describe concepts related to sustainability” including concepts such as “Factor 4 and Factor 10, ecological footprint, ecological rucksack...

Cost-optimal energy performance renovation measures of educational buildings in cold climate

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Niemelä, Tuomo; Kosonen, Risto; Jokisalo, Juha

2016-01-01

Highlights: • The proposed national nZEB target can be cost-effectively achieved in renovations. • Energy saving potential of HVAC systems is significant compared to the building envelope. • Modern renewable energy production technologies are cost-efficient and recommendable. • Improving the indoor climate conditions in deep renovations is recommendable. • Simulation-based optimization method is efficient in building performance analyzes. - Abstract: The paper discusses cost-efficient energy performance renovation measures for typical educational buildings built in the 1960s and 1970s in cold climate regions. The study analyzes the impact of different energy renovation measures on the energy efficiency and economic viability in a Finnish case study educational building located in Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT) campus area. The main objective of the study was to determine the cost-optimal energy performance renovation measures to meet the proposed national nearly zero-energy building (nZEB) requirements, which are defined according to the primary energy consumption of buildings. The main research method of the study was simulation-based optimization (SBO) analysis, which was used to determine the cost-optimal renovation solutions. The results of the study indicate that the minimum national energy performance requirement of new educational buildings (E_p_r_i_m_a_r_y ⩽ 170 kWh/(m"2,a)) can be cost-effectively achieved in deep renovations of educational buildings. In addition, the proposed national nZEB-targets are also well achievable, while improving the indoor climate (thermal comfort and indoor air quality) conditions significantly at the same time. Cost-effective solutions included renovation of the original ventilation system, a ground source heat pump system with relatively small dimensioning power output, new energy efficient windows and a relatively large area of PV-panels for solar-based electricity production. The results and

A CMake-based build and configuration framework

CERN Multimedia

CERN. Geneva

2012-01-01

The LHCb experiment has been using the CMT build and configuration tool for its software since the first versions, mainly because of its multi-platform build support and its powerful configuration management functionality. Still, CMT has some limitations in terms of build performance and the increased complexity added to the tool to cope with new use cases added latterly. Therefore, we have been looking for a viable alternative to it and we have investigated the possibility of adopting the CMake tool, which does a very good job for building and is getting very popular in the HEP community. The result of this study is a CMake-based framework which provides most of the special configuration features available natively only in CMT, with the advantages of better performances, flexibility and portability.

Invention, design and performance of coconut agrowaste fiberboards for ecologically efficacious buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Lokko, Mae-ling Jovenes

As global quantities of waste by-products from food production as well as the range of their applications increase, researchers are realizing critical opportunities to transform the burden of underutilized wastes into ecological profits. Within the tropical hot-humid region, where half the world's current and projected future population growth is concentrated, there is a dire demand for building materials to meet ambitious development schemes and rising housing deficits. However, the building sector has largely overlooked the potential of local agricultural wastes to serve as alternatives to energy-intensive, imported building technologies. Industrial ecologists have recently investigated the use of agrowaste biocomposites to replace conventional wood products that use harmful urea-formaldehyde, phenolic and isocyanate resins. Furthermore, developments in the performance of building material systems with respect to cost, energy, air quality management and construction innovation have evolved metrics about what constitutes material 'upcycling' within building life cycle. While these developments have largely been focused on technical and cost performance, much less attention has been paid to addressing deeply-seated social and cultural barriers to adoption that have sedimented over decades of importation. This dissertation evaluates the development coconut agricultural building material systems in four phases: (i) non-toxic, low-energy production of medium-high density boards (500-1200 kg/m3) from coconut fibers and emerging biobinders; (ii) characterization and evaluation of coconut agricultural building materials hygrothermal performance (iii) scaled-up design development of coconut modular building material systems and (iv) development of a value translation framework for the bottom-up distribution of value to stakeholders within the upcycling framework. This integrated design methodological approach is significant to develop ecological thinking around agrowaste

Performative building envelope design correlated to solar radiation and cooling energy consumption

Science.gov (United States)

Jacky, Thiodore; Santoni

2017-11-01

Climate change as an ongoing anthropogenic environmental challenge is predominantly caused by an amplification in the amount of greenhouse gases (GHGs), notably carbon dioxide (CO2) in building sector. Global CO2 emissions are emitted from HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning) occupation to provide thermal comfort in building. In fact, the amount of energy used for cooling or heating building is implication of building envelope design. Building envelope acts as interface layer of heat transfer between outdoor environment and the interior of a building. It appears as wall, window, roof and external shading device. This paper examines performance of various design strategy on building envelope to limit solar radiation and reduce cooling loads in tropical climate. The design strategies are considering orientation, window to wall ratio, material properties, and external shading device. This research applied simulation method using Autodesk Ecotect to investigate simultaneously between variations of wall and window ratio, shading device composition and the implication to the amount of solar radiation, cooling energy consumption. Comparative analysis on the data will determine logical variation between opening and shading device composition and cooling energy consumption. Optimizing the building envelope design is crucial strategy for reducing CO2 emissions and long-term energy reduction in building sector. Simulation technology as feedback loop will lead to better performative building envelope.

The performance of atria in two school buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Harris, D.J. [Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh (United Kingdom). Dept. of Building Engineering and Surveying

1997-10-01

Atria have become popular additions to many building types in recent years. There is a common misconception that they will automatically result in lower energy consumption, but this is not necessarily the case. Only when designed and used in an appropriate way will atria contribute to energy conservation. In this paper the performance of two school buildings, one incorporating a heat atrium, the other an unheated atrium, was studied. Comparisons between their performance were made with respect to thermal comfort, heating costs, overheating and daylighting. While heating the atrium incurred a cost penalty, it resulted in comfortable conditions in the space for a greater proportion of the time in winter, and consequently created a more useful space. In summer months overheating was likely unless an area of opening vents the equivalent of 10% or more of the floor area is provided in the atrium roof. (author)

Hybrid feature selection for supporting lightweight intrusion detection systems

Science.gov (United States)

Song, Jianglong; Zhao, Wentao; Liu, Qiang; Wang, Xin

2017-08-01

Redundant and irrelevant features not only cause high resource consumption but also degrade the performance of Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS), especially when coping with big data. These features slow down the process of training and testing in network traffic classification. Therefore, a hybrid feature selection approach in combination with wrapper and filter selection is designed in this paper to build a lightweight intrusion detection system. Two main phases are involved in this method. The first phase conducts a preliminary search for an optimal subset of features, in which the chi-square feature selection is utilized. The selected set of features from the previous phase is further refined in the second phase in a wrapper manner, in which the Random Forest(RF) is used to guide the selection process and retain an optimized set of features. After that, we build an RF-based detection model and make a fair comparison with other approaches. The experimental results on NSL-KDD datasets show that our approach results are in higher detection accuracy as well as faster training and testing processes.

Building Performance Optimization while Empowering Occupants Toward Environmentally Sustainable Behavior through Continuous Monitoring and Diagnostics

Science.gov (United States)

2016-12-01

Federal Energy Management Program FM Facility Manager GHG Green House Gases HASP Health and Safety Plan HVAC Heating Ventilation and... workplace energy efficiency enhancement by the DOD personnel. 2.1.2 ID-F Intelligent Dashboards for Facility Managers Creation of the Base Building...demonstration project. The first technology, ‘ID-F,’ targets building facility managers and allows real time diagnostics for BAS systems with features

Noise, buildings and people

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Croome, D J

1977-01-01

This book covers the physics of acoustics necessary to understand the analytical aspects of acoustical design and noise control in buildings. The major part is devoted to the problems of noise and man, and other chapters cover features of noise control in and around buildings. In an introduction, building environmental engineering is dealth with in general terms of architecture, creativity, systms design, etc. Aspects of the acoustical environment, noise sources in buildings, control of airborne and structure-borne noise and acoustical design techniques are covered in Part II. Items include: comfort, physiological response to noise and vibrations, noise criteria, human performance, speech communication, landscaped offices, sound generation by air-conditioning and heating equipment, building structure and noise attenuation, acoustical design. Part III gives some fundamentals of acoustics; mechanical vibration, wave motion, propagation of sound, structure-borne sound, behavior of sound in rooms, transmission of sound through structure. References include lists of British standards and booklets on health and safety at work.

76 FR 74050 - Measured Building Energy Performance Data Taxonomy

Science.gov (United States)

2011-11-30

... developed using a ``top-down'' approach, based on a logical understanding of building performance... were developed using a ``bottom-up'' approach, by compiling and editing lists of fields from existing...

Performance-based methodology for assessing seismic vulnerability and capacity of buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Shibin, Lin; Lili, Xie; Maosheng, Gong; Ming, Li

2010-06-01

This paper presents a performance-based methodology for the assessment of seismic vulnerability and capacity of buildings. The vulnerability assessment methodology is based on the HAZUS methodology and the improved capacitydemand-diagram method. The spectral displacement ( S d ) of performance points on a capacity curve is used to estimate the damage level of a building. The relationship between S d and peak ground acceleration (PGA) is established, and then a new vulnerability function is expressed in terms of PGA. Furthermore, the expected value of the seismic capacity index (SCev) is provided to estimate the seismic capacity of buildings based on the probability distribution of damage levels and the corresponding seismic capacity index. The results indicate that the proposed vulnerability methodology is able to assess seismic damage of a large number of building stock directly and quickly following an earthquake. The SCev provides an effective index to measure the seismic capacity of buildings and illustrate the relationship between the seismic capacity of buildings and seismic action. The estimated result is compared with damage surveys of the cities of Dujiangyan and Jiangyou in the M8.0 Wenchuan earthquake, revealing that the methodology is acceptable for seismic risk assessment and decision making. The primary reasons for discrepancies between the estimated results and the damage surveys are discussed.

Environmental sustainability assessment of buildings in hot climates: the case of the UAE

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

AboulNaga, Mohsen M.; Elsheshtawy, Yasser H.

2001-01-01

Sustainability has acquired great importance due to the negative impact of various developments on the environment. The rapid growth during the last decade has been accompanied by active construction which, in some instances, neglected the impact on the environment and human activities. The impact of developments on the traditional heritage has not been taken into consideration although the latter represents a rich resource for sustainable building practices. The study aims at examining these developments in the UAE using an assessment tool that measures the performance of buildings in terms of their sustainability. This study attempts to: (a) develop a comprehensive definition of sustainability to suit UAE needs; (b) classify sustainable building practices at international and regional levels; (c) assess building performance in the UAE; and (d) establish guidelines for future sustainable architecture. T-Sol software was used to predict the CO 2 emission level in selected buildings in the UAE. Results illustrate that average energy use/area in domestic buildings is high (213 kWh/m 2 ) and public buildings showed less sustainable measures in terms of energy features, energy performance and environmental features. Issues considered in the assessment of buildings such as energy use per square metre and CO 2 emission are alarming. Traditional buildings in the UAE were more sustainable than contemporary buildings, however. (Author)

A SOFTWARE TOOL TO COMPARE MEASURED AND SIMULATED BUILDING ENERGY PERFORMANCE DATA

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Maile, Tobias; Bazjanac, Vladimir; O' Donnell, James; Garr, Matthew

2011-11-01

Building energy performance is often inadequate when compared to design goals. To link design goals to actual operation one can compare measured with simulated energy performance data. Our previously developed comparison approach is the Energy Performance Comparison Methodology (EPCM), which enables the identification of performance problems based on a comparison of measured and simulated performance data. In context of this method, we developed a software tool that provides graphing and data processing capabilities of the two performance data sets. The software tool called SEE IT (Stanford Energy Efficiency Information Tool) eliminates the need for manual generation of data plots and data reformatting. SEE IT makes the generation of time series, scatter and carpet plots independent of the source of data (measured or simulated) and provides a valuable tool for comparing measurements with simulation results. SEE IT also allows assigning data points on a predefined building object hierarchy and supports different versions of simulated performance data. This paper briefly introduces the EPCM, describes the SEE IT tool and illustrates its use in the context of a building case study.

Environmental performance of green building code and certification systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Suh, Sangwon; Tomar, Shivira; Leighton, Matthew; Kneifel, Joshua

2014-01-01

We examined the potential life-cycle environmental impact reduction of three green building code and certification (GBCC) systems: LEED, ASHRAE 189.1, and IgCC. A recently completed whole-building life cycle assessment (LCA) database of NIST was applied to a prototype building model specification by NREL. TRACI 2.0 of EPA was used for life cycle impact assessment (LCIA). The results showed that the baseline building model generates about 18 thousand metric tons CO2-equiv. of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and consumes 6 terajoule (TJ) of primary energy and 328 million liter of water over its life-cycle. Overall, GBCC-compliant building models generated 0% to 25% less environmental impacts than the baseline case (average 14% reduction). The largest reductions were associated with acidification (25%), human health-respiratory (24%), and global warming (GW) (22%), while no reductions were observed for ozone layer depletion (OD) and land use (LU). The performances of the three GBCC-compliant building models measured in life-cycle impact reduction were comparable. A sensitivity analysis showed that the comparative results were reasonably robust, although some results were relatively sensitive to the behavioral parameters, including employee transportation and purchased electricity during the occupancy phase (average sensitivity coefficients 0.26-0.29).

Benchmarking the energy performance of office buildings: A data envelopment analysis approach

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Molinos-Senante, María

2016-12-01

Full Text Available The achievement of energy efficiency in buildings is an important challenge facing both developed and developing countries. Very few papers have assessed the energy efficiency of office buildings using real data. To overcome this limitation, this paper proposes an energy efficiency index for buildings having a large window-to-wall ratio, and uses this index to identify the main architectural factors affecting energy performance. This paper assesses, for the first time, the energy performances of 34 office buildings in Santiago, Chile, by using data envelopment analysis. Overall energy efficiency is decomposed into two indices: the architectural energy efficiency index, and the management energy efficiency index. This decomposition is an essential step in identifying the main drivers of energy inefficiency and designing measures for improvement. Office buildings examined here have significant room for improving their energy efficiencies, saving operational costs and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The methodology and results of this study will be of great interest to building managers and policymakers seeking to increase the sustainability of cities.

High Performance Homes That Use 50% Less Energy Than the DOE Building America Benchmark Building

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Christian, J.

2011-01-01

This document describes lessons learned from designing, building, and monitoring five affordable, energy-efficient test houses in a single development in the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) service area. This work was done through a collaboration of Habitat for Humanity Loudon County, the US Department of Energy (DOE), TVA, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).The houses were designed by a team led by ORNL and were constructed by Habitat's volunteers in Lenoir City, Tennessee. ZEH5, a two-story house and the last of the five test houses to be built, provided an excellent model for conducting research on affordable high-performance houses. The impressively low energy bills for this house have generated considerable interest from builders and homeowners around the country who wanted a similar home design that could be adapted to different climates. Because a design developed without the project constraints of ZEH5 would have more appeal for the mass market, plans for two houses were developed from ZEH5: a one-story design (ZEH6) and a two-story design (ZEH7). This report focuses on ZEH6, identical to ZEH5 except that the geothermal heat pump is replaced with a SEER 16 air source unit (like that used in ZEH4). The report also contains plans for the ZEH6 house. ZEH5 and ZEH6 both use 50% less energy than the DOE Building America protocol for energyefficient buildings. ZEH5 is a 4 bedroom, 2.5 bath, 2632 ft2 house with a home energy rating system (HERS) index of 43, which qualifies it for federal energy-efficiency incentives (a HERS rating of 0 is a zero-energy house, and a conventional new house would have a HERS rating of 100). This report is intended to help builders and homeowners build similar high-performance houses. Detailed specifications for the envelope and the equipment used in ZEH5 are compared with the Building America Benchmark building, and detailed drawings, specifications, and lessons learned in the construction and analysis of data gleaned

Tall-Building Projects Sustainability Indicator (TPSI: A New Design and Environmental Assessment Tool for Tall Buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hasim Altan

2012-04-01

Full Text Available The paper presents the features of Tall-building Projects Sustainability Indicator (TPSI—a “Sustainability Rating System” that specializes in tall-building projects. The system comprises two components; the “Technical Manual” in the form of a booklet and the “Calculator” in the form of an Excel tool. It can be used as a “design tool” and/or as a “checklist” to compare and to improve the sustainable performance of tall-building design schemes. At the same time, the system can be used to evaluate the sustainability of existing tall-building projects. The first version of the TPSI rating system (TPSI 2012 Version was released as an online tool (GreenLight and thoroughly examined and validated by multiple parties.

Writing standards for performance based building regulations. Conditions to be fulfilled

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Scholten, N.P.M.; Walters, W.; Nouwen, R.

2001-01-01

The Dutch Building Decree, a general administrative measure based on the Housing Act, is expressed in performance requirements. In each clause the performance requirement is based on a functional definit-ion. This definition expresses the intention of the performance requirement. The performance

76 FR 65511 - Office of Governmentwide Policy; Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings; the Green...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-10-21

... Governmentwide Policy; Office of Federal High- Performance Green Buildings; the Green Building Advisory Committee... meeting of the Green Building Advisory Committee Meeting (the Committee). The meeting is open to the..., Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings, Office of Governmentwide Policy, General Services...

Data Preparation Process for the Buildings Performance Database

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Walter, Travis; Dunn, Laurel; Mercado, Andrea; Brown, Richard E.; Mathew, Paul

2014-06-30

The Buildings Performance Database (BPD) includes empirically measured data from a variety of data sources with varying degrees of data quality and data availability. The purpose of the data preparation process is to maintain data quality within the database and to ensure that all database entries have sufficient data for meaningful analysis and for the database API. Data preparation is a systematic process of mapping data into the Building Energy Data Exchange Specification (BEDES), cleansing data using a set of criteria and rules of thumb, and deriving values such as energy totals and dominant asset types. The data preparation process takes the most amount of effort and time therefore most of the cleansing process has been automated. The process also needs to adapt as more data is contributed to the BPD and as building technologies over time. The data preparation process is an essential step between data contributed by providers and data published to the public in the BPD.

performance evaluation of feature sets of minutiae quadruplets

African Journals Online (AJOL)

databases. This shows that the evaluation of algorithms on just one or two databases is not sufficient to confirm the performance of tech- niques as they may be database-dependent. Much work was done to find a feature-set that would have a good performance across three. FVC databases of the FVC 2000, 2002 and. 2004 ...

Multi-criteria decision making under uncertainty in building performance assessment

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hopfe, C.J.; Augenbroe, G.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2013-01-01

Building performance assessment is complex, as it has to respond to multiple criteria. Objectives originating from the demands that are put on energy consumption, acoustical performance, thermal occupant comfort, indoor air quality and many other issues must all be reconciled. An assessment requires

Energy Performance and CO2 Emissions of HVAC Systems in Commercial Buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rafat Al-Waked

2017-10-01

Full Text Available Energy performance of buildings has attracted much attention among building physicists and engineers worldwide. The effects of building heating; ventilation; and air conditioning (HVAC systems’ design upgrade on the building energy performance are the focus of the current study. The adopted HVAC system consisted of chilled ceiling and chilled beam systems served by a centrifugal water chiller. An energy simulation study was undertaken in accordance with the national Australian built environment rating system-rules for collecting and using data. A three-dimensional simulation study was carried out utilizing the virtual environment-integrated environmental solutions software. Results from the current study have shown the importance of utilizing energy-efficient HVAC systems and HVAC strategies for achieving a high building energy star rating. Recommended strategies in order to achieve the nominated star rating; as predicted by the simulation analysis; were presented. Moreover; the effects of solar radiation inside the building atrium were significant; which cannot be overcome by simply installing a low shading coefficient glazing type at the atrium skylight. In addition to providing chilled ceiling technology; a high efficiency chiller and low energy lighting; it is recommended that the building be well tuned during the commissioning period. The current approach could be extended to accommodate higher energy ratings of commercial buildings at different locations worldwide.

The Impact of Insulation and HVAC Degradation on Overall Building Energy Performance: A Case Study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Georgios Eleftheriadis

2018-02-01

Full Text Available Through monitoring of buildings, it can be proven that the performance of envelope elements and energy supply systems deteriorates with time. The results of this degradation are higher energy consumption and life cycle costs than projected in the building design phase. This paper considers the impacts of this deterioration on the whole building energy performance with the goal of improving the accuracy of long term performance calculations. To achieve that, simplified degradation equations found in literature are applied on selected envelope elements and heating system components of a single-family house in Germany. The energy performance of the building over 20 years is determined through simulations by EnergyPlus and MATLAB. The simulation results show that, depending on maintenance and primary heating system, the building can consume between 18.4% and 47.1% more primary energy over 20 years compared to a scenario in which no degradation were to occur. Thus, it can be concluded that considering performance drop with time is key in order to improve the decision-making process when designing future-proof buildings.

LHCb: A CMake-based build and configuration framework

CERN Multimedia

Clemencic, M; Mato, P

2011-01-01

The LHCb experiment has been using the CMT build and configuration tool for its software since the first versions, mainly because of its multi-platform build support and its powerful configuration management functionality. Still, CMT has some limitations in terms of build performance and the increased complexity added to the tool to cope with new use cases added latterly. Therefore, we have been looking for a viable alternative to it and we have investigated the possibility of adopting the CMake tool, which does a very good job for building and is getting very popular in the HEP community. The result of this study is a CMake-based framework which provides most of the special configuration features available natively only in CMT, with the advantages of better performances, flexibility and portability.

Relevance feature selection of modal frequency-ambient condition pattern recognition in structural health assessment for reinforced concrete buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

He-Qing Mu

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Modal frequency is an important indicator for structural health assessment. Previous studies have shown that this indicator is substantially affected by the fluctuation of ambient conditions, such as temperature and humidity. Therefore, recognizing the pattern between modal frequency and ambient conditions is necessary for reliable long-term structural health assessment. In this article, a novel machine-learning algorithm is proposed to automatically select relevance features in modal frequency-ambient condition pattern recognition based on structural dynamic response and ambient condition measurement. In contrast to the traditional feature selection approaches by examining a large number of combinations of extracted features, the proposed algorithm conducts continuous relevance feature selection by introducing a sophisticated hyperparameterization on the weight parameter vector controlling the relevancy of different features in the prediction model. The proposed algorithm is then utilized for structural health assessment for a reinforced concrete building based on 1-year daily measurements. It turns out that the optimal model class including the relevance features for each vibrational mode is capable to capture the pattern between the corresponding modal frequency and the ambient conditions.

The ORC method. Effective modelling of thermal performance of multilayer building components

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Akander, Jan

2000-02-01

The ORC Method (Optimised RC-networks) provides a means of modelling one- or multidimensional heat transfer in building components, in this context within building simulation environments. The methodology is shown, primarily applied to heat transfer in multilayer building components. For multilayer building components, the analytical thermal performance is known, given layer thickness and material properties. The aim of the ORC Method is to optimise the values of the thermal resistances and heat capacities of an RC-model such as to give model performance a good agreement with the analytical performance, for a wide range of frequencies. The optimisation procedure is made in the frequency domain, where the over-all deviation between model and analytical frequency response, in terms of admittance and dynamic transmittance, is minimised. It is shown that ORC's are effective in terms of accuracy and computational time in comparison to finite difference models when used in building simulations, in this case with IDA/ICE. An ORC configuration of five mass nodes has been found to model building components in Nordic countries well, within the application of thermal comfort and energy requirement simulations. Simple RC-networks, such as the surface heat capacity and the simple R-C-configuration are not appropriate for detailed building simulation. However, these can be used as basis for defining the effective heat capacity of a building component. An approximate method is suggested on how to determine the effective heat capacity without the use of complex numbers. This entity can be calculated on basis of layer thickness and material properties with the help of two time constants. The approximate method can give inaccuracies corresponding to 20%. In-situ measurements have been carried out in an experimental building with the purpose of establishing the effective heat capacity of external building components that are subjected to normal thermal conditions. The auxiliary

Performance evaluation of the Solar Building Test Facility

Science.gov (United States)

Jensen, R. N.

1981-01-01

The general performance of the NASA Solar Building Test Facility (SBTF) and its subsystems and components over a four year operational period is discussed, and data are provided for a typical one year period. The facility consists of a 4645 sq office building modified to accept solar heated water for operation of an absorption air conditioner and a baseboard heating system. An adjoining 1176 sq solar flat plate collector field with a 114 cu tank provides the solar heated water. The solar system provided 57 percent of the energy required for heating and cooling on an annual basis. The average efficiency of the solar collectors was 26 percent over a one year period.

Impact of window selection on the energy performance of residential buildings in South Korea

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ihm, Pyeongchan; Park, Lyool; Krarti, Moncef; Seo, Donghyun

2012-01-01

With rapidly increasing energy consumption attributed to residential buildings in South Korea, there is a need to update requirements of the building energy code in order to improve the energy performance of buildings. This paper provides some guidelines to improve the building energy code to better select glazing types that minimize total energy use of residential buildings in Korea. In particular, detailed energy simulation analyses coupled with economical and environmental assessments are carried out to assess the thermal, economical, and environmental impacts of glazing thermal characteristics as well as window sizes associated with housing units in various representative climates within South Korea. The results of the analyses have clearly indicated that selecting glazing with low solar heat gain coefficient is highly beneficial especially for large windows and for mild climates. In particular, it is found that using any double-pane low-e glazing would provide better performance for windows in residential buildings than the clear double-pane glazing, currently required by the Korean building energy code. - Highlights: ► Results show that windows can be energy neutral for residential buildings. ► In Korea, double-pane low-e glazing would provide better energy performance. ► Double low-e clear filled with argon gas glazing is the most cost-effective.

Surface characteristics modeling and performance evaluation of urban building materials using LiDAR data.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Xiaolu; Liang, Yu

2015-05-20

Analysis of light detection and ranging (LiDAR) intensity data to extract surface features is of great interest in remote sensing research. One potential application of LiDAR intensity data is target classification. A new bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) model is derived for target characterization of rough and smooth surfaces. Based on the geometry of our coaxial full-waveform LiDAR system, the integration method is improved through coordinate transformation to establish the relationship between the BRDF model and intensity data of LiDAR. A series of experiments using typical urban building materials are implemented to validate the proposed BRDF model and integration method. The fitting results show that three parameters extracted from the proposed BRDF model can distinguish the urban building materials from perspectives of roughness, specular reflectance, and diffuse reflectance. A comprehensive analysis of these parameters will help characterize surface features in a physically rigorous manner.

“Team Building: Proven Strategies for Improving Team Performance, 4th Edition”

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Greg Homan

2008-12-01

Full Text Available Team Building is an important issue for Youth Development professionals. We utilize team-focused work to achieve our objectives in educating youth. The team building skills we integrate into programming serve to prepare youth for the dynamic, highly interpersonal work environment of today. “Team Building: Proven Strategies for Improving Team Performance, 4th Edition,” by W. Dyer, W.G. Dyer, and J. Dyer (2007, provides a practical theoretical framework for those interested in team building application, training, and practice in everyday work.

Using intelligent clustering techniques to classify the energy performance of school buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Santamouris, M.; Sfakianaki, K.; Papaglastra, M.; Pavlou, C.; Doukas, P.; Geros, V.; Assimakopoulos, M.N.; Zerefos, S. [University of Athens, Department of Physics, Division of Applied Physics, Laboratory of Meteorology, Athens (Greece); Mihalakakou, G.; Gaitani, N. [University of Ioannina, Department of Environmental and Natural Resources Management, Agrinio (Greece); Patargias, P. [University of Peloponnesus, Faculty of Human Sciences and Cultural Studies, Department of History, Kalamata (Greece); Primikiri, E. [University of Patras, Department of Architecture, Patras (Greece); Mitoula, R. [Charokopion University of Athens, Athens (Greece)

2007-07-01

The present paper deals with the energy performance, energy classification and rating and the global environmental quality of school buildings. A new energy classification technique based on intelligent clustering methodologies is proposed. Energy rating of school buildings provides specific information on their energy consumption and efficiency relative to the other buildings of similar nature and permits a better planning of interventions to improve its energy performance. The overall work reported in the present paper, is carried out in three phases. During the first phase energy consumption data have been collected through energy surveys performed in 320 schools in Greece. In the second phase an innovative energy rating scheme based on fuzzy clustering techniques has been developed, while in the third phase, 10 schools have been selected and detailed measurements of their energy efficiency and performance as well as of the global environmental quality have been performed using a specific experimental protocol. The proposed energy rating method has been applied while the main environmental and energy problems have been identified. The potential for energy and environmental improvements has been assessed. (author)

Selection criteria for building performance simulation tools : contrasting architects' and engineers' needs

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Attia, S.G.; Hensen, J.L.M.; Beltran, L.; De Herde, A.

2012-01-01

This article summarises a study undertaken to reveal potential challenges and opportunities for using building performance simulation (BPS) tools. The article reviews current trends in building simulation and outlines major criteria for BPS tool selection and evaluation based on analysing users'

Sustainable construction building performance simulation and asset and maintenance management

CERN Document Server

2016-01-01

This book presents a collection of recent research works that highlight best practice solutions, case studies and practical advice on the implementation of sustainable construction techniques. It includes a set of new developments in the field of building performance simulation, building sustainability assessment, sustainable management, asset and maintenance management and service-life prediction. Accordingly, the book will appeal to a broad readership of professionals, scientists, students, practitioners, lecturers and other interested parties.

High-rise buildings under multi-hazard environment assessment and design for optimal performance

CERN Document Server

Huang, Mingfeng

2017-01-01

This book discusses performance-based seismic and wind-resistant design for high-rise building structures, with a particular focus on establishing an integrated approach for performance-based wind engineering, which is currently less advanced than seismic engineering. This book also provides a state-of-the-art review of numerous methodologies, including computational fluid dynamics (CFD), extreme value analysis, structural optimization, vibration control, pushover analysis, response spectrum analysis, modal parameter identification for the assessment of the wind-resistant and seismic performance of tall buildings in the design stage and actual tall buildings in use. Several new structural optimization methods, including the augmented optimality criteria method, have been developed and employed in the context of performance-based design. This book is a valuable resource for students, researchers and engineers in the field of civil and structural engineering.

Characterising the Actual Thermal Performance of Buildings: Current Results of Common Exercises Performed in the Framework of the IEA EBC Annex 58-Project

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Roels, Staf; Bacher, Peder; Bauwens, Geert

2015-01-01

Several studies have shown that actual thermal performance of buildings after construction may deviate significantly from that anticipated at design stage. As a result, there is growing interest in full scale testing of components and whole buildings. The IEA EBC Annex 58-project ‘Reliable Building...... Energy Performance Characterisation Based on Full Scale Dynamic Measurements’ is developing the necessary knowledge and tools to achieve reliable in-situ dynamic testing and data analysis methods that can be used to characterise the actual thermal performance and energy efficiency of building components...... and whole buildings. The research within this project is driven by case studies. As a first simple case, an experiment on testing and data analysis is performed on a round robin test box. This test box can be seen as a scale model of a building, built by one of the participants, with fabric properties...

Integration of control and building performance simulation software by run-time coupling

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Yahiaoui, A.; Hensen, J.L.M.; Soethout, L.L.

2003-01-01

This paper presents the background, approach and initial results of a project, which aims to achieve better integrated building and systems control modeling in building performance simulation by runtime coupling of distributed computer programs. This paper focuses on one of the essential steps

Automatic generation and simulation of urban building energy models based on city datasets for city-scale building retrofit analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chen, Yixing; Hong, Tianzhen; Piette, Mary Ann

2017-01-01

Highlights: •Developed methods and used data models to integrate city’s public building records. •Shading from neighborhood buildings strongly influences urban building performance. •A case study demonstrated the workflow, simulation and analysis of building retrofits. •CityBES retrofit analysis feature provides actionable information for decision making. •Discussed significance and challenges of urban building energy modeling. -- Abstract: Buildings in cities consume 30–70% of total primary energy, and improving building energy efficiency is one of the key strategies towards sustainable urbanization. Urban building energy models (UBEM) can support city managers to evaluate and prioritize energy conservation measures (ECMs) for investment and the design of incentive and rebate programs. This paper presents the retrofit analysis feature of City Building Energy Saver (CityBES) to automatically generate and simulate UBEM using EnergyPlus based on cities’ building datasets and user-selected ECMs. CityBES is a new open web-based tool to support city-scale building energy efficiency strategic plans and programs. The technical details of using CityBES for UBEM generation and simulation are introduced, including the workflow, key assumptions, and major databases. Also presented is a case study that analyzes the potential retrofit energy use and energy cost savings of five individual ECMs and two measure packages for 940 office and retail buildings in six city districts in northeast San Francisco, United States. The results show that: (1) all five measures together can save 23–38% of site energy per building; (2) replacing lighting with light-emitting diode lamps and adding air economizers to existing heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems are most cost-effective with an average payback of 2.0 and 4.3 years, respectively; and (3) it is not economical to upgrade HVAC systems or replace windows in San Francisco due to the city’s mild

Highlighting High Performance: Whitman Hanson Regional High School; Whitman, Massachusetts

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

2006-06-01

This brochure describes the key high-performance building features of the Whitman-Hanson Regional High School. The brochure was paid for by the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative as part of their Green Schools Initiative. High-performance features described are daylighting and energy-efficient lighting, indoor air quality, solar and wind energy, building envelope, heating and cooling systems, water conservation, and acoustics. Energy cost savings are also discussed.

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF THE IRD RSUP DR. SARDJITO BUILDING TO THE INFLUENCE OF EARTHQUAKE

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

T. S.M. Aritonang

2012-02-01

Full Text Available In performance-based design, the level of performance of hospital buildings is generally operational, where the buildings are expected to continue to function after the occurrence of the earthquake and do not undergo significant damage. This research evaluates the level of performance suitability of the Emergency Care Installation Buildings of Dr. Sardjito Hospital (hereinafter referred to as IRD RSUP Dr. Sardjito building for the effects of earthquakes. First evaluation is done by Rapid Visual Screening by FEMA 154 (2002, then continued with more detailed evaluation based on FEMA 310 (1998. The building structure is modeled by SAP2000 and created in 2 models, i.e. the Models with wall and the Models without wall. The earthquake loads refers to SNI 1726-2002. The strength of structural elements is calculated with SNI 2847-2002 and Response-2000. For evaluation of structure performance levels, a pushover analysis used for nonlinear procedures, where the analysis used to the Seismicity region 3 and 4. Performance point is determined by Capacity Spectrum Method based on ATC-40 (1996, which has built-in in the SAP2000 Program. The performance level of the building is determined by drift ratio criteria required by FEMA 356 (2000 as well as ATC-40 (1996. From the research results, it is obtained that the natural period for the Model with wall is 0.592 seconds and 1.687 Hz frequency, and natural period for Model without wall is 1.291 seconds and 0.774 Hz frequency. Therefore, the level of structure performances for earthquake return period of 500 years is immediate occupancy.

Performance Evaluation and Improvement of a Newly-Renovated Danish School Building (Retro-commissioning)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Liu, Li; Georgieva, Viktoriya Vasileva; Zabusova, Diana

2017-01-01

In this study, we analyse and evaluate the energy performance of a Danish school building 4 years after its renovation. The structure of the following paper follows four phases, which include Planning, Investigation, Implementation and Hand-off. In the Planning phase, the objectives of the retro...... commissioning are set based on the Owner’s Project Requirements. The Investigation phase aims to analyze how the building and its systems are performing in terms of energy use and indoor environmental quality. The Implementation phase includes dynamic building simulations, which target to analyze different...... solutions and their impact on the energy consumption and indoor environmental quality in the building. Description of the final solution for optimization is included in the conclusion (Hand-off phase) of this paper....

Integrated performance appraisal of Daylight-Europe case study buildings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hensen, J.L.M.; Clarke, J.A.; Hand, J.W.; Johnson, K.; Wittchen, K.; Madsen, C.; Compagnon, R.

1996-01-01

This paper describes the approach taken within the EC’s Daylight-Europe project to apply combined thermal/daylight simulations to existing building designs which are representative of European types and climate contexts. The outputs from the performance appraisals are then incorporated within design

Attributes and descriptors for building performance evaluation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. Gopikrishnan

2017-12-01

In order to obtain the right feedback in levels of satisfaction with respect to these attributes, there is a need to have appropriate descriptors for incorporation in a survey instrument. This paper identifies attributes that indicate building performance and provides simple description of these attributes based on which items can be generated for a questionnaire. Such items can enable any user/occupant to easily understand the characteristics of these attributes and offer an objective feedback during questionnaire survey.

Do Certified Buildings Enhance Indoor Environmental Quality and Performance of Office Work?

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Da Silva, Nuno Alexandre Faria; Wargocki, Pawel

2014-01-01

With the growth of sustainability consciousness, the awareness of stakeholders for high performance buildings has also increased. The concept of green buildings has appeared. Several voluntary environmental rating schemes for buildings were created. Their focus has been energy conservation...... on productivity and that an average employee cost can be >10-100 times higher than the rental operation and maintenance costs (Morrell, 2005; Persramet al., 2007). There is however lack of consistent and systematic data benchmarking benefits of green building, in particular as regards IEQ and the effects...... (Lee, 2011), the green building do not have to necessarily meet this postulation. Quite limited numbers of credits for enhancing IEQ offered by the schemes will certainly not very much help that the high IEQ is guaranteed. The present paper surveyed literature on green buildings to examine whether...

Development of an Online Toolkit for Measuring Commercial Building Energy Efficiency Performance -- Scoping Study

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Wang, Na

2013-03-13

This study analyzes the market needs for building performance evaluation tools. It identifies the existing gaps and provides a roadmap for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop a toolkit with which to optimize energy performance of a commercial building over its life cycle.

Building Enclosure Hygrothermal Performance Study, Phase 1

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Karagiozis, A.N.

2002-08-08

The moisture performance of three different classes of wall systems has been investigated in the context of the preliminary hygrothermal analysis of walls in Seattle. The results reported in this phase specifically address the moisture performance of walls designed with loads that have some unintentional water penetration. The results have been developed in a manner to present the relative performance of the walls in the same climate with similar water penetration effects. The analysis was performed with the best available input data. Several limitations should be recognized within the context of this study. Results showed that selection of wooden sheathing boards on interior vapor-tight assemblies does not significantly influence the performance of stucco-clad walls. A larger effect was observed when the interior vapor control is made vapor open. When continuous cavity ventilation is employed, the effect of the selection of the type of sheathing board on the hygrothermal performance of the wall was found to be negligible. When comparing oriented strand board sheathing performance against the performance of exterior grade gypsum, the differences are very significant in terms of the amount of moisture content present in the walls. Moisture content alone does not indicate their respective durability as durability is directly related to the combination of relative humidity and temperature, mechanical, chemical, and biological properties of the substrates. This study did not investigate the durability performance of either sheathing. In terms of interior vapor control, inhabitant behavior must be considered during the wall hygrothermal design stage. If interior relative humidity is maintained below 60%, then a latex primer and paint may perform better than the use of PVA or even a polyethylene sheet. When the interior environment is maintained at a higher relative humidity, then stricter vapor control is needed. Multilayered building paper was experimentally shown to

Perceived Importance of Wellness Features at a Cancer Center: Patient and Staff Perspectives.

Science.gov (United States)

Tinner, Michelle; Crovella, Paul; Rosenbaum, Paula F

2018-01-01

Determine the relative impact of 11 building wellness features on preference and on the ability to deliver/receive quality care for two groups: patients and caregivers. The impact of building features that promote wellness is of increasing interest to the building owners, designers, and occupants. This study performed a postoccupancy evaluation of two user groups at a healthcare facility with specific wellness features. Seventy-six staff and 62 patients of a cancer center were polled separately to determine their preferences in 11 categories. Results showed that all wellness features were viewed favorably by the two groups, with natural lighting, views of nature, and thermal comfort as top categories for both. The t-test comparisons were performed, and significant differences ( p < .05) between the two groups were found for three of the features (views of nature, art and murals, and indoor plants). Discussion of these differences and the interaction of competing design goals (thermal comfort, views of nature, natural light, and desire for privacy) are included. Designers and owners will want to consider the preferred use of roof gardens, art and murals, and indoor plants for patient spaces, where their relative value is greater. Access to private and quiet spaces is the top need for caregivers. Ease of movement, thermal comfort, and natural light were top needs for patients.

Improving building performance using smart building concept: Benefit cost ratio comparison

Science.gov (United States)

Berawi, Mohammed Ali; Miraj, Perdana; Sayuti, Mustika Sari; Berawi, Abdur Rohim Boy

2017-11-01

Smart building concept is an implementation of technology developed in the construction industry throughout the world. However, the implementation of this concept is still below expectations due to various obstacles such as higher initial cost than a conventional concept and existing regulation siding with the lowest cost in the tender process. This research aims to develop intelligent building concept using value engineering approach to obtain added value regarding quality, efficiency, and innovation. The research combined quantitative and qualitative approach using questionnaire survey and value engineering method to achieve the research objectives. The research output will show additional functions regarding technology innovation that may increase the value of a building. This study shows that smart building concept requires higher initial cost, but produces lower operational and maintenance costs. Furthermore, it also confirms that benefit-cost ratio on the smart building was much higher than a conventional building, that is 1.99 to 0.88.

a Performance Comparison of Feature Detectors for Planetary Rover Mapping and Localization

Science.gov (United States)

Wan, W.; Peng, M.; Xing, Y.; Wang, Y.; Liu, Z.; Di, K.; Teng, B.; Mao, X.; Zhao, Q.; Xin, X.; Jia, M.

2017-07-01

Feature detection and matching are key techniques in computer vision and robotics, and have been successfully implemented in many fields. So far there is no performance comparison of feature detectors and matching methods for planetary mapping and rover localization using rover stereo images. In this research, we present a comprehensive evaluation and comparison of six feature detectors, including Moravec, Förstner, Harris, FAST, SIFT and SURF, aiming for optimal implementation of feature-based matching in planetary surface environment. To facilitate quantitative analysis, a series of evaluation criteria, including distribution evenness of matched points, coverage of detected points, and feature matching accuracy, are developed in the research. In order to perform exhaustive evaluation, stereo images, simulated under different baseline, pitch angle, and interval of adjacent rover locations, are taken as experimental data source. The comparison results show that SIFT offers the best overall performance, especially it is less sensitive to changes of image taken at adjacent locations.

A PERFORMANCE COMPARISON OF FEATURE DETECTORS FOR PLANETARY ROVER MAPPING AND LOCALIZATION

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

W. Wan

2017-07-01

Full Text Available Feature detection and matching are key techniques in computer vision and robotics, and have been successfully implemented in many fields. So far there is no performance comparison of feature detectors and matching methods for planetary mapping and rover localization using rover stereo images. In this research, we present a comprehensive evaluation and comparison of six feature detectors, including Moravec, Förstner, Harris, FAST, SIFT and SURF, aiming for optimal implementation of feature-based matching in planetary surface environment. To facilitate quantitative analysis, a series of evaluation criteria, including distribution evenness of matched points, coverage of detected points, and feature matching accuracy, are developed in the research. In order to perform exhaustive evaluation, stereo images, simulated under different baseline, pitch angle, and interval of adjacent rover locations, are taken as experimental data source. The comparison results show that SIFT offers the best overall performance, especially it is less sensitive to changes of image taken at adjacent locations.

A conceptual framework for future-proofing the energy performance of buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Georgiadou, Maria Christina; Hacking, Theophilus; Guthrie, Peter

2012-01-01

This paper presents a review undertaken to understand the concept of ‘future-proofing’ the energy performance of buildings. The long lifecycles of the building stock, the impacts of climate change and the requirements for low carbon development underline the need for long-term thinking from the early design stages. ‘Future-proofing’ is an emerging research agenda with currently no widely accepted definition amongst scholars and building professionals. In this paper, it refers to design processes that accommodate explicitly full lifecycle perspectives and energy trends and drivers by at least 2050, when selecting energy efficient measures and low carbon technologies. A knowledge map is introduced, which explores the key axes (or attributes) for achieving a ‘future-proofed’ energy design; namely, coverage of sustainability issues, lifecycle thinking, and accommodating risks and uncertainties that affect the energy consumption. It is concluded that further research is needed so that established building energy assessment methods are refined to better incorporate future-proofing. The study follows an interdisciplinary approach and is targeted at design teams with aspirations to achieve resilient and flexible low-energy buildings over the long-term. - Highlights: ► We examine the concept of ‘future-proofing’ the energy performance of buildings. ► It reconciles sustainability issues, lifecycle thinking, risks and uncertainties. ► A knowledge map with axes and types of ‘future-proofed’ solutions is presented. ► The energy design process should adopt full lifecycle considerations. ► Design for flexibility, use of dynamic models and futures techniques are suggested.

Energy Performance of Verandas in the Building Retrofit Process

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rossano Albatici

2016-05-01

Full Text Available Passive solar elements for both direct and indirect gains, are systems used to maintain a comfortable living environment while saving energy, especially in the building energy retrofit and adaptation process. Sunspaces, thermal mass and glazing area and orientation have been often used in the past to guarantee adequate indoor conditions when mechanical devices were not available. After a period of neglect, nowadays they are again considered as appropriate systems to help face environmental issues in the building sector, and both international and national legislation takes into consideration the possibility of including them in the building planning tools, also providing economic incentives. Their proper design needs dynamic simulation, often difficult to perform and time consuming. Moreover, results generally suffer from several uncertainties, so quasi steady-state procedures are often used in everyday practice with good results, but some corrections are still needed. In this paper, a comparative analysis of different solutions for the construction of verandas in an existing building is presented, following the procedure provided by the slightly modified and improved Standard EN ISO 13790:2008. Advantages and disadvantages of different configurations considering thermal insulation, windows typology and mechanical ventilation systems are discussed and a general intervention strategy is proposed. The aim is to highlight the possibility of using sunspaces in order to increase the efficiency of the existing building stock, considering ease of construction and economic viability.

Application of computational fluid dynamics in building performance simulation for the outdoor environment: an overview

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Blocken, B.J.E.; Stathopoulos, T.; Carmeliet, J.; Hensen, J.L.M.

2011-01-01

This paper provides an overview of the application of CFD in building performance simulation for the outdoor environment, focused on four topics: (1) pedestrian wind environment around buildings, (2) wind-driven rain on building facades, (3) convective heat transfer coefficients at exterior building

Realizing High-Performance Buildings; NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

None

2015-03-02

High-performance buildings (HPBs) are exceptional examples of both design and practice. Their energy footprints are small, and these are buildings that people want to work in because of their intelligent structure, operations, and coincident comfort. However, the operation of most buildings, even ones that are properly constructed and commissioned at the start, can deviate significantly from the original design intent over time, particularly due to control system overrides and growing plug and data center loads. With early planning for systems such as submetering and occupant engagement tools, operators can identify and remedy the problems. This guide is a primer for owners and owners’ representatives who are pursuing HPBs. It describes processes that have been successful in the planning, procurement, and operation of HPBs with exceptional energy efficiency. Much of the guidance offered results from a series of semi-structured conference calls with a technical advisory group of 15 owners and operators of prominent HPBs in the United States. The guide provides a prescription for planning, achieving, and maintaining an HPB. Although the guide focuses on the operations stage of buildings, many of the operations practices are specified during the planning stage.

Energy policy instruments and technical change in the residential building sector

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Beerepoot, W.M.C.

2007-01-01

The passing by the European Parliament of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) in 2003 obliges all European member states to implement energy regulations for buildings based on the concept of energy performance by the year 2009 ultimately. Given the importance of the development of innovations in energy technology, and a transition to a sustainable energy supply system, it is necessary that policy instruments for energy conservation in the building sector stimulate the development and diffusion of innovations. This thesis contributes to knowledge about the content of energy performance policy and concludes that the effect of Dutch energy performance policy in encouraging innovation is limited. Energy efficiency improvements, by energy performance policy, seem to have come from the overall optimisation of all the energy related features of residential buildings. Insulation levels improved, although not spectacular. Efficiencies of heating technology improved, although this seems partly to be a result of the ongoing development that started in the 1980s. The efficiency of fans used for ventilation improved, as did the efficiency of all sorts of auxiliary devices needed in heating technology, as well as the efficiency of heat recovery in balanced ventilation systems. Although energy performance policy seems to have contributed to the optimisation of all energy related features of residential buildings, it did not cause a breakthrough of innovative technology such as solar thermal systems or heat pumps. The study of the innovation system of the Dutch construction industry identifies how the project-based nature of the construction industry is an obstacle to 'learning-rich' collaboration between the various stakeholders. The study contributes to the discussion about the impact of government policy for energy conservation in the building sector, in the context of climate change policy.

76 FR 13617 - Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings (OFHPGB); Notice of GSA Bulletin OFHPGB 2011...

Science.gov (United States)

2011-03-14

...-Performance Green Buildings (OFHPGB); Notice of GSA Bulletin OFHPGB 2011-OGP-1 AGENCY: Office of.... Procedures Bulletins regarding the Office of Federal High-Performance Green Building are located on the... Washington, DC 20405 OFFICE OF FEDERAL HIGH-PERFORMANCE GREEN BUILDINGS GSA Bulletin 2011-OGP-1 TO: Heads of...

Energy and comfort performance evaluation after renovation of an office building

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Renzi, V.; Burgun, F. [Inst. National de l' Energie Solaire, Le Bourget du Lac (France)

2009-07-01

Buildings constitute 42.5 per cent of the energy consumption in Europe. As such, the building sector represents a high potential for innovation in terms of reducing global energy consumption. Since existing buildings represent a large part of the built environment, refurbishment is an important issue to consider. However, efficient processes of renovation must be well defined. France's National Institute of Solar Energy has developed a methodology to reduce consumption of primary energy use and decrease greenhouse gas emissions in the built environment, while increasing user comfort. The methodology places much emphasis on the health and comfort of occupants from the very beginning of the process. The methodology was developed to make the building renovation process more efficient by elaborating generic guidelines and tools. In this study, an office building from the 1970s was refurbished and monitored for both energy performance and comfort. The objective was to better understand the technological and psychosocial aspects involved in refurbishing an old building. Measurements were compared with the perception of the occupants. The impacts of human interaction on the building behaviour was also evaluated. 6 refs., 1 tab., 4 figs.

A prototype feature system for feature retrieval using relationships

Science.gov (United States)

Choi, J.; Usery, E.L.

2009-01-01

Using a feature data model, geographic phenomena can be represented effectively by integrating space, theme, and time. This paper extends and implements a feature data model that supports query and visualization of geographic features using their non-spatial and temporal relationships. A prototype feature-oriented geographic information system (FOGIS) is then developed and storage of features named Feature Database is designed. Buildings from the U.S. Marine Corps Base, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina and subways in Chicago, Illinois are used to test the developed system. The results of the applications show the strength of the feature data model and the developed system 'FOGIS' when they utilize non-spatial and temporal relationships in order to retrieve and visualize individual features.

Thermo Active Building Systems(TABS) - Performance in practice and possibilities for optimization

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kolarik, Jakub

The project “Thermo Active Building Systems (TABS) – Performance in practice and possibilities for optimization” was carried out at DTU Byg in the period form 1.9.2012 until 31.12.2014. The aim of the project was to conduct field measurements in modern office buildings equipped with TABS systems...

FINAL REPORT: Building Performance Optimization while Empowering Occupants Toward Environmentally Sustainable Behavior through Continuous Monitoring and Diagnostics

Science.gov (United States)

2016-12-05

Federal Energy Management Program FM Facility Manager GHG Green House Gases HASP Health and Safety Plan HVAC Heating Ventilation and... workplace energy efficiency enhancement by the DOD personnel. 2.1.2 ID-F Intelligent Dashboards for Facility Managers Creation of the Base Building...demonstration project. The first technology, ‘ID-F,’ targets building facility managers and allows real time diagnostics for BAS systems with features

Building Momentum: National Trends and Prospects for High-Performance Green Buildings.

Science.gov (United States)

2003

This report is an outgrowth of the Green Building Roundtable of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works held in conjunction with the U.S. Green Building Council on April 24, 2002. The roundtable brought together diverse interests to educate members of Congress on green building trends and generated discussion about the economic…

Highlighting High Performance: Blackstone Valley Regional Vocational Technical High School; Upton, Massachusetts

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

2006-10-01

This brochure describes the key high-performance building features of the Blackstone Valley High School. The brochure was paid for by the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative as part of their Green Schools Initiative. High-performance features described are daylighting and energy-efficient lighting, indoor air quality, solar energy, building envelope, heating and cooling systems, and water conservation. Energy cost savings are also discussed.

Integrated energy system for a high performance building

Science.gov (United States)

Jaczko, Kristen

Integrated energy systems have the potential to reduce of the energy consumption of residential buildings in Canada. These systems incorporate components to meet the building heating, cooling and domestic hot water load into a single system in order to reduce energy losses. An integrated energy system, consisting of a variable speed heat pump, cold and hot thermal storage tanks, a photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) collector array and a battery bank, was designed for the Queen's Solar Design Team's (QSDT) test house. The system uses a radiant floor to provide space- heating and sensible cooling and a dedicated outdoor air system provides ventilation and dehumidifies the incoming fresh air. The test house, the Queen's Solar Education Centre (QSEC), and the integrated energy system were both modelled in TRNSYS. Additionally, a new TRNSYS Type was developed to model the PV/T collectors, enabling the modeling of the collection of energy from the ambient air. A parametric study was carried out in TRNSYS to investigate the effect of various parameters on the overall energy performance of the system. These parameters included the PV/T array size and the slope of the collectors, the heat pump source and load-side inlet temperature setpoints, the compressor speed control and the size of the thermal storage tanks and the battery bank. The controls of the heat pump were found to have a large impact on the performance of the integrated energy system. For example, a low evaporator setpoint improved the overall free energy ratio (FER) of the system but the heat pump performance was lowered. Reducing the heat loss of the PV/T panels was not found to have a large effect on the system performance however, as the heat pump is able to lower the inlet collector fluid temperature, thus reducing thermal losses. From the results of the sensitivity study, a recommended system model was created and this system had a predicted FER of 77.9% in Kingston, Ontario, neglecting the energy consumption of

Parameter study on performance of building cooling by night-time ventilation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Artmann, Nikolai; Manz, H.; Heiselberg, Per

2008-01-01

of different parameters such as building construction, heat gains, air change rates, heat transfer coefficients and climatic conditions including annual variations on the number of overheating degree hours (operative room temperature >26 °C) was evaluated. Climatic conditions and air flow rate during night......Especially for commercial buildings in moderate climates, night-time ventilation seems to be a simple and energy-efficient approach to improve thermal comfort in summer. However, due to uncertainties in the prediction of thermal comfort in buildings with night-time ventilation, architects...... and engineers are still hesitant to apply this technique. In order to reduce the uncertainties, the most important parameters affecting night ventilation performance need to be identified. A typical office room was therefore modelled using a building energy simulation programme (HELIOS), and the effect...

Character-Defining Features of Contributing Buildings and Structures in the Fort Gordon, Georgia, Signal School Campus Historic District

Science.gov (United States)

2016-07-01

aluminum and plate- glass doors, sidelights, and transoms [right] (ERDC-CERL, 2015). .................. 178 Figure 243. Ceiling -mounted light fixture...Light pattern” effect on wall The typical Signal School building is of cast-in-place concrete columns with a waffle floor/ ceiling structure. The...would have a significant effect on the character-defining feature of the classroom hall- ways as would installing a dropped ceiling to cover the

Joint Feature Selection and Classification for Multilabel Learning.

Science.gov (United States)

Huang, Jun; Li, Guorong; Huang, Qingming; Wu, Xindong

2018-03-01

Multilabel learning deals with examples having multiple class labels simultaneously. It has been applied to a variety of applications, such as text categorization and image annotation. A large number of algorithms have been proposed for multilabel learning, most of which concentrate on multilabel classification problems and only a few of them are feature selection algorithms. Current multilabel classification models are mainly built on a single data representation composed of all the features which are shared by all the class labels. Since each class label might be decided by some specific features of its own, and the problems of classification and feature selection are often addressed independently, in this paper, we propose a novel method which can perform joint feature selection and classification for multilabel learning, named JFSC. Different from many existing methods, JFSC learns both shared features and label-specific features by considering pairwise label correlations, and builds the multilabel classifier on the learned low-dimensional data representations simultaneously. A comparative study with state-of-the-art approaches manifests a competitive performance of our proposed method both in classification and feature selection for multilabel learning.

SOME SPECIFIC FEATURES OF ENERGY CONSUMPTION IN MODERN RESIDENTIAL BUILDINGS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. N. Osipov

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Over the past 20 years there have been significant changes in the customer requirements for housing in the countries of the former USSR. Besides, new materials and construction products, such as the ones for sealed windows and balcony doors have appeared in the market. The number of vacant flats with the heating off in the winter significantly increased that may cause condensation on the surfaces of interroom partitions and the formation of mold. Meanwhile, the requirements for lower energy consumption are constantly increasing, that is especially pronouncedly manifested in the growth of normative values of thermal resistance of enclosing structures of buildings and in the increased interest in the use of secondary energy resources extracted from the air and effluent wastewater. The present article describes the method to prevent moisture condensation on the fencing of adjacent premises with different temperatures containing heating systems and the use of waste heat removed from the room exhaust air. For quick emergency switching of in-house systems of heat and gas supply to outdoor mobile sources of heat and gas it is recommended to install special taps with connectors insulated in special niches in the walls or other parts of buildings considering the possibility of placing them close to the outer mobile sources of heat and gas. In the case of heating the building with the aid of a roof gas boiler or by doorto-door heaters fueled by gas, a single pipeline (collector, equipped with an additional device for the connection of emergency gas supply is being put along the wall. In order to reduce specific heat consumption for heating of buildings it is recommended to increase the net enclosure volume of buildings and to improve their form in various ways, including by combining two or more adjacent low-rise buildings in one secondary building with increasing height and with the broadening of either or each side for modernization and reconstruction

Comfort Indicators for the Assessment of Indoor Environmental Building Performance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Brohus, Henrik; Bendtsen, A.; Sørensen, M.

2006-01-01

Indoor environmental building performance assessment requires efficient indicators of the indoor comfort. In order to be effective and useful the comfort indicators must be able to include the temporal variation of indoor comfort as well as the degree of discomfort perceived by the occupants....... This paper discusses and presents a number of comfort indicators that includes both the temporal variation and the degree of discomfort in the calculations. A test case comprising a ventilated office building is used to show the application of the various comfort indices. It is found that the new comfort...

Improving energy performance of school buildings while ensuring indoor air quality ventilation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Becker, Rachel; Goldberger, Itamar [Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa (Israel). Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Department of Structural Engineering and Construction Management; Paciuk, Monica [National Building Research Institute, Technion, Haifa (Israel)

2007-09-15

Energy conscious design of school buildings, as well as deemed-to-satisfy provisions in a Performance Based Energy Code, should address the problem known as the energy efficiency - thermal comfort - indoor air quality dilemma (EE-TC-IAQ Dilemma). In warm and moderate climates, the large internal heat sources usually found in school buildings prevent achieving thermal comfort without active cooling in summer, but are not sufficient to eliminate the need for heating in winter. Commonly used air-conditioners do not improve air quality, while natural ventilation induces uncontrolled energy losses. In this study, a step by step process was used for the development of deemed-to-satisfy design solutions, which cope with the EE-TC-IAQ Dilemma, for a performance based code. A distinction is made between improving building design variables and improving ventilation schemes. Results indicate that implementation of improved ventilation schemes in an otherwise well designed energy-conscious building result in savings of 28-30% and 17-18% for northern and southern classroom orientations, respectively. (author)

Improving total-building seismic performance using linear fluid viscous dampers

OpenAIRE

Del Gobbo, GM; Blakeborough, A; Williams, MS

2018-01-01

Previous research has revealed that Eurocode-compliant structures can experience structural and nonstructural damage during earthquakes. Retrofitting buildings with fluid viscous dampers (FVDs) can improve interstorey drifts and floor accelerations, two structural parameters that characterize seismic demand. Previous research focusing on FVD applications for improving seismic performance has focused on structural performance. Structural parameters such as interstorey drifts and floor accelera...

RESEARCH ON FEATURE POINTS EXTRACTION METHOD FOR BINARY MULTISCALE AND ROTATION INVARIANT LOCAL FEATURE DESCRIPTOR

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hongwei Ying

2014-08-01

Full Text Available An extreme point of scale space extraction method for binary multiscale and rotation invariant local feature descriptor is studied in this paper in order to obtain a robust and fast method for local image feature descriptor. Classic local feature description algorithms often select neighborhood information of feature points which are extremes of image scale space, obtained by constructing the image pyramid using certain signal transform method. But build the image pyramid always consumes a large amount of computing and storage resources, is not conducive to the actual applications development. This paper presents a dual multiscale FAST algorithm, it does not need to build the image pyramid, but can extract feature points of scale extreme quickly. Feature points extracted by proposed method have the characteristic of multiscale and rotation Invariant and are fit to construct the local feature descriptor.

Balanced framework for measuring performance of supply chains in house building

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Halman, Johannes I.M.; Voordijk, Johannes T.

2012-01-01

Despite its importance, performance measurement of supply chains of house building firms has not received much attention yet in academic literature. The objective of this study is to develop a framework to measure this performance. In a first step, a comprehensive framework is developed composed of

Object-oriented Method of Hierarchical Urban Building Extraction from High-resolution Remote-Sensing Imagery

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

TAO Chao

2016-02-01

Full Text Available An automatic urban building extraction method for high-resolution remote-sensing imagery,which combines building segmentation based on neighbor total variations with object-oriented analysis,is presented in this paper. Aimed at different extraction complexity from various buildings in the segmented image,a hierarchical building extraction strategy with multi-feature fusion is adopted. Firstly,we extract some rectangle buildings which remain intact after segmentation through shape analysis. Secondly,in order to ensure each candidate building target to be independent,multidirectional morphological road-filtering algorithm is designed which can separate buildings from the neighboring roads with similar spectrum. Finally,we take the extracted buildings and the excluded non-buildings as samples to establish probability model respectively,and Bayesian discriminating classifier is used for making judgment of the other candidate building objects to get the ultimate extraction result. The experimental results have shown that the approach is able to detect buildings with different structure and spectral features in the same image. The results of performance evaluation also support the robustness and precision of the approach developed.

Extracting BI-RADS Features from Portuguese Clinical Texts.

Science.gov (United States)

Nassif, Houssam; Cunha, Filipe; Moreira, Inês C; Cruz-Correia, Ricardo; Sousa, Eliana; Page, David; Burnside, Elizabeth; Dutra, Inês

2012-01-01

In this work we build the first BI-RADS parser for Portuguese free texts, modeled after existing approaches to extract BI-RADS features from English medical records. Our concept finder uses a semantic grammar based on the BIRADS lexicon and on iterative transferred expert knowledge. We compare the performance of our algorithm to manual annotation by a specialist in mammography. Our results show that our parser's performance is comparable to the manual method.

The comparison of the energy performance of hotel buildings using PROMETHEE decision-making method

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vujosevic Milica L.

2016-01-01

Full Text Available Annual energy performance of the atrium type hotel buildings in Belgrade climate conditions are analysed in this paper. The objective is to examine the impact of the atrium on the hotel building’s energy needs for space heating and cooling, thus establishing the best design among four proposed alternatives of the hotels with atrium. The energy performance results are obtained using EnergyPlus simulation engine, taking into account Belgrade climate data and thermal comfort parameters. The selected results are compared and the hotels are ranked according to certain criteria. Decision-making process that resulted in the ranking of the proposed alternatives is conducted using PROMETHEE method and Borda model. The methodological approach in this research includes the creation of a hypothetical model of an atrium type hotel building, numerical simulation of energy performances of four design alternatives of the hotel building with an atrium, comparative analysis of the obtained results and ranking of the proposed alternatives from the building’s energy performance perspective. The main task of the analysis is to examine the influence of the atrium, with both its shape and position, on the energy performance of the hotel building. Based on the results of the research it can be to determine the most energy efficient model of the hotel building with atrium for Belgrade climate condition areas. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije: Spatial, Environmental, Energy and Social aspects of the Developing Settlements and Climate Change - Mutual Impacts

Construction Performance Optimization toward Green Building Premium Cost Based on Greenship Rating Tools Assessment with Value Engineering Method

Science.gov (United States)

Latief, Yusuf; Berawi, Mohammed Ali; Basten, Van; Riswanto; Budiman, Rachmat

2017-07-01

Green building concept becomes important in current building life cycle to mitigate environment issues. The purpose of this paper is to optimize building construction performance towards green building premium cost, achieving green building rating tools with optimizing life cycle cost. Therefore, this study helps building stakeholder determining building fixture to achieve green building certification target. Empirically the paper collects data of green building in the Indonesian construction industry such as green building fixture, initial cost, operational and maintenance cost, and certification score achievement. After that, using value engineering method optimized green building fixture based on building function and cost aspects. Findings indicate that construction performance optimization affected green building achievement with increasing energy and water efficiency factors and life cycle cost effectively especially chosen green building fixture.

Improving the Energy Performance in Existing Non-residential Buildings in Denmark Using the Total Concept Method

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Krawczyk, Pawel; Afshari, Alireza; Simonsen, Graves K.

2016-01-01

This project is a part of a joint European research project, “Total Concept”, which is a method for improving the energy performance in existing non-Residential buildings. The method focuses on achieving maximum energy savings in a Building within the profitability frames set by a building owner...... was to form a package of measures for an energy performance improvement in the building based on the Total Concept method. This paper presents results from recently analyzed data on two renovated Danish buildings according to the rules of “Total Concept” method. According to the estimation done based...

Contribution Index Based on Green Building Certification Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yuting Sun

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Green Building Certification Systems (GBCS are carried out in many countries due to the rising awareness of the importance of sustainability in the building industry. The intention should have motivated participants to construct and operate buildings sustainably, however, there is not yet a method developed to investigate the motivation of the participants. Based on the GBCS, this paper proposes the contribution index as a standard global method to analyze the performance of participants in the green building industry. Three contribution indices, namely Frequency Contribution Index (FCI, Intensity Contribution Index (ICI and Comprehensive Contribution Index (CCI that concern each different category of participant, have been formulated. Three further analyses based on the index were undertaken to investigate some features of the industry. A case study of Singapore was conducted to show how the contribution index could be used to extract industry patterns and trends and assess the participants’ performance in the green building industry. Interviews with experts provide some suggested applications and support for the findings.

Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) - Better Buildings Neighborhood Program at Greater Cincinnati Energy Alliance: Home Performance with Energy Star® and Better Buildings Performance

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Holzhauser, Andy; Jones, Chris; Faust, Jeremy; Meyer, Chris; Van Divender, Lisa

2013-12-30

The Greater Cincinnati Energy Alliance (Energy Alliance) is a nonprofit economic development agency dedicated to helping Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky communities reduce energy consumption. The Energy Alliance has launched programs to educate homeowners, commercial property owners, and nonprofit organizations about energy efficiency opportunities they can use to drive energy use reductions and financial savings, while extending significant focus to creating/retaining jobs through these programs. The mission of the Energy Alliance is based on the premise that investment in energy efficiency can lead to transformative economic development in a region. With support from seven municipalities, the Energy Alliance began operation in early 2010 and has been among the fastest growing nonprofit organizations in the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky area. The Energy Alliance offers two programs endorsed by the Department of Energy: the Home Performance with ENERGY STAR® Program for homeowners and the Better Buildings Performance Program for commercial entities. Both programs couple expert guidance, project management, and education in energy efficiency best practices with incentives and innovative energy efficiency financing to help building owners effectively invest in the energy efficiency, comfort, health, longevity, and environmental impact of their residential or commercial buildings. The Energy Alliance has raised over $23 million of public and private capital to build a robust market for energy efficiency investment. Of the $23 million, $17 million was a direct grant from the Department of Energy Better Buildings Neighborhood Program (BBNP). The organization’s investments in energy efficiency projects in the residential and commercial sector have led to well over $50 million in direct economic activity and created over 375,000 hours of labor created or retained. In addition, over 250 workers have been trained through the Building Performance Training

Performance evaluation of operational energy use in refurbishment, reuse, and conservation of heritage buildings for optimum sustainability

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

O.K. Akande

2016-09-01

Full Text Available The operational phase of a building project has increasingly gained importance with their energy performance becoming valuable and determining their operational excellence. In most heritage building projects (HBPs, the operational energy use aspects are less considered, and a systematic way of analyzing their energy performance following project delivery is often lacking. The aim of this study is to evaluate the operational performance of refurbishment and reuse of UK listed church projects. The objective is to assess the operational energy use with a view to optimizing their sustainable performance. The methodology includes eight selected case study buildings refurbished and converted for multipurpose use. The case study approach provided qualitative insights into how the study contributes to a more structured requirements for energy management in HBPs with specific attention to energy-efficient building operations. The findings show the need to focus on fundamental areas of operational management (i.e. by developing and implementing more focused policy on operational energy performance of heritage buildings to minimize the energy required to operate them. The challenges of implementing changes in operational energy performance improvement of heritage buildings are addressed in the form of recommendations that could lead to real results. The study concludes that leveraging these areas requires commitment from all heritage building stakeholders because they all have substantial roles in harmonizing the requirement for the project׳s sustainability and not just the building operators. Meanwhile, baseline project planning, periodic updating, monitoring, and managing the energy use pattern are suggested as measures that could greatly facilitate better energy performance to optimizing their sustainable reuse compared with the traditional approach of trying to improve their thermal performance.

The Building Fabric Thermal Performance of Passivhaus Dwellings—Does It Do What It Says on the Tin?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David Johnston

2016-01-01

Full Text Available The Passivhaus (or Passive House Standard is one of the world’s most widely known voluntary energy performance standards. For a dwelling to achieve the Standard and be granted Certification, the building fabric requires careful design and detailing, high levels of thermal insulation, building airtightness, close site supervision and careful workmanship. However, achieving Passivhaus Certification is not a guarantee that the thermal performance of the building fabric as designed will actually be achieved in situ. This paper presents the results obtained from measuring the in situ whole building heat loss coefficient (HLC of a small number of Certified Passivhaus case study dwellings. They are located on different sites and constructed using different technologies in the UK. Despite the small and non-random nature of the dwelling sample, the results obtained from the in situ measurements revealed that the thermal performance of the building fabric, for all of the dwellings, performed very close to the design predictions. This suggests that in terms of the thermal performance of the building fabric, Passivhaus does exactly what it says on the tin.

Success factors of energy performance contracting (EPC) for sustainable building energy efficiency retrofit (BEER) of hotel buildings in China

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Xu Pengpeng; Chan, Edwin Hon-Wan; Queena Kun Qian

2011-01-01

Hotel building is a type of high-energy-consuming building and most existing hotel buildings need energy efficiency improvement in China. Energy performance contracting (EPC) is considered a win-win mechanism to organize building energy efficiency retrofit (BEER) project. However, EPC mechanism has been introduced into China relatively recently and many EPCs have not been successful in building energy efficiency retrofit projects. This research aims to develop a set of critical success factors (CSFs) of EPC for sustainable energy efficiency retrofit (BEER) of hotel buildings in China. Semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire survey with practitioners and other professionals were conducted. The findings reveal the relative importance of the 21 number of identified success factors. In order to explore the underlying relationship among the identified critical success factors (CSFs), factor analysis method was adopted for further investigation, which leads to grouping the 21 identified CSFs into six clusters. These are (1) project organization process, (2) EPC project financing for hotel retrofit, (3) knowledge and innovation of EPC, sustainable development (SD), and M and V, (4) implementation of sustainable development strategy, (5) contractual arrangement, and (6) external economic environment. Finally, several relevant policies were proposed to implement EPC successfully in sustainable BEER in hotel buildings. - Highlights: → EPC is a win-win mechanism to organize building energy efficiency retrofit project. → CSFs of EPC mechanism for sustainable BEER of hotel building in China are examined. → Six clusters are extracted from 21 identified CSFs based on factor analysis.

Multiscale deep features learning for land-use scene recognition

Science.gov (United States)

Yuan, Baohua; Li, Shijin; Li, Ning

2018-01-01

The features extracted from deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have shown their promise as generic descriptors for land-use scene recognition. However, most of the work directly adopts the deep features for the classification of remote sensing images, and does not encode the deep features for improving their discriminative power, which can affect the performance of deep feature representations. To address this issue, we propose an effective framework, LASC-CNN, obtained by locality-constrained affine subspace coding (LASC) pooling of a CNN filter bank. LASC-CNN obtains more discriminative deep features than directly extracted from CNNs. Furthermore, LASC-CNN builds on the top convolutional layers of CNNs, which can incorporate multiscale information and regions of arbitrary resolution and sizes. Our experiments have been conducted using two widely used remote sensing image databases, and the results show that the proposed method significantly improves the performance when compared to other state-of-the-art methods.

A methodology for energy performance classification of residential building stock of Hamirpur

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aniket Sharma

2017-12-01

Full Text Available In India, there are various codes, standards, guidelines and rating systems launched to make energy intensive and large sized buildings energy efficient whereas independent residential buildings are not covered even though they exist most in numbers of total housing stock. This paper presents a case study methodology for energy performance assessment of existing residential stock of Hamirpur that can be used to develop suitable energy efficiency regulations. The paper discusses the trend of residential development in Hamirpur followed by classification based on usage, condition, predominant material use, ownership size and number of rooms, source of lighting, assets available, number of storey and plot sizes using primary and secondary data. It results in identification of predominant materials used and other characteristics in each of urban and rural area. Further cradle to site embodied energy index of various dominant building materials and their market available alternative materials is calculated from secondary literature and by calculating transportation energy. One representative existing building is selected in each of urban and rural area and their energy performance is evaluated for material embodied energy and operational energy using simulation. Further alternatives are developed based on other dominant materials in each area and evaluated for change in embodied and operational energy. This paper identifies the energy performance of representative houses for both areas and in no way advocates the preference of one type over another. The paper demonstrates a methodology by which energy performance assessment of houses shall be done and also highlights further research.

Investigating User Perception of High-Performance Schools about Factors Associated with Building Energy Efficiency

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mohd Najib Mohd Salleh

2016-01-01

Full Text Available Energy demand in buildings can be reduced by improving energy efficiency. MS1525 has recommended that energy efficiency for Non-Residential Buildings in Malaysia to be not more than 135kWh/m²/year. A school building is a non-residential building and has major social responsibilities. Based on the theory of building energy-efficiency, energy efficiency can be achieved through three main factors: a design of buildings; b design of services; and c user behavior. This study aims to investigate the user perceptions in High-Performance Schools. The questionnaire viewed three main perceptions of users: perception of user behavior, the perception of building design and perception of services design.

Challenges in Getting Building Performance Monitoring Tools for Everyday Use: User Experiences with A New Tool

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Heikki Ihasalo

2014-05-01

Full Text Available There is a need for building performance monitoring because it is common that buildings do not perform as intended. A number of advanced tools for the purpose have been developed within the last tens of years. However, these tools have not been widely adopted in real use. A new tool presented here utilizes building automation data and transforms the data into a set of performance metrics, and is capable of visualizing building performance from energy, indoor conditions, and HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning system perspectives. The purpose of this paper is to study the users’ perceptions of the use of tool. The research method was semi-structured interviews. Although the users were satisfied with the solution in general, it was not taken into operative use. The main challenges with the use of the solution were related to accessibility, trust, and management practices. The interviewees were struggling to manage with numerous information systems and therefore had problems in finding the solution and authenticating to it. All the interviewees did not fully trust the solution, since they did not entirely understand what the performance metrics meant or because the solution had limitations in assessing building performance. Management practices are needed to support the performance measurement philosophy.

Building America System Research Results. Innovations for High Performance Homes

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

none,

2006-05-01

This report provides a summary of key lessons learned from the first 10 years of the Building America program and also included a summary of the future challenges that must be met to reach the program’s long term performance goals.

An analysis of the performance of a 2.6 kWp building integrated photovoltaic installation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sulaiman Shaari

2000-01-01

This paper presents a summary of an analysis of the performance results of a 2.6 kWp Building integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) installation. The building has fifty Siemens M55 photovoltaic (PV) modules integrated as part of the roof of the building, grid-interactive via an SMA inverter. Data have been compiled and a detailed analysis of its performance was done using a dedicated BIPV computer model called PVSYST2.0. It was found that the general performance of the system was at the lower end of the spectrum mainly due to inherent architectural design of the building. This came by way of shading on the modules casted by shadow: of existing roofs of the building, and adverse effects from temperature increases on the modules due to the heating regimes in the building and lack of ventilation of the modules. The problem was exacerbated by an inverter-to-PV size ratio mismatch. In addition there had been some teething problems during the earlier periods of operation. Lessons from this experience are drawn up to serve as a precautionary note in designing other BIPV installations, especially valuable for applications in tropical climate countries, like Malaysia. (Author)

Evaluating national environmental sustainability: performance measures and influential factors for OECD-member countries featuring Canadian performance and policy implications

OpenAIRE

Calbick, Kenneth Stuart

2011-01-01

This research reviews five studies that evaluate national environmental sustainability with composite indices; performs uncertainty and sensitivity analyses of techniques for building a composite index; completes principal components factor analysis to help build subindices measuring waste and pollution, sustainable energy, sustainable food, nature conservation, and sustainable cities (Due to its current importance, the greenhouse gases (GHG) indicator is included individually as another poli...

Quantifying environmental performance of Jali screen facades for contemporary buildings in Lahore, Pakistan

Science.gov (United States)

Batool, Ayesha

Jali screens are traditional window treatments in vernacular buildings throughout South Asia and the Middle East. Contemporary builders are starting to incorporate Jali screens as decorative facade elements; however, architects and scholars have largely ignored the impact of Jali screens on overall building energy and day-lighting performance. This research evaluates the effect of Jali screens, across a range of perforation ratios, on energy utilization and day-lighting quality in contemporary office buildings. The data collection and analysis is through fieldwork in Lahore, Pakistan, as well as through computational energy modeling. Results demonstrate that Jali screens have a promising positive impact on cooling loads and may improve visual comfort. The findings suggest a holistic perspective combining traditional architecture and performance enhancement by architects and designers.

Energy performance and indoor air quality in modern buildings in Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kotol, Martin; Rode, Carsten; Vahala, Jan

2015-01-01

A new dormitory for engineering students "Apisseq" was built in Sisimiut, Greenland in 2010. Its purpose is not only to provide accommodation for students, but thanks to its complex monitoring system, it enables researchers to evaluate the building's energy performance and indoor air quality. Some......, which have negative effects on the energy performance and indoor air quality. The heat demand in 2011 was 26.5% higher than expected. One of the main causes of the extra heat demand is the fact that the ventilation system was over-dimensioned, and although it is running on the lowest fan power...... of the installed technologies are not commonly used in the current Greenlandic building stock. Therefore, evaluation of their performance under local conditions is essential for further use and development. The first year of operation has disclosed some errors made during the design process and construction phase...

Earthquake-resistant performance investigation for rural buildings in Zhongxiang area, China

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lei Jingya

2013-02-01

Full Text Available We carried out a census of the rural residential buildings of Zhongxiang area’s 17 towns. Next, we conducted a sample survey in four townships: Huji, Shipai, Zhangji, and Jiuli. According to the census and sample survey data of the rural residence buildings, we evaluated the quality and earthquake-resistant performance of the rural buildings for the various local rural residential structural types. The results showed that there are four main factors affecting the seismic performance of the local rural residences: (1 Foundations are not made appropriately (such as by compaction or some other fill but are built directly in the farming soil. (2 Seismic measures are not completely implemented. Structure construction measures are not in place at the junction of the vertical and horizontal wall. The vertical wall joints are not the result of the same masonry techniques as the horizontal joints. There are no lintels above the door and window openings, or if there are any, the length of the lintels is less than 240 mm. (3 The brick masonry wall has low strength. The greatest housing wall mortar strength is between M0. 4–1.5, much lower than the strength of the brick. (4 The building material and construction quality are poor. The quality of the mortar masonry wall is poor. The cracks between the bricks are uneven, even in the seams.

Building and measuring a high performance network architecture

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kramer, William T.C.; Toole, Timothy; Fisher, Chuck; Dugan, Jon; Wheeler, David; Wing, William R; Nickless, William; Goddard, Gregory; Corbato, Steven; Love, E. Paul; Daspit, Paul; Edwards, Hal; Mercer, Linden; Koester, David; Decina, Basil; Dart, Eli; Paul Reisinger, Paul; Kurihara, Riki; Zekauskas, Matthew J; Plesset, Eric; Wulf, Julie; Luce, Douglas; Rogers, James; Duncan, Rex; Mauth, Jeffery

2001-04-20

Once a year, the SC conferences present a unique opportunity to create and build one of the most complex and highest performance networks in the world. At SC2000, large-scale and complex local and wide area networking connections were demonstrated, including large-scale distributed applications running on different architectures. This project was designed to use the unique opportunity presented at SC2000 to create a testbed network environment and then use that network to demonstrate and evaluate high performance computational and communication applications. This testbed was designed to incorporate many interoperable systems and services and was designed for measurement from the very beginning. The end results were key insights into how to use novel, high performance networking technologies and to accumulate measurements that will give insights into the networks of the future.

An integrated environmental and health performance quantification model for pre-occupancy phase of buildings in China

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li, Xiaodong, E-mail: eastdawn@tsinghua.edu.cn; Su, Shu, E-mail: sushuqh@163.com; Zhang, Zhihui, E-mail: zhzhg@tsinghua.edu.cn; Kong, Xiangqin, E-mail: kxlwq@126.com

2017-03-15

To comprehensively pre-evaluate the damages to both the environment and human health due to construction activities in China, this paper presents an integrated building environmental and health performance (EHP) assessment model based on the Building Environmental Performance Analysis System (BEPAS) and the Building Health Impact Analysis System (BHIAS) models and offers a new inventory data estimation method. The new model follows the life cycle assessment (LCA) framework and the inventory analysis step involves bill of quantity (BOQ) data collection, consumption data formation, and environmental profile transformation. The consumption data are derived from engineering drawings and quotas to conduct the assessment before construction for pre-evaluation. The new model classifies building impacts into three safeguard areas: ecosystems, natural resources and human health. Thus, this model considers environmental impacts as well as damage to human wellbeing. The monetization approach, distance-to-target method and panel method are considered as optional weighting approaches. Finally, nine residential buildings of different structural types are taken as case studies to test the operability of the integrated model through application. The results indicate that the new model can effectively pre-evaluate building EHP and the structure type significantly affects the performance of residential buildings.

An integrated environmental and health performance quantification model for pre-occupancy phase of buildings in China

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Li, Xiaodong; Su, Shu; Zhang, Zhihui; Kong, Xiangqin

2017-01-01

To comprehensively pre-evaluate the damages to both the environment and human health due to construction activities in China, this paper presents an integrated building environmental and health performance (EHP) assessment model based on the Building Environmental Performance Analysis System (BEPAS) and the Building Health Impact Analysis System (BHIAS) models and offers a new inventory data estimation method. The new model follows the life cycle assessment (LCA) framework and the inventory analysis step involves bill of quantity (BOQ) data collection, consumption data formation, and environmental profile transformation. The consumption data are derived from engineering drawings and quotas to conduct the assessment before construction for pre-evaluation. The new model classifies building impacts into three safeguard areas: ecosystems, natural resources and human health. Thus, this model considers environmental impacts as well as damage to human wellbeing. The monetization approach, distance-to-target method and panel method are considered as optional weighting approaches. Finally, nine residential buildings of different structural types are taken as case studies to test the operability of the integrated model through application. The results indicate that the new model can effectively pre-evaluate building EHP and the structure type significantly affects the performance of residential buildings.

Hybrid Building Performance Simulation Models for Industrial Energy Efficiency Applications

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Peter Smolek

2018-06-01

Full Text Available In the challenge of achieving environmental sustainability, industrial production plants, as large contributors to the overall energy demand of a country, are prime candidates for applying energy efficiency measures. A modelling approach using cubes is used to decompose a production facility into manageable modules. All aspects of the facility are considered, classified into the building, energy system, production and logistics. This approach leads to specific challenges for building performance simulations since all parts of the facility are highly interconnected. To meet this challenge, models for the building, thermal zones, energy converters and energy grids are presented and the interfaces to the production and logistics equipment are illustrated. The advantages and limitations of the chosen approach are discussed. In an example implementation, the feasibility of the approach and models is shown. Different scenarios are simulated to highlight the models and the results are compared.

Thermal and Energy Performance of Conditioned Building Due To Insulated Sloped Roof

Science.gov (United States)

Irwan, Suhandi Syiful; Ahmed, Azni Zain; Zakaria, Nor Zaini; Ibrahim, Norhati

2010-07-01

For low-rise buildings in equatorial region, the roof is exposed to solar radiation longer than other parts of the envelope. Roofs are to be designed to reject heat and moderate the thermal impact. These are determined by the design and construction of the roofing system. The pitch of roof and the properties of construction affect the heat gain into the attic and subsequently the indoor temperature of the living spaces underneath. This finally influences the thermal comfort conditions of naturally ventilated buildings and cooling load of conditioned buildings. This study investigated the effect of insulated sloping roof on thermal energy performance of the building. A whole-building thermal energy computer simulation tool, Integrated Environmental Solution (IES), was used for the modelling and analyses. A building model with dimension of 4.0 m × 4.0 m × 3.0 m was designed with insulated roof and conventional construction for other parts of the envelope. A 75 mm conductive insulation material with thermal conductivity (k-value) of 0.034 Wm-1K-1 was installed underneath the roof tiles. The building was modelled with roof pitch angles of 0° , 15°, 30°, 45°, 60° and simulated for the month of August in Malaysian climate conditions. The profile for attic temperature, indoor temperature and cooling load were downloaded and evaluated. The optimum roof pitch angle for best thermal performance and energy saving was identified. The results show the pitch angle of 0° is able to mitigate the thermal impact to provide the best thermal condition with optimum energy savings. The maximum temperature difference between insulated and non-insulted roof for attic (AtticA-B) and indoor condition (IndoorA-B) is +7.8 °C and 0.4 °C respectively with an average energy monthly savings of 3.9 %.

Methods for implementing Building Information Modeling and Building Performance Simulation approaches

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mondrup, Thomas Fænø

methodologies. Thesis studies showed that BIM approaches have the potential to improve AEC/FM communication and collaboration. BIM is by its nature multidisciplinary, bringing AEC/FM project participants together and creating constant communication. However, BIM adoption can lead to technical challenges......, Engineering, Construction, and Facility Management (AEC/ FM) communication, and (b) BPS as a platform for early-stage building performance prediction. The second is to develop (a) relevant AEC/FM communication support instruments, and (b) standardized BIM and BPS execution guidelines and information exchange......, for example, getting BIM-compatible tools to communicate properly. Furthermore, BIM adoption requires organizational change, that is changes in AEC/FM work practices and interpersonal dynamics. Consequently, to ensure that the adoption of BIM is successful, it is recommended that common IT regulations...

Optimization and Performance Study of Select Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning Technologies for Commercial Buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Kamal, Rajeev

Buildings contribute a significant part to the electricity demand profile and peak demand for the electrical utilities. The addition of renewable energy generation adds additional variability and uncertainty to the power system. Demand side management in the buildings can help improve the demand profile for the utilities by shifting some of the demand from peak to off-peak times. Heating, ventilation and air-conditioning contribute around 45% to the overall demand of a building. This research studies two strategies for reducing the peak as well as shifting some demand from peak to off-peak periods in commercial buildings: 1. Use of gas heat pumps in place of electric heat pumps, and 2. Shifting demand for air conditioning from peak to off-peak by thermal energy storage in chilled water and ice. The first part of this study evaluates the field performance of gas engine-driven heat pumps (GEHP) tested in a commercial building in Florida. Four GEHP units of 8 Tons of Refrigeration (TR) capacity each providing air-conditioning to seven thermal zones in a commercial building, were instrumented for measuring their performance. The operation of these GEHPs was recorded for ten months, analyzed and compared with prior results reported in the literature. The instantaneous COPunit of these systems varied from 0.1 to 1.4 during typical summer week operation. The COP was low because the gas engines for the heat pumps were being used for loads that were much lower than design capacity which resulted in much lower efficiencies than expected. The performance of equivalent electric heat pump was simulated from a building energy model developed to mimic the measured building loads. An economic comparison of GEHPs and conventional electrical heat pumps was done based on the measured and simulated results. The average performance of the GEHP units was estimated to lie between those of EER-9.2 and EER-11.8 systems. The performance of GEHP systems suffers due to lower efficiency at

Relationship between Performance of Quantity Surveying Students in Building Construction and Construction Measurement Courses

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Olatunde Nathaniel Ayinde

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Stakeholders in the educational sector over the century have devoted substantial resources in seeking ways of improving students’ academic performance, yet, the desired improved academic performance has not been achieved. By appraising the relationship between the performance of Quantity Surveying (QS students in Building Construction and Construction Measurement courses; the study identified a major curriculum drafting deficiency in the QS programmes in Nigeria which if addressed could help achieve the much needed improved students’ academic performance. The specific objectives of the study were to determine the performance of QS students in Building construction and construction Measurement Courses; and to determine whether a relationship exist in the performances of QS students in the two subject areas. Purposive sampling technique was used to select Federal Polytechnic Ede, Osun State for the study. Random sampling technique was used to select 241 students who provide data for the study. Close ended questionnaire was used to collect data for the study and data was analyzed using frequency, percentile and correlation analysis. Finding indicates that 43% of the respondents on the average put up good performances in Building Construction Courses while only 19% of the respondents on the average had good grades in Construction Measurement Courses. Results also showed that a significant relationship exist between the performance of QS students in Building Construction and Construction Measurement courses as 83.3% (five out of six pair courses shows significant positive linear correlation. The study recommends that a quick curriculum re-adjustment should be initiated so as to enhance improved academic performance by QS Students especially in Construction Measurement courses.

Studies on high performance Timeslice building on the CBM FLES

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hartmann, Helvi [Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, Goethe University, Frankfurt (Germany); Collaboration: CBM-Collaboration

2015-07-01

In contrast to already existing high energy physics experiments the Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment collects all data untriggered. The First-level Event Selector (FLES), which denotes a high performance computer cluster, processes the very high incoming data rate of 1 TByte/s and performs a full online event reconstruction. For this task it needs to access the raw detector data in time intervals referred to as Timeslices. In order to construct the Timeslices, the FLES Timeslice building has to combine data from all input links and distribute them via a high-performance network to the compute nodes. For fast data transfer the Infiniband network has proven to be appropriate. One option to address the network is using Infiniband (RDMA) Verbs directly and potentially making best use of Infiniband. However, it is a very low-level implementation relying on the hardware and neglecting other possible network technologies in the future. Another approach is to apply a high-level API like MPI which is independent of the underlying hardware and suitable for less error prone software development. I present the given possibilities and show the results of benchmarks ran on high-performance computing clusters. The solutions are evaluated regarding the Timeslice building in CBM.

Calculation of the yearly energy performance of heating systems based on the European Building Energy Directive and related CEN Standards

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Olesen, Bjarne W.; de Carli, Michele

2011-01-01

According to the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) all new European buildings (residential, commercial, industrial, etc.) must since 2006 have an energy declaration based on the calculated energy performance of the building, including heating, ventilating, cooling and lighting syst......–20% of the building energy demand. The additional loss depends on the type of heat emitter, type of control, pump and boiler. Keywords: Heating systems; CEN standards; Energy performance; Calculation methods......According to the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) all new European buildings (residential, commercial, industrial, etc.) must since 2006 have an energy declaration based on the calculated energy performance of the building, including heating, ventilating, cooling and lighting...... systems. This energy declaration must refer to the primary energy or CO2 emissions. The European Organization for Standardization (CEN) has prepared a series of standards for energy performance calculations for buildings and systems. This paper presents related standards for heating systems. The relevant...

Accelerating the energy retrofit of commercial buildings using a database of energy efficiency performance

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lee, Sang Hoon; Hong, Tianzhen; Piette, Mary Ann; Sawaya, Geof; Chen, Yixing; Taylor-Lange, Sarah C.

2015-01-01

Small and medium-sized commercial buildings can be retrofitted to significantly reduce their energy use, however it is a huge challenge as owners usually lack of the expertise and resources to conduct detailed on-site energy audit to identify and evaluate cost-effective energy technologies. This study presents a DEEP (database of energy efficiency performance) that provides a direct resource for quick retrofit analysis of commercial buildings. DEEP, compiled from the results of about ten million EnergyPlus simulations, enables an easy screening of ECMs (energy conservation measures) and retrofit analysis. The simulations utilize prototype models representative of small and mid-size offices and retails in California climates. In the formulation of DEEP, large scale EnergyPlus simulations were conducted on high performance computing clusters to evaluate hundreds of individual and packaged ECMs covering envelope, lighting, heating, ventilation, air-conditioning, plug-loads, and service hot water. The architecture and simulation environment to create DEEP is flexible and can expand to cover additional building types, additional climates, and new ECMs. In this study DEEP is integrated into a web-based retrofit toolkit, the Commercial Building Energy Saver, which provides a platform for energy retrofit decision making by querying DEEP and unearthing recommended ECMs, their estimated energy savings and financial payback. - Highlights: • A DEEP (database of energy efficiency performance) supports building retrofit. • DEEP is an SQL database with pre-simulated results from 10 million EnergyPlus runs. • DEEP covers 7 building types, 6 vintages, 16 climates, and 100 energy measures. • DEEP accelerates retrofit of small commercial buildings to save energy use and cost. • DEEP can be expanded and integrated with third-party energy software tools.

Infiltration rate performance of buildings in the historic centre of Oporto

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alves, S.

2014-09-01

Full Text Available This work is part of a major investigation the authors are undertaking aiming to evaluate the energy performance of different retrofitting strategies for housing buildings, in order to establish preferential criteria of intervention according to its climate zone location, morphology, constructive features and patrimonial values. In the historic centre of Oporto, one of the major actions resides on a significant reduction in the heating loads of these distinctive buildings by decreasing the windows infiltration rate. To be able to accurate this potential for energy savings, in situ measurements of the infiltration rate of this houses at present were required, previous to a possible intervention. This article presents the data obtained using a fan pressurization method in two non-refurbished characteristic buildings of the Oporto’s Historic Centre, and analyses the results obtained for both a typical sash window and a casement window. Some relations between these infiltration rates and the buildings morphological and typological characteristics are considered.Este trabajo forma parte de una investigación mayor que los autores están llevando a cabo y que tiene como objetivo evaluar la eficiencia energética de diferentes estrategias de rehabilitación de edificios de viviendas, con el fin de establecer criterios preferenciales de intervención de acuerdo a la zona climáticas donde se ubica, a la morfología de los edificios, a sus características constructivas y a sus valores patrimoniales. En el centro histórico de Oporto, una de las principales acciones consistiría en la reducción significativa de la demanda de calefacción en los edificios de viviendas que lo caracterizan, mediante la disminución de la tasa de infiltración de las ventanas. Para poder precisar este potencial de ahorro de energía, se requieren mediciones in situ de las tasas de infiltración de las citadas viviendas en su estado actual, previamente a una posible

Identification of Village Building via Google Earth Images and Supervised Machine Learning Methods

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zhiling Guo

2016-03-01

Full Text Available In this study, a method based on supervised machine learning is proposed to identify village buildings from open high-resolution remote sensing images. We select Google Earth (GE RGB images to perform the classification in order to examine its suitability for village mapping, and investigate the feasibility of using machine learning methods to provide automatic classification in such fields. By analyzing the characteristics of GE images, we design different features on the basis of two kinds of supervised machine learning methods for classification: adaptive boosting (AdaBoost and convolutional neural networks (CNN. To recognize village buildings via their color and texture information, the RGB color features and a large number of Haar-like features in a local window are utilized in the AdaBoost method; with multilayer trained networks based on gradient descent algorithms and back propagation, CNN perform the identification by mining deeper information from buildings and their neighborhood. Experimental results from the testing area at Savannakhet province in Laos show that our proposed AdaBoost method achieves an overall accuracy of 96.22% and the CNN method is also competitive with an overall accuracy of 96.30%.

Energy Performance Certification of Faculty Buildings in Spain: The gap between estimated and real energy consumption

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Herrando, María; Cambra, David; Navarro, Marcos; Cruz, Lucio de la; Millán, Gema; Zabalza, Ignacio

2016-01-01

Highlights: • Most of the Faculty Buildings studied are within the average of CO_2 emissions. • Academic and Research buildings have a similar simulated energy consumption. • Several restrictions found in the official Energy Performance Certification tool. • Average deviation of 30% between estimated and real energy consumption. • Electrical equipment and user behaviour notably increase the energy performance gap. - Abstract: A systematic method has been established to perform and analyse in detail the Energy Performance Certification of 21 Faculty Buildings located at the University of Zaragoza (Spain), according to the transposition of Directive 2010/31/EU. First of all, the problem background and a review of the state-of-the-art of the energy certification in buildings is outlined, regarding both the actual state of the Government regulations and the studies undertaken in several countries to assess the energy performance of different types of buildings, residential and non-residential. A summary of the causes found in other studies for the discrepancies between the estimated (by simulation) and actual energy consumption is shown which is afterwards tested and compared with the results found in the present study. Thereafter, the method followed to undertake the buildings’ Energy Performance Certification is explained, and the main results found together with the discussion are detailed, comparing actual vs. estimated energy consumption in the different case studies and proposing reasons for these deviations. The energy consumption breakdown by uses for several buildings is also analysed, and potential improvements for the simulation software are assessed.

A study on building performance analysis for energy retrofit of existing industrial facilities

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gourlis, Georgios; Kovacic, Iva

2016-01-01

Highlights: • Thermal simulation of a historical industrial hall with limited data availability. • Considering waste heat from machinery after measuring production fluctuations. • Test of retrofit alternatives for roof and skylights. • Results indicate a significant reduction in heating energy demand up to 52%. • After retrofit naturally ventilated hall can achieve thermal comfort in summer. - Abstract: Due to the strengthening of regulations and codes on building energy performance, as well as with the application of national legislations regarding energy management and efficiency, existing industrial facilities are using thermal refurbishment and renovation as impetus for increasing their overall energy efficiency. This paper analyzes a building envelope refurbishment for a case study of an existing historical industrial facility. Critical parameters affecting energy performance of industrial buildings were identified by reviewing relevant literate. Two retrofit scenarios were developed and dynamic thermal simulation using EnergyPlus was implemented to evaluate the potential for improvement. Thereby the impact of interior loads was considered, determined by measurements conducted on factory machines, occupancy and lighting operation patterns. However, information regarding constructions of the existing facility and installed technical building services is limited. There is also uncertainty in the quantification of natural ventilation air change rate for such buildings. To overcome these limitations a study of various material databases was carried out, in order to assess data for building envelope composition. Input values for missing data were provided based on literature, allowing a fair comparison between refurbishment alternatives. Simulation results showed that the heating demand of the facility could be reduced up to 52%, indicating a significant potential for energy savings. Beyond that, thermal performance against summer overheating also

Thermal Performance of Typical Residential Building in Karachi with Different Materials for Construction

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nafeesa Shaheen

2016-04-01

Full Text Available This research work deals with a study of a residential building located in climatic context of Karachi with the objective of being the study of thermal performance based upon passive design techniques. The study helps in reducing the electricity consumption by improving indoor temperatures. The existing residential buildings in Karachi were studied with reference to their planning and design, analyzed and evaluated. Different construction?s compositions of buildings were identified, surveyed and analyzed in making of the effective building envelops. Autodesk® Ecotect, 2011 was used to determine indoor comfort conditions and HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air-Conditioning and Cooling loads. The result of the research depicted significant energy savings of 38.5% in HVAC loads with proposed building envelop of locally available materials and glazing.

The thermal performance of earth buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Heathcote, K.

2011-09-01

Full Text Available This paper examines the theoretical basis for the thermal performance of earth walls and links it to some test results on buildings constructed by the author, and to their predicted performance using a sophisticated computer modelling program. The analysis shows that for all earth walls the steady state thermal resistance is low but that for walls greater than about 450 mm thick the cyclic thermal resistance is high and increases exponentially. Whilst the steady state resistance of all thickness walls is low and results in higher than normal average temperatures in summer and lower than normal in winter the ability of thick earth walls to even out the swings in temperature is thought to be responsible for the materials reputation. The paper notes that good passive design principles (such as providing internal thermal mass and large areas of glazing for winter performance will greatly improve the performance of earth buildings with thin walls, but it is the author’s opinion that external earth walls should be at least 450 mm thick to gain the full benefit of thermal mass.

Este artículo examina la base teórica del comportamiento térmico de las paredes de tierra y la relaciona con varios resultados de test realizados sobre edificios construidos por el autor, y con su comportamiento previsto utilizando un sofisticado programa de modelado por ordenador. El análisis muestra que la resistencia térmica constante es baja para todas las paredes de tierra, pero que para muros con un grosor mayor que 450 mm la resistencia térmica cíclica es alta y se incrementa exponencialmente. Mientras que la resistencia térmica constante de las paredes de cualquier grosor es baja y se traduce en temperaturas más altas que la media en verano y más bajas que la media en invierno, la capacidad de las paredes gruesas de tierra para amortiguar las variaciones de temperatura es la responsable de la reputación de los materiales. El artículo señala que los

Implementation of the EU directive on the energy performance of buildings: Development of the Latvian Scheme for energy auditing of buildings and inspection of boilers. Project document

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2005-07-01

'Development of the Latvian Scheme for energy auditing of buildings and inspection of boilers' includes major steps in implementing the EU EPB directive in Latvia. The EPB directive includes a number of efforts: 1. A methodology for calculation of the integrated energy performance of buildings 2. Application of minimum requirements on the energy performance for new buildings 3. Application of minimum requirements on the energy performance for larger existing buildings subject to major renovation 4. Energy performance certification (energy labelling) of buildings 5. Regular inspection of boilers and of air-conditioning systems in buildings, and assessment of heating installations in older systems. The present project includes activities connected to point 4 and point 5. The results will include 4 steps in implementing the EU EPB directive: 1) A Latvian training of certified independent energy auditors to be active conducting energy audits and issuing energy performance certificates. Including a handbook in energy auditing. 2) A Latvian training of certified independent experts for inspection of boilers, air-con systems and assessing older heating systems. Including a handbook in boiler inspection. 3) A proposal for the institutional set-up for a connected scheme for energy auditing and a scheme for boiler inspection 4) Initial information on the scheme of energy auditors and of the boiler inspection. (au)

Balanced Evaluation of Structural and Environmental Performances in Building Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marco Lamperti Tornaghi

2018-03-01

Full Text Available The design of new buildings, and even more the rehabilitation of existing ones, needs to satisfy modern criteria in terms of energy efficiency and environmental performance, within the context of adequate safety requirements. Tackling all these needs at the same time is cumbersome, as demonstrated by several experiences during recent earthquakes, where the improvement of energy performance vanished by seismic-induced damages. The costs of energy retrofitting must be added to the normal losses caused by the earthquake. Even though the minimum safety requirements are met (no collapse, the damage due to earthquake might be enough to waste the investment made to improve energy efficiency. Since these measures are often facilitated by corresponding incentives, the use of public funding is not cost effective. The application of the existing impact assessment methods is typically performed at the end of the architectural and structural design process. Thus, no real optimisation can be achieved, because a good structural solution could correspond to a poor environmental performance and vice versa. The proposed Sustainable Structural Design method (SSD considers both environmental and structural parameters in the life cycle perspective. The integration of environmental data in the structural performance is the focus of the method. Structural performances are considered in a probabilistic approach, through the introduction of a simplified Performance Based Assessment method. Finally, the SSD method is implemented with a case-study of an office-occupancy building, both for precast and cast-in-situ structural systems, with the aim to find the best solution in terms of sustainability and structural performance for the case at hand.

Identification of coordination factors affecting building projects performance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wesam Salah Alaloul

2016-09-01

Full Text Available Construction projects performance requires improvement to fulfil the complexity of the stakeholders’ needs and expectations. Coordination process is proposed as an efficient solution for weak performance of construction projects. Therefore, coordination factors are vital in ensuring a successful implementation of all project phases. This study aimed to identify and prioritise coordination factors that influence the performance of building projects in Malaysian context. A vast body of literature on coordination process was reviewed and resulted in 53 coordination factor. Three rounds of Delphi technique were conducted. The most effective coordination factors were ranked based on the Relative Importance Index (RII such as Scheduling (RII = 0.97, Quality assurance plan (RII = 0.93, and all parties’ participation in plans (RII = 0.89. These coordination factors have fulfilled the research gap and provided better management and higher performance for project parties. The results offer insightful perspectives to define the most effective coordination factors, for addressing the dependency between project tasks and the parties to enhance project performance.

Dynamic energy performance analysis: Case study for energy efficiency retrofits of hospital buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Buonomano, Annamaria; Calise, Francesco; Ferruzzi, Gabriele; Palombo, Adolfo

2014-01-01

This paper investigates several actions for the energy refurbishment of some buildings of the University Hospital Federico II of Naples. The analysis focuses on a specific lot of 4 buildings, representative of the whole district hospital. For those structures, sustainable energy savings actions are investigated. They regard the installation of: i) roofs thermal insulation; ii) a substation climatic 3-way valve; iii) radiators thermostatic valves; iv) AHU (air handling unit) time-programmable regulation. This paper aims at presenting an investigation methodology, useful for designers and other stakeholders involved in hospital energy refurbishments, based on an integrated approach which combines dynamic energy performance simulations and experimental campaigns. In order to measure all the simulations' missing input parameters, a suitable experimental analysis, including measurements of temperature, humidity, flow rate and density of construction materials, is performed. A thermographic investigation is also performed for investigating the building envelope performance. This analysis showed that significant savings can be achieved especially by adopting radiators thermostatic valves and AHU regulations. Coherently, the installation of a 3-way valve in the substation does not determine significant additional savings when radiators thermostatic valves are already installed. For high-rise buildings, roofs insulation returns only marginal reductions of space heating and cooling demands. - Highlights: • Energy saving measures applied to the largest hospital of South Italy are analyzed. • A new approach combining dynamic simulations and measurements is implemented. • Thermography, temperature and flow measurements are performed. • High savings are achieved by adopting thermostatic valves and AHU control systems. • The simplest energy saving actions resulted to be the most profitable ones

Assigning Robust Default Values in Building Performance Simulation Software for Improved Decision-Making in the Initial Stages of Building Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Hiyama, Kyosuke

2015-01-01

Applying data mining techniques on a database of BIM models could provide valuable insights in key design patterns implicitly present in these BIM models. The architectural designer would then be able to use previous data from existing building projects as default values in building performance simulation software for the early phases of building design. The author has proposed the method to minimize the magnitude of the variation in these default values in subsequent design stages. This approach maintains the accuracy of the simulation results in the initial stages of building design. In this study, a more convincing argument is presented to demonstrate the significance of the new method. The variation in the ideal default values for different building design conditions is assessed first. Next, the influence of each condition on these variations is investigated. The space depth is found to have a large impact on the ideal default value of the window to wall ratio. In addition, the presence or absence of lighting control and natural ventilation has a significant influence on the ideal default value. These effects can be used to identify the types of building conditions that should be considered to determine the ideal default values.

Thermal performance of air-conditioned office buildings constructed with inclined walls in different climates in China

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chan, A.L.S.; Chow, T.T.

2014-01-01

Highlights: • A generic fully air-conditioned office building with inclined walls was modeled. • Simulations were run under climatic conditions in three modern cities in China. • Reduction in cooling load can outweigh the increase in heating load for Hong Kong. • Inclined angle of 30° is appropriate for inverted pyramidal building in Hong Kong. • Building constructed with inclined walls is not encouraged in Shanghai and Beijing. - Abstract: An inverted pyramidal building is built with inclined walls instead of the traditional vertical façades. In terms of thermal performance, an inverted pyramidal building can provide a self-shading effect against the beam solar radiation, leading to a reduction in solar heat gain as well as building cooling load. On the other hand, the heating requirement of an inverted pyramidal building will be increased in winter. There is a strong dependency of building performance on the climatic condition. In this study, a generic air-conditioned office building with inclined walls set at different inclination angles was modeled using a building energy simulation program. Computer simulations were run to assess the thermal performance of the building constructed with inclined walls under different climatic conditions in three modern cities in China–Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing. The results reveal that for the building cases with inclined walls set at different inclination angles in subtropical Hong Kong, the saving in annual cooling load ranges from 0.6% to 10.9% and can outweigh the increase in heating load. Moreover, an inclination angle of 30° was found as a better design option for an inverted pyramidal building with symmetrical layout design under the climatic condition in Hong Kong. For the other two cities: Shanghai and Beijing, the saving in cooling load due to self-shading effect cannot offset the increased heating requirement. Design and construction of an inverted pyramidal building is not encouraged in these two

Performance investigation of heat insulation solar glass for low-carbon buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cuce, Erdem; Young, Chin-Huai; Riffat, Saffa B.

2014-01-01

Highlights: • U-value of HISG is found to be 1.10 W/m 2 K. • Maximum temperature difference is achieved by HISG with 12.70 °C. • HISG provides two times better insulation than standard double glazed windows. • HISG generates over 40 W electricity from a glazing surface of 0.66 m 2 . • 100% of UV in incoming solar radiation is absorbed by HISG. - Abstract: Heat insulation solar glass (HISG), which has been recently developed by Professor Chin-Huai Young in Taiwan is an extraordinary glazing technology for low/zero carbon buildings. HISG differs from traditional glazing technologies with its ability of producing electricity. It also offers some additional features such as thermal insulation, sound insulation, self-cleaning and energy saving. In this work, thermal insulation, power generation and optical performance of HISG are experimentally investigated. Thermal insulation performance of HISG is analysed through standardized co-heating test methodology, and the results are compared with different traditional double glazed window samples. For the power generation and optical performance of HISG, two samples (air filled HISG and Argon filled HISG) are experimentally investigated in real and simulated operating conditions. The results indicate that both configurations show similar performance in terms of power generation. Under a solar intensity of 850 W/m 2 , over 40 W electrical power is achieved from HISG samples with a glazing area of 0.66 m 2 . Performance of samples under solar simulator is not found to be promising due to the absence of UV and IR parts in the artificial light source. In terms of thermal insulation ability, HISG is also found to be attractive. The average U-value of HISG is determined to be 1.10 W/m 2 K, which is two times better than standard double glazed windows. Some simulation results for two different cities (Taipei, Taiwan and Nottingham, UK) demonstrating the energy saving potential of HISG are also presented

Energy policy for integrating the building environmental performance model of an air conditioned building in a subtropical climate

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Mui, K.W.

2006-01-01

For an air conditioned building, the major electricity consumption is by the heating, and air conditioning (HVAC) system. As energy saving strategies may be in conflict with the criteria of indoor air quality and thermal comfort, a concept of the building environmental performance model (BEPM) has been developed to optimize energy consumption in HVAC systems without any deterioration of the indoor air quality and thermal comfort. The BEPM is divided into two main modules: the adaptive comfort temperature (ACT) module and the new demand control ventilation (nDCV) module. This study aims to enhance and prompt the conventional operation of the air side systems by incorporating temperature reset with the adaptive comfort temperature control and the new demand control ventilation system in high rise buildings in Hong Kong. A new example weather year (1991) was established as a reference to compute the energy use of HVAC systems in buildings in order to obtain more representative data for predicting annual energy consumption. A survey of 165 Hong Kong office buildings was conducted and it provided valuable information on the existing HVAC design values in different grades of private commercial buildings in Hong Kong. It was found that the actual measured values of indoor temperature were lower than the design ones. Furthermore, with the new example weather year and the integration of the BEPM into Grade A private office buildings in Hong Kong, the total energy saving of the air conditioning systems was calculated (i.e. a saving of HK$122 million in electrical consumption per year) while the thermal comfort for the occupants was also maintained

Archaeomagnetic Study performed on Early Medieval Buildings from western France

Science.gov (United States)

Chauvin, A.; Lanos, P.; Dufresne, P.; Blain, S.; Guibert, P.; Oberlin, C.; Sapin, C.

2009-05-01

A multiple dating study, involving a collaboration between specialists of dating techniques (thermoluminescence (TL) and radiocarbon), historians of art and archaeologists, has been carried out on several early medieval buildings from western France. The early medieval period is not well known especially in France where there is a lack of visible evidence that identifies pre-Romanesque architecture. The majority of buildings to have survived from this period are religious ones, considered important enough to be made of strong, non-perishable material such as stone or brick, as for example the churches of Notre-Dame-sous- Terre in the Mont-Saint-Michel or St Martin in Angers. Due to their significance in architectural history, it is imperative to position them accurately in the chronology of the history of art. Bricks are often used to build up round-headed arches or to reinforce the frame of a wall with bonding courses in those churches. TL dating and archeomagnetic analysis were performed on cores drilled within bricks while radiocarbon dating were undertaken on coals found within mortars. In order to increase the number of data during the early Middle Ages, archeointensity determinations using the classical Thellier technique with anisotropy of thermal remanence and cooling rate corrections were performed. Archaeomagnetic directions were used to recognize the firing position of bricsk during manufacture. Reliable and precise ages were obtained on the church Notre-Dame-sous-Terre; they indicate two phases of building in 950±50AD and 990±50AD. Mean archeointensities obtained on 17 (21) samples from the first (second) phases appears very closed 69.1±1.2 and 68.3±1.6 microTesla. Ages and archeomagnetic results obtained on 4 other sites will be presented and compared to the available data in western Europe.

Numerical methods for optimizing the performance of buildings

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pedersen, Frank

2008-01-01

The many different parties that influence design and control decisions for buildings, such as building owners, users, architects, consulting engineers, contractors, etx. may have different and to some extent conradicting requirements to buildings. Furthermore, national building regulations specif...

Hazardous Waste/Mixed Waste Treatment Building Safety Information Document (SID)

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fatell, L.B.; Woolsey, G.B.

1993-01-01

This Safety Information Document (SID) provides a description and analysis of operations for the Hazardous Waste/Mixed Waste Disposal Facility Treatment Building (the Treatment Building). The Treatment Building has been classified as a moderate hazard facility, and the level of analysis performed and the methodology used are based on that classification. Preliminary design of the Treatment Building has identified the need for two separate buildings for waste treatment processes. The term Treatment Building applies to all these facilities. The evaluation of safety for the Treatment Building is accomplished in part by the identification of hazards associated with the facility and the analysis of the facility's response to postulated events involving those hazards. The events are analyzed in terms of the facility features that minimize the causes of such events, the quantitative determination of the consequences, and the ability of the facility to cope with each event should it occur. The SID presents the methodology, assumptions, and results of the systematic evaluation of hazards associated with operation of the Treatment Building. The SID also addresses the spectrum of postulated credible events, involving those hazards, that could occur. Facility features important to safety are identified and discussed in the SID. The SID identifies hazards and reports the analysis of the spectrum of credible postulated events that can result in the following consequences: Personnel exposure to radiation; Radioactive material release to the environment; Personnel exposure to hazardous chemicals; Hazardous chemical release to the environment; Events leading to an onsite/offsite fatality; and Significant damage to government property. The SID addresses the consequences to the onsite and offsite populations resulting from postulated credible events and the safety features in place to control and mitigate the consequences

Hazardous Waste/Mixed Waste Treatment Building Safety Information Document (SID)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fatell, L.B.; Woolsey, G.B.

1993-04-15

This Safety Information Document (SID) provides a description and analysis of operations for the Hazardous Waste/Mixed Waste Disposal Facility Treatment Building (the Treatment Building). The Treatment Building has been classified as a moderate hazard facility, and the level of analysis performed and the methodology used are based on that classification. Preliminary design of the Treatment Building has identified the need for two separate buildings for waste treatment processes. The term Treatment Building applies to all these facilities. The evaluation of safety for the Treatment Building is accomplished in part by the identification of hazards associated with the facility and the analysis of the facility`s response to postulated events involving those hazards. The events are analyzed in terms of the facility features that minimize the causes of such events, the quantitative determination of the consequences, and the ability of the facility to cope with each event should it occur. The SID presents the methodology, assumptions, and results of the systematic evaluation of hazards associated with operation of the Treatment Building. The SID also addresses the spectrum of postulated credible events, involving those hazards, that could occur. Facility features important to safety are identified and discussed in the SID. The SID identifies hazards and reports the analysis of the spectrum of credible postulated events that can result in the following consequences: Personnel exposure to radiation; Radioactive material release to the environment; Personnel exposure to hazardous chemicals; Hazardous chemical release to the environment; Events leading to an onsite/offsite fatality; and Significant damage to government property. The SID addresses the consequences to the onsite and offsite populations resulting from postulated credible events and the safety features in place to control and mitigate the consequences.

Integrated cost estimation methodology to support high-performance building design

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Vaidya, Prasad; Greden, Lara; Eijadi, David; McDougall, Tom [The Weidt Group, Minnetonka (United States); Cole, Ray [Axiom Engineers, Monterey (United States)

2007-07-01

Design teams evaluating the performance of energy conservation measures (ECMs) calculate energy savings rigorously with established modelling protocols, accounting for the interaction between various measures. However, incremental cost calculations do not have a similar rigor. Often there is no recognition of cost reductions with integrated design, nor is there assessment of cost interactions amongst measures. This lack of rigor feeds the notion that high-performance buildings cost more, creating a barrier for design teams pursuing aggressive high-performance outcomes. This study proposes an alternative integrated methodology to arrive at a lower perceived incremental cost for improved energy performance. The methodology is based on the use of energy simulations as means towards integrated design and cost estimation. Various points along the spectrum of integration are identified and characterized by the amount of design effort invested, the scheduling of effort, and relative energy performance of the resultant design. It includes a study of the interactions between building system parameters as they relate to capital costs. Several cost interactions amongst energy measures are found to be significant.The value of this approach is demonstrated with alternatives in a case study that shows the differences between perceived costs for energy measures along various points on the integration spectrum. These alternatives show design tradeoffs and identify how decisions would have been different with a standard costing approach. Areas of further research to make the methodology more robust are identified. Policy measures to encourage the integrated approach and reduce the barriers towards improved energy performance are discussed.

Local health rules and building regulations: a survey on local hygiene and building regulations in Italian municipalities.

Science.gov (United States)

Gola, Marco; Signorelli, Carlo; Buffoli, Maddalena; Rebecchi, Andrea; Capolongo, Stefano

2017-01-01

WHO has highlighted the need to strengthen the relationship between health and built environment factors, such as inappropriate housing conditions. Local Health Rules (LHRs) and Building Regulations (BRs) are tools which provide safety and building hygiene in construction practices. Currently the Italian Government is considering to establish a National Building Regulation and, related to the following purpose, this paper presents a survey on the status of adoption and updating of LHRs and BRs in Italian municipalities. The current Italian state of LHRs, BRs and Municipal Development Plans (MDPs) have been examined by a survey considering a sample of about 550 cities, with different demo graphic and geographic features, starting from the previous research work by Signorelli et al. (1999). The analysis underlines a serious shortage of updated LHRs, especially in small and medium-sized municipalities whereas BRs and MDPs are widespread. Only 30% of them are previously approved and validated by Local Health Authorities. Starting from a survey, the present scenario of Building Regulations requires the introduction of further performance guidelines instead of normative ones and, therefore, the current actions to give rise to a National Building Regulation could be integrated by building hygiene contents of LHRs.

The potential of net zero energy buildings (NZEBs) concept at design stage for healthcare buildings towards sustainable development

Science.gov (United States)

Hazli Abdellah, Roy; Asrul Nasid Masrom, Md; Chen, Goh Kai; Mohamed, Sulzakimin; Omar, Roshartini

2017-11-01

The focus on net-zero energy buildings (NZEBs) has been widely analysed and discussed particularly when European Union Parliament are progressively moving towards regulation that promotes the improvement of energy efficiency (EE). Additionally, it also to reduce energy consumption through the recast of the EU Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings (EPBD) in which all new buildings to be “nearly Zero-Energy” Buildings by 2020. Broadly, there is a growing trend to explore the feasibility of net zero energy in healthcare sector as the level energy consumption for healthcare sector is found significantly high. Besides that, healthcare buildings energy consumption also exceeds of many other nondomestic building types, and this shortcoming is still undetermined yet especially for developing countries. This paper aims to review the potential of NZEBs in healthcare buildings by considering its concept in design features. Data are gathered through a comprehensive energy management literature review from previous studies. The review is vital to encourage construction players to increase their awareness, practices, and implementation of NZEBs in healthcare buildings. It suggests that NZEBs concept has a potential to be adapted in healthcare buildings through emphasizing of passive approach as well as the utilization of energy efficiency systems and renewable energy systems in buildings. This paper will provide a basis knowledge for construction key players mainly architects to promote NZEBs concept at design stage for healthcare buildings development.

Technological features of installation of transformable low-rise buildings from sandwich panels

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pleshivtsev Aleksandr Aleksandrovich

2018-04-01

Full Text Available Subject of research: organizational and technological solutions are considered in the construction of transformable low-rise residential buildings using sandwich panels. Aims: rational choice of organizational and technological solutions for the rhythmic construction of the underground and above-ground part of the transformable low-rise buildings in order to reduce labor costs and construction time. Materials and methods: methods of computer modeling of the technological processes are used to determine the duration of the construction of the low-rise buildings. Results: rational methods for erecting a complex of transformable low-rise buildings are defined, parameters of technological processes are established, an analysis of technological operations is provided for the construction of transformable low-rise residential buildings using sandwich panels. Conclusions: now organizational and technological solutions for the construction of transformable low-rise residential buildings with the use of sandwich panels reduce labour costs, increase the construction pace and as well as the using of improved technological processes in the construction of such buildings leads to a reduction in construction time.

Performance of Single Friction Pendulum bearing for isolated buildings subjected to seismic actions in Vietnam

Science.gov (United States)

Nguyen, N. V.; Nguyen, C. H.; Hoang, H. P.; Huong, K. T.

2018-04-01

Using structural control technology in earthquake resistant design of buildings in Vietnam is very limited. In this paper, a performance evaluation of using Single Friction Pendulum (SFP) bearing for seismically isolated buildings with earthquake conditions in Vietnam is presented. A two-dimensional (2-D) model of the 5-storey building subjected to earthquakes is analyzed in time domain. Accordingly, the model is analyzed for 2 cases: with and without SFP bearing. The ground acceleration data is selected and scaled to suit the design acceleration in Hanoi followed by the Standard TCVN 9386:2012. It is shown that the seismically isolated buildings gets the performance objectives while achieving an 91% reduction in the base shear, a significant decrease in the inter-story drift and absolute acceleration of each story.

Replicating distinctive facial features in lineups: identification performance in young versus older adults.

Science.gov (United States)

Badham, Stephen P; Wade, Kimberley A; Watts, Hannah J E; Woods, Natalie G; Maylor, Elizabeth A

2013-04-01

Criminal suspects with distinctive facial features, such as tattoos or bruising, may stand out in a police lineup. To prevent suspects from being unfairly identified on the basis of their distinctive feature, the police often manipulate lineup images to ensure that all of the members appear similar. Recent research shows that replicating a distinctive feature across lineup members enhances eyewitness identification performance, relative to removing that feature on the target. In line with this finding, the present study demonstrated that with young adults (n = 60; mean age = 20), replication resulted in more target identifications than did removal in target-present lineups and that replication did not impair performance, relative to removal, in target-absent lineups. Older adults (n = 90; mean age = 74) performed significantly worse than young adults, identifying fewer targets and more foils; moreover, older adults showed a minimal benefit from replication over removal. This pattern is consistent with the associative deficit hypothesis of aging, such that older adults form weaker links between faces and their distinctive features. Although replication did not produce much benefit over removal for older adults, it was not detrimental to their performance. Therefore, the results suggest that replication may not be as beneficial to older adults as it is to young adults and demonstrate a new practical implication of age-related associative deficits in memory.

An Adaptive Intelligent Integrated Lighting Control Approach for High-Performance Office Buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Karizi, Nasim

An acute and crucial societal problem is the energy consumed in existing commercial buildings. There are 1.5 million commercial buildings in the U.S. with only about 3% being built each year. Hence, existing buildings need to be properly operated and maintained for several decades. Application of integrated centralized control systems in buildings could lead to more than 50% energy savings. This research work demonstrates an innovative adaptive integrated lighting control approach which could achieve significant energy savings and increase indoor comfort in high performance office buildings. In the first phase of the study, a predictive algorithm was developed and validated through experiments in an actual test room. The objective was to regulate daylight on a specified work plane by controlling the blind slat angles. Furthermore, a sensor-based integrated adaptive lighting controller was designed in Simulink which included an innovative sensor optimization approach based on genetic algorithm to minimize the number of sensors and efficiently place them in the office. The controller was designed based on simple integral controllers. The objective of developed control algorithm was to improve the illuminance situation in the office through controlling the daylight and electrical lighting. To evaluate the performance of the system, the controller was applied on experimental office model in Lee et al.'s research study in 1998. The result of the developed control approach indicate a significantly improvement in lighting situation and 1-23% and 50-78% monthly electrical energy savings in the office model, compared to two static strategies when the blinds were left open and closed during the whole year respectively.

Overcoming barriers to high performance seismic design using lessons learned from the green building industry

Science.gov (United States)

Glezil, Dorothy

NEHRP's Provisions today currently governing conventional seismic resistant design. These provisions, though they ensure the life-safety of building occupants, extensive damage and economic losses may still occur in the structures. This minimum performance can be enhanced using the Performance-Based Earthquake Engineering methodology and passive control systems like base isolation and energy dissipation systems. Even though these technologies and the PBEE methodology are effective reducing economic losses and fatalities during earthquakes, getting them implemented into seismic resistant design has been challenging. One of the many barriers to their implementation has been their upfront costs. The green building community has faced some of the same challenges that the high performance seismic design community currently faces. The goal of this thesis is to draw on the success of the green building industry to provide recommendations that may be used overcome the barriers that high performance seismic design (HPSD) is currently facing.

Construction products performances and basic requirements for fire safety of facades in energy rehabilitation of buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Laban Mirjana Đ.

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Construction product means any product or kit which is produced and placed on the market for incorporation in a permanent manner in construction works, or parts thereof, and the performance of which has an effect on the performance of the construction works with respect to the basic requirements for construction works. Safety in case of fire and Energy economy and heat retention represent two among seven basic requirements which building has to meet according to contemporary technical rules on planning and construction. Performances of external walls building materials (particularly reaction to fire could significantly affect to fire spread on the façade and other building parts. Therefore, façade shaping and materialization in building renewal process, has to meet the fire safety requirement, as well as the energy requirement. Brief survey of fire protection regulations development in Serbia is presented in the paper. Preventive measures for fire risk reduction in building façade energy renewal are proposed according to contemporary fire safety requirements.

Building Information Modeling (BIM) for Indoor Environmental Performance Analysis

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

The report is a part of a research assignment carried out by students in the 5ETCS course “Project Byggeri – [entitled as: Building Information Modeling (BIM) – Modeling & Analysis]”, during the 3rd semester of master degree in Civil and Architectural Engineering, Department of Engineering, Aarhus...... University. This includes seven papers describing BIM for Sustainability, concentrating specifically on individual topics regarding to Indoor Environment Performance Analysis....

Real estate market and building energy performance: Data for a mass appraisal approach

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pietro Bonifaci

2015-12-01

Data are related to the analysis performed in Bonifaci and Copiello [1], about the relationship between house prices and building energy performance, that is to say, the willingness to pay in order to benefit from more efficient dwellings.

Observations of Building Performance under Combined Wind and Surge Loading from Hurricane Harvey

Science.gov (United States)

Lombardo, F.; Roueche, D. B.; Krupar, R. J.; Smith, D. J.; Soto, M. G.

2017-12-01

Hurricane Harvey struck the Texas coastline on August 25, 2017, as a Category 4 hurricane - the first major hurricane to reach the US in twelve years. Wind gusts over 130 mph and storm surge as high as 12.5 ft caused widespread damage to buildings and critical infrastructure in coastal communities including Rockport, Fulton, Port Aransas and Aransas Pass. This study presents the methodology and preliminary observations of a coordinated response effort to document residential building performance under wind and storm surge loading. Over a twelve day survey period the study team assessed the performance of more than 1,000 individual, geo-located residential buildings. Assessments were logged via a smartphone application to facilitate rapid collection and collation of geotagged photographs, building attributes and structural details, and structural damage observations. Detailed assessments were also made of hazard intensity, specifically storm surge heights and both wind speed and direction indicators. Preliminary observations and findings will be presented, showing strong gradients in damage between inland and coastal regions of the affected areas that may be due in part to enhanced individual loading effects of wind and storm surge and potentially joint-hazard loading effects. Contributing factors to the many cases of disproportionate damage observed in close proximity will also be discussed. Ongoing efforts to relate building damage to near-surface hazard measurements (e.g., radar, anemometry) in close proximity will also be described.

A Review of Influence of Various Types of Structural Bracing to the Structural Performance of Buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Razak, S. M.; Kong, T. C.; Zainol, N. Z.; Adnan, A.; Azimi, M.

2018-03-01

Excessive lateral drift can contribute significantly towards crack formation, leading to structural damage. The structural damage will in turn reduce the capacity of the structure and weaken it from the intended design capacity. Generally, lateral drift is more pronounced in higher and longer structure, such as high rise buildings and bridges. A typical method employed to control lateral drift is structural bracing, which works by increasing stiffness and stability of structure. This paper reviews the influence of various types of structural bracing to structural performance of buildings. The history of structural bracing is visited and the differences between numerous structural bracing in term of suitability to different types of buildings and loading, mechanisms, technical details, advantages and limitations, and the overall effect on the structural behaviour and performance are dissected. Proper and efficient structural bracing is pertinent for each high rise building as this will lead towards safer, sustainable and more economical buildings, which are cheaper to maintain throughout the life of the buildings in the future.

Improvement of energy performances of existing buildings by application of solar thermal systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Krstić-Furundžić Aleksandra

2009-01-01

Full Text Available Improvement of energy performances of the existing buildings in the suburban settlement Konjarnik in Belgrade, by the application of solar thermal systems is the topic presented in this paper. Hypothetical models of building improvements are created to allow the benefits of applying solar thermal collectors to residential buildings in Belgrade climate conditions to be estimated. This case study presents different design variants of solar thermal collectors integrated into a multifamily building envelope. The following aspects of solar thermal systems integration are analyzed in the paper: energy, architectural, ecological and economic. The results show that in Belgrade climatic conditions significant energy savings and reduction of CO2 emissions can be obtained with the application of solar thermal collectors.

Moisture performance of building materials: From material characterization to building simulation using the Moisture Buffer Value concept

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Abadie, Marc Olivier [Mechanical Engineering Graduate Program, Pontifical Catholic University of Parana, PUC-PR/CCET, Curitiba, PR 80215-901 (Brazil); LEPTAB, University of La Rochelle, La Rochelle, 17042 Cedex 1 (France); Mendonca, Katia Cordeiro [Mechanical Engineering Graduate Program, Pontifical Catholic University of Parana, PUC-PR/CCET, Curitiba, PR 80215-901 (Brazil)

2009-02-15

Predicting the indoor air relative humidity evolution is of great importance to evaluate people thermal comfort, perceived air quality and energy consumption. In building environments, porous materials of the envelope and furniture act on the indoor air humidity by reducing its variations. Solving the physical processes involved inside the porous materials requires the knowledge of the material hygrothermal properties that needs multiple and, for some of them, time-consuming experimental procedures. Recently, both the NORDTEST Project and Japanese Industrial Standard described a new Moisture Buffer Capacity index that accounts for surrounding air vapor concentration variation. The Moisture Buffer Value (MBV) indicates the amount of water vapor that is transported in or out of a material, during a certain period of time, when the vapor concentration of the surrounding air varies. The MBV evaluation requires only one experimental procedure and its value permits a direct comparison of the building materials moisture performance. However, two limitations can be distinguished: first, no relation between the MBV and the usual material hygrothermal properties has been clearly identified and second, no model has been proposed to actually use the MBV in building simulation. The present study aims to solve these two problems. First, the MBV fundamentals are introduced and discussed; followed by its relation with the usual material properties. Then, a lumped model for building simulation, whose parameters can be determined from the MBV experimental procedure, is described. To finish, examples of the use of this MBV-based lumped model for moisture prediction in buildings are presented. (author)

The building blocks of a 'Liveable Neighbourhood': Identifying the key performance indicators for walking of an operational planning policy in Perth, Western Australia.

Science.gov (United States)

Hooper, Paula; Knuiman, Matthew; Foster, Sarah; Giles-Corti, Billie

2015-11-01

Planning policy makers are requesting clearer guidance on the key design features required to build neighbourhoods that promote active living. Using a backwards stepwise elimination procedure (logistic regression with generalised estimating equations adjusting for demographic characteristics, self-selection factors, stage of construction and scale of development) this study identified specific design features (n=16) from an operational planning policy ("Liveable Neighbourhoods") that showed the strongest associations with walking behaviours (measured using the Neighbourhood Physical Activity Questionnaire). The interacting effects of design features on walking behaviours were also investigated. The urban design features identified were grouped into the "building blocks of a Liveable Neighbourhood", reflecting the scale, importance and sequencing of the design and implementation phases required to create walkable, pedestrian friendly developments. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Application of 6D Building Information Model (6D BIM) for Business-storage Building in Slovenia

Science.gov (United States)

Pučko, Zoran; Vincek, Dražen; Štrukelj, Andrej; Šuman, Nataša

2017-10-01

The aim of this paper is to present an application of 6D building information modelling (6D BIM) on a real business-storage building in Slovenia. First, features of building maintenance in general are described according to the current Slovenian legislation, and also a general principle of BIM is given. After that, step-by-step activities for modelling 6D BIM are exposed, namely from Element list for maintenance, determination of their lifetime and service measures, cost analysing and time analysing to 6D BIM modelling. The presented 6D BIM model is designed in a unique way in which cost analysis is performed as 5D BIM model with linked data to use BIM Construction Project Management Software (Vico Office), integrated with 3D BIM model, whereas time analysis as 4D BIM model is carried out as non-linked data with the help of Excel (without connection to 3D BIM model). The paper is intended to serve as a guide to the building owners to prepare 6D BIM and to provide an insight into the relevant dynamic information about intervals and costs for execution of maintenance works in the whole building lifecycle.

Assigning Robust Default Values in Building Performance Simulation Software for Improved Decision-Making in the Initial Stages of Building Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kyosuke Hiyama

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Applying data mining techniques on a database of BIM models could provide valuable insights in key design patterns implicitly present in these BIM models. The architectural designer would then be able to use previous data from existing building projects as default values in building performance simulation software for the early phases of building design. The author has proposed the method to minimize the magnitude of the variation in these default values in subsequent design stages. This approach maintains the accuracy of the simulation results in the initial stages of building design. In this study, a more convincing argument is presented to demonstrate the significance of the new method. The variation in the ideal default values for different building design conditions is assessed first. Next, the influence of each condition on these variations is investigated. The space depth is found to have a large impact on the ideal default value of the window to wall ratio. In addition, the presence or absence of lighting control and natural ventilation has a significant influence on the ideal default value. These effects can be used to identify the types of building conditions that should be considered to determine the ideal default values.

Commissioning of building HVAC systems for improvement of energy performance; Commissioning of building HVAC systems for improvement of energy performance. Teilnahme IEA-ECBCS Annex 40 (Betreiberkompetenz)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chuard, J -M

2005-06-15

This paper takes a look at the tasks performed in Task 40 of the 'Energy Conservation in Buildings and Community Systems ECBCS' programme of the International Energy Agency IEA that is taking a look at the commissioning of building HVAC systems with the aim of improving the energy performance of such systems. Emphasis is put on the Swiss contribution to the task. This well-illustrated paper presents information on the structure of the task, time-lines and a diagram for its implementation structures. Also, the countries participating in Task 40 and their representatives are listed, and various work already published by the annex is noted. The paper places a focus on operator competence and lists points to be taken into account when carrying out work on optimising energy consumption. The various processes involved are noted and discussed. Management guidelines are presented and economical and market aspects are discussed. Finally, projects that will continue the work are noted.

Commissioning of building HVAC systems for improvement of energy performance; Commissioning of building HVAC systems for improvement of energy performance. Teilnahme IEA-ECBCS Annex 40 (Betreiberkompetenz)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chuard, J.-M.

2005-06-15

This paper takes a look at the tasks performed in Task 40 of the 'Energy Conservation in Buildings and Community Systems ECBCS' programme of the International Energy Agency IEA that is taking a look at the commissioning of building HVAC systems with the aim of improving the energy performance of such systems. Emphasis is put on the Swiss contribution to the task. This well-illustrated paper presents information on the structure of the task, time-lines and a diagram for its implementation structures. Also, the countries participating in Task 40 and their representatives are listed, and various work already published by the annex is noted. The paper places a focus on operator competence and lists points to be taken into account when carrying out work on optimising energy consumption. The various processes involved are noted and discussed. Management guidelines are presented and economical and market aspects are discussed. Finally, projects that will continue the work are noted.

Occupant performance and building energy consumption with different philosophies of determining acceptable thermal conditions

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Toftum, Jørn; Andersen, Rune Vinther; Jensen, Kasper Lynge

2009-01-01

Based on building energy and indoor environment simulations, this study uses a recently developed method relying on Bayesian Network theory to estimate and compare the consequences for occupant performance and energy consumption of applying temperature criteria set according to the adaptive model...... configurations, especially in the tropical climate, the estimated performance differed only modestly between configurations. However, energy consumption was always lower in buildings without mechanical cooling, particularly so in the tropical climate. The findings indicate that determining acceptable indoor...... thermal environments with the adaptive comfort model may result in significant energy savings and at the same time will not have large consequences for the mental performance of occupants....

BARRIER DESIGN STRATEGIES TO CONTROL NOISE INGRESS INTO DOMESTIC BUILDINGS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Christina E. Mediastika

2003-01-01

Full Text Available Noise source for buildings adjacent to streets is traffic-generated predominantly. Where people are mostly spend their time indoors, it is important for buildings to have screening or blocking to control noise intrusion into living spaces. But this blocking should also permit airflow. This is important for middle to low-cost domestic buildings, which do not employ conditioned ventilation. A common feature of Indonesian buildings, fence, is studied to perform noise barrier. The fence -a barrier to be- should obey three factors: position, dimension, and material. All these three factors were studied to seek compromised design for acoustic performance and natural ventilation purpose. Domestic building situated in the urban area of Yogyakarta was studying to see the most possible design of the barrier to be. There are two calculation methods employed to investigate the proposed design. The study shows that it is possible to gain minimum of 10 dB noise reduction by placing windows within the shadow effect of approximately 1.5 height fence-barrier.

Building Integrated Active Flow Control: Improving the Aerodynamic Performance of Tall Buildings Using Fluid-Based Aerodynamic Modification

Science.gov (United States)

Menicovich, David

By 2050 an estimated 9 billion people will inhabit planet earth and almost all the growth in the next 40 years will be in urban areas putting tremendous pressure on creating sustainable cities. The rapid increase in population, rise in land value and decrease in plot sizes in cities around the world positions tall or more importantly slender buildings as the best suited building typology to address the increasingly critical demand for space in this pressing urbanization trend. However, the majority of new tall building urban developments have not followed principles of environmental and/or sustainable design and incentives to innovate, both technological and economic, are urgently required. The biggest climatic challenge to the design, construction and performance of tall buildings is wind sensitivity. This challenge is further emphasized seeing two market driven trends: on one hand as urban population grows, land value rises while plot sizes decrease; on the other, more cost effective modular construction techniques are introducing much lighter tall building structures. The combination of the two suggests a potential increase in the slenderness ratio of tall buildings (typically less than 6:1 but stretching to 20:1 in the near future) where not-so-tall but much lighter buildings will be the bulk of new construction in densely populated cities, providing affordable housing in the face of fast urbanization but also introducing wind sensitivity which was previously the problem of a very limited number of super tall buildings to a much larger number of buildings and communities. The proposed research aims to investigate a novel approach to the interaction between tall buildings and their environment. Through this approach the research proposes a new relationship between buildings and the flows around, through and inside them, where buildings could adapt to better control and manage the air flow around them, and consequently produce significant opportunities to reduce

Energy retrofit of an office building by substitution of the generation system: performance evaluation via dynamic simulation versus current technical standards

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Testi, D; Schito, E; Grassi, W; Menchetti, E

2014-01-01

Constructions built in Italy before 1945 (about 30% of the total built stock) feature low energy efficiency. Retrofit actions in this field can lead to valuable energetic and economic savings. In this work, we ran a dynamic simulation of a historical building of the University of Pisa during the heating season. We firstly evaluated the energy requirements of the building and the performance of the existing natural gas boiler, validated with past billings of natural gas. We also verified the energetic savings obtainable by the substitution of the boiler with an air-to-water electrically-driven modulating heat pump, simulated through a cycle-based model, evaluating the main economic metrics. The cycle-based model of the heat pump, validated with manufacturers' data available only at specified temperature and load conditions, can provide more accurate results than the simplified models adopted by current technical standards, thus increasing the effectiveness of energy audits

Thermal mass impact on energy performance of a low, medium and heavy mass building in Belgrade

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anđelković Bojan V.

2012-01-01

Full Text Available Heavy mass materials used in building structures and architecture can significantly affect building energy performance and occupant comfort. The purpose of this study was to investigate if thermal mass can improve the internal environment of a building, resulting in lower energy requirements from the mechanical systems. The study was focused on passive building energy performance and compared annual space heating and cooling energy requirements for an office building in Belgrade with several different applications of thermal mass. A three-dimensional building model was generated to represent a typical office building. Building shape, orientation, glazing to wall ratio, envelope insulation thickness, and indoor design conditions were held constant while location and thickness of building mass (concrete was varied between cases in a series of energy simulations. The results were compared and discussed in terms of the building space heating and cooling energy and demand affected by thermal mass. The simulation results indicated that with addition of thermal mass to the building envelope and structure: 100% of all simulated cases experienced reduced annual space heating energy requirements, 67% of all simulated cases experienced reduced annual space cooling energy requirements, 83% of all simulated cases experienced reduced peak space heating demand and 50% of all simulated cases experienced reduced peak space cooling demand. The study demonstrated that there exists a potential for reducing space heating and cooling energy requirements with heavy mass construction in the analyzed climate region (Belgrade, Serbia.

Influence of minor geometric features on Stirling pulse tube cryocooler performance

Science.gov (United States)

Fang, T.; Spoor, P. S.; Ghiaasiaan, S. M.; Perrella, M.

2017-12-01

Minor geometric features and imperfections are commonly introduced into the basic design of multi-component systems to simplify or reduce the manufacturing expense. In this work, the cooling performance of a Stirling type cryocooler was tested in different driving powers, cold-end temperatures and inclination angles. A series of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations based on a prototypical cold tip was carried out. Detailed CFD model predictions were compared with the experiment and were used to investigate the impact of such apparently minor geometric imperfections on the performance of Stirling type pulse tube cryocoolers. Predictions of cooling performance and gravity orientation sensitivity were compared with experimental results obtained with the cryocooler prototypes. The results indicate that minor geometry features in the cold tip assembly can have considerable negative effects on the gravity orientation sensitivity of a pulse tube cryocooler.

A hybrid decision support system for sustainable office building renovation and energy performance improvement

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Juan, Yi-Kai [Department of Architecture, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (NTUST) (China); Center for Sustainable Development and Global Competitiveness, Stanford University (United States); Gao, Peng [Department of Traffic and Transportation Engineering, Tongji University (China); Wang, Jie [Center for Sustainable Development and Global Competitiveness, Stanford University (United States)

2010-03-15

Energy consumption of buildings accounts for around 20-40% of all energy consumed in advanced countries. Over the last decade, more and more global organizations are investing significant resources to create sustainably built environments, emphasizing sustainable building renovation processes to reduce energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. This study develops an integrated decision support system to assess existing office building conditions and to recommend an optimal set of sustainable renovation actions, considering trade-offs between renovation cost, improved building quality, and environmental impacts. A hybrid approach that combines A* graph search algorithm with genetic algorithms (GA) is used to analyze all possible renovation actions and their trade-offs to develop the optimal solution. A two-stage system validation is performed to demonstrate the practical application of the hybrid approach: zero-one goal programming (ZOGP) and genetic algorithms are adopted to validate the effectiveness of the algorithm. A real-world renovation project is introduced to validate differences in energy performance projected for the renovation solution suggested by the system. The results reveal that the proposed hybrid system is more computationally effective than either ZOGP or GA alone. The system's suggested renovation actions would provide substantial energy performance improvements to the real project if implemented. (author)

Assessment of energy and economic performance of office building models: a case study

Science.gov (United States)

Song, X. Y.; Ye, C. T.; Li, H. S.; Wang, X. L.; Ma, W. B.

2016-08-01

Energy consumption of building accounts for more than 37.3% of total energy consumption while the proportion of energy-saving buildings is just 5% in China. In this paper, in order to save potential energy, an office building in Southern China was selected as a test example for energy consumption characteristics. The base building model was developed by TRNSYS software and validated against the recorded data from the field work in six days out of August-September in 2013. Sensitivity analysis was conducted for energy performance of building envelope retrofitting; five envelope parameters were analyzed for assessing the thermal responses. Results indicated that the key sensitivity factors were obtained for the heat-transfer coefficient of exterior walls (U-wall), infiltration rate and shading coefficient (SC), of which the sum sensitivity factor was about 89.32%. In addition, the results were evaluated in terms of energy and economic analysis. The analysis of sensitivity validated against some important results of previous studies. On the other hand, the cost-effective method improved the efficiency of investment management in building energy.

Multi-Objective Optimization for Energy Performance Improvement of Residential Buildings: A Comparative Study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kangji Li

2017-02-01

Full Text Available Numerous conflicting criteria exist in building design optimization, such as energy consumption, greenhouse gas emission and indoor thermal performance. Different simulation-based optimization strategies and various optimization algorithms have been developed. A few of them are analyzed and compared in solving building design problems. This paper presents an efficient optimization framework to facilitate optimization designs with the aid of commercial simulation software and MATLAB. The performances of three optimization strategies, including the proposed approach, GenOpt method and artificial neural network (ANN method, are investigated using a case study of a simple building energy model. Results show that the proposed optimization framework has competitive performances compared with the GenOpt method. Further, in another practical case, four popular multi-objective algorithms, e.g., the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II, multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO, the multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA and multi-objective differential evolution (MODE, are realized using the propose optimization framework and compared with three criteria. Results indicate that MODE achieves close-to-optimal solutions with the best diversity and execution time. An uncompetitive result is achieved by the MOPSO in this case study.

CAST-IN-PLACE BUILDING FRAME AND ITS FEATURES AT SEPARATE LIFE CYCLES

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Koyankin Aleksandr Aleksandrovich

2015-09-01

Full Text Available Modern intensive development of precast-cast-in-place construction has led to creation of a wide range of various constructive systems of buildings during the last 100 years. They allow constructing buildings with best account of the requirements of functionality, architectural expressiveness, production possibilities of construction companies, etc. However in spite of this development both precast and cast-in-place housing construction has its peculiarities, positive and negative ones. The constructive systems of precast monolithic buildings existing at the moment are based on the required mutual deformation of prefabricated reinforced and cast iron reinforced concrete at the stage of a building construction and at the stage of its use as well. Having refused from this rule, the authors of this article have introduced a constructive system of a precast monolithic building able to bear loads, developing at the stage of erection (due to completion of a precast frame and at the stage of use (due to completion of a precast monolithic frame. The offered construction of a precast monolithic building frame allows efficiently using the advantages of precast and cast-in-place construction minimizing their disadvantages and it also fully corresponds to the obligatory requirements to buildings. The corresponding patents are obtained.

Public building retrofit

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

1982-01-01

This report demonstrates the economic viability of cost effective, energy efficient retrofitting of a public building. The Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce in conjunction with the Canada/Yukon Conservation and Renewable Energy Demonstration Project undertook the demonstration project. The energy conservation features included increasing the insulation in the walls and ceiling, providing a 6 mm polyethylene air-vapour barrier and installing triple glazed windows on the north side. Also, an air-to-air heat exchanger and a combination wood/oil furnace were installed. However, neither of these latter features have been used since the completion of the renovations. In total, the features cost approximately $26,300. The energy conservation measures yielded less energy savings than expected. Although the T.C. Richard building is now consuming less heating oil (33% less); the amount of electricity used has increased by 146.6%. Overall the building achieved a 23% reduction in heating consumption (this figure takes into account the heat energy generated from the lighting system). Reasons for the low yield in energy savings can be attributed to the improper installation of the air-vapour barrier and not using the existing wood boiler. 1 fig. 5 tabs.

Urban weather data and building models for the inclusion of the urban heat island effect in building performance simulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Palme, M; Inostroza, L; Villacreses, G; Lobato, A; Carrasco, C

2017-10-01

This data article presents files supporting calculation for urban heat island (UHI) inclusion in building performance simulation (BPS). Methodology is used in the research article "From urban climate to energy consumption. Enhancing building performance simulation by including the urban heat island effect" (Palme et al., 2017) [1]. In this research, a Geographical Information System (GIS) study is done in order to statistically represent the most important urban scenarios of four South-American cities (Guayaquil, Lima, Antofagasta and Valparaíso). Then, a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) is done to obtain reference Urban Tissues Categories (UTC) to be used in urban weather simulation. The urban weather files are generated by using the Urban Weather Generator (UWG) software (version 4.1 beta). Finally, BPS is run out with the Transient System Simulation (TRNSYS) software (version 17). In this data paper, four sets of data are presented: 1) PCA data (excel) to explain how to group different urban samples in representative UTC; 2) UWG data (text) to reproduce the Urban Weather Generation for the UTC used in the four cities (4 UTC in Lima, Guayaquil, Antofagasta and 5 UTC in Valparaíso); 3) weather data (text) with the resulting rural and urban weather; 4) BPS models (text) data containing the TRNSYS models (four building models).

Architecture and performance of neural networks for efficient A/C control in buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Mahmoud, Mohamed A.; Ben-Nakhi, Abdullatif E.

2003-01-01

The feasibility of using neural networks (NNs) for optimizing air conditioning (AC) setback scheduling in public buildings was investigated. The main focus is on optimizing the network architecture in order to achieve best performance. To save energy, the temperature inside public buildings is allowed to rise after business hours by setting back the thermostat. The objective is to predict the time of the end of thermostat setback (EoS) such that the design temperature inside the building is restored in time for the start of business hours. State of the art building simulation software, ESP-r, was used to generate a database that covered the years 1995-1999. The software was used to calculate the EoS for two office buildings using the climate records in Kuwait. The EoS data for 1995 and 1996 were used for training and testing the NNs. The robustness of the trained NN was tested by applying them to a 'production' data set (1997-1999), which the networks have never 'seen' before. For each of the six different NN architectures evaluated, parametric studies were performed to determine the network parameters that best predict the EoS. External hourly temperature readings were used as network inputs, and the thermostat end of setback (EoS) is the output. The NN predictions were improved by developing a neural control scheme (NC). This scheme is based on using the temperature readings as they become available. For each NN architecture considered, six NNs were designed and trained for this purpose. The performance of the NN analysis was evaluated using a statistical indicator (the coefficient of multiple determination) and by statistical analysis of the error patterns, including ANOVA (analysis of variance). The results show that the NC, when used with a properly designed NN, is a powerful instrument for optimizing AC setback scheduling based only on external temperature records

ALGORITHM OF SELECTION EFFECTIVE SOLUTIONS FOR REPROFILING OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

MENEJLJUK A. I.

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Raising of problem.Non-compliance requirements of today's industrial enterprises, which were built during the Soviet period, as well as significant technical progress, economic reform and transition to market principles of performance evaluation leading to necessity to change their target and functionality. The technical condition of many industrial buildings in Ukraine allows to exploit them for decades.Redesigning manufacturing enterprises allows not only to reduce the cost of construction, but also to obtain new facilities in the city. Despite the large number of industrial buildings that have lost their effectiveness and relevance, as well as a significant investor interest in these objects, the scope of redevelopment in the construction remains unexplored. Analysis researches on the topic. The problem of reconstruction of industrial buildings considered in Topchy D. [3], Travin V. [9], as well as in the work of other scientists. However, there are no rules in regulatory documents and system studies for improving the organization of the reconstruction of buildings at realigning. The purpose of this work is the development an algorithm of actions for selection of effective organizational decisions at the planning stage of a reprofiling project of industrial buildings. The proposed algorithm allows you to select an effective organizational and technological solution for the re-profiling of industrial buildings, taking into account features of the building, its location, its state of structures and existing restrictions. The most effective organizational solution allows realize the reprofiling project of an industrial building in the most possible short terms and with the lowest possible use of material resources, taking into account the available features and restrictions. Conclusion. Each object has a number of unique features that necessary for considering at choosing an effective reprofiling variant. The developed algorithm for selecting

Comparison of the performance of concrete-filled steel tubular and hollow steel diagrid buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Peter, Minu Ann; S, Sajith A.; Nagarajan, Praveen

2018-03-01

In the recent construction scenario, diagrid structures are becoming a popular high-rise building structural system. Diagrid structures consist of diagonals in the perimeter and an interior core. The corner and interior vertical columns are not required due to the structural efficiency of diagrid structural systems. Steel and concrete are commonly used material for diagrid. An alternate material for diagrid is concrete-filled steel tube (CFST). CFST incorporates the advantages of both steel and concrete. In CFST, the inward buckling of the steel tube is effectively prevented by the filled concrete. The compressive strength of concrete increases due to the tri-axial state of stress in concrete induced by the steel tube. The longitudinal as well as lateral reinforcement to the concrete core is also provided by the steel tube. This paper compares the performance of CFST and steel diagrid buildings using linear static analysis. For this purpose, a 12 storey and 36 storey building are analysed using finite element method and CFST diagrid building is found to perform better.

Review of California and National Methods for Energy PerformanceBenchmarking of Commercial Buildings

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Matson, Nance E.; Piette, Mary Ann

2005-09-05

This benchmarking review has been developed to support benchmarking planning and tool development under discussion by the California Energy Commission (CEC), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and others in response to the Governor's Executive Order S-20-04 (2004). The Executive Order sets a goal of benchmarking and improving the energy efficiency of California's existing commercial building stock. The Executive Order requires the CEC to propose ''a simple building efficiency benchmarking system for all commercial buildings in the state''. This report summarizes and compares two currently available commercial building energy-benchmarking tools. One tool is the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Energy Star National Energy Performance Rating System, which is a national regression-based benchmarking model (referred to in this report as Energy Star). The second is Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's Cal-Arch, which is a California-based distributional model (referred to as Cal-Arch). Prior to the time Cal-Arch was developed in 2002, there were several other benchmarking tools available to California consumers but none that were based solely on California data. The Energy Star and Cal-Arch benchmarking tools both provide California with unique and useful methods to benchmark the energy performance of California's buildings. Rather than determine which model is ''better'', the purpose of this report is to understand and compare the underlying data, information systems, assumptions, and outcomes of each model.

A building characterization-based method for the advancement of knowledge on external architectural features of traditional rural buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Porto, S. M. C.

2013-12-01

Full Text Available The significant role that traditional rural buildings have with regard to environmental conservation and rural development is widely acknowledged by the scientific community. These buildings must be protected from inappropriate building interventions that may stem from their rather superficial knowledge. Therefore, this study was directed towards overcoming such a limitation by developing a method based on traditional rural buildings’ characterization. In particular, the study aimed at the characterization of building materials and techniques used for the construction of a number of building components that make up the external envelope of traditional rural buildings. The application of the method to a homogeneous area of the Etna Regional Park (Italy highlighted the need to improve the technical norms of the park’s Territorial Coordination Plan to respect the building characteristics of the traditional rural buildings located in the protected area.La comunidad científica le atribuye a las construcciones rurales tradicionales un papel fundamental en términos de conservación del medioambiente y de evolución rural. Dichos edificios deben ser protegidos contra obras inapropiadas debidas a un conocimiento más bien superficial. Por lo tanto, el objetivo de este estudio fue el de eliminar dichas limitaciones desarrollando un método basado en la caracterización de las construcciones rurales tradicionales, que puede ser aplicado para mejorar el conocimiento de estas últimas. En particular, el susodicho estudio tiene la finalidad de caracterizar los materiales y las técnicas constructivas a emplear para la construcción de algunos componentes del envoltorio externo de las construcciones rurales tradicionales. La aplicación del método propuesto a una zona homogénea del Parque Regional del Etna (Italia puso de relieve la necesidad de mejorar las normas técnicas del Plan de Coordinación Territorial del parque para respetar las caracter

Face-iris multimodal biometric scheme based on feature level fusion

Science.gov (United States)

Huo, Guang; Liu, Yuanning; Zhu, Xiaodong; Dong, Hongxing; He, Fei

2015-11-01

Unlike score level fusion, feature level fusion demands all the features extracted from unimodal traits with high distinguishability, as well as homogeneity and compatibility, which is difficult to achieve. Therefore, most multimodal biometric research focuses on score level fusion, whereas few investigate feature level fusion. We propose a face-iris recognition method based on feature level fusion. We build a special two-dimensional-Gabor filter bank to extract local texture features from face and iris images, and then transform them by histogram statistics into an energy-orientation variance histogram feature with lower dimensions and higher distinguishability. Finally, through a fusion-recognition strategy based on principal components analysis and support vector machine (FRSPS), feature level fusion and one-to-n identification are accomplished. The experimental results demonstrate that this method can not only effectively extract face and iris features but also provide higher recognition accuracy. Compared with some state-of-the-art fusion methods, the proposed method has a significant performance advantage.

Climate responsive and safe earthquake construction: a community building a school

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hari Darshan

2011-10-01

Full Text Available This article outlines environment friendly features, climate responsive features and construction features of a prototype school building constructed using green building technology. The school building has other additional features such as earthquake resistant construction, use of local materials and local technology. The construction process not only establishes community ownership, but also facilitates dissemination of the technology to the communities. Schools are effective media for raising awareness, disseminating technology and up-scaling the innovative approach. The approach is cost effective and sustainable for long-term application of green building technology. Furthermore, this paper emphasizes that such construction technology will be instrumental to build culture of safety in communities and reduce disaster risk.

Cost optimal building performance requirements. Calculation methodology for reporting on national energy performance requirements on the basis of cost optimality within the framework of the EPBD

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Boermans, T.; Bettgenhaeuser, K.; Hermelink, A.; Schimschar, S. [Ecofys, Utrecht (Netherlands)

2011-05-15

On the European level, the principles for the requirements for the energy performance of buildings are set by the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD). Dating from December 2002, the EPBD has set a common framework from which the individual Member States in the EU developed or adapted their individual national regulations. The EPBD in 2008 and 2009 underwent a recast procedure, with final political agreement having been reached in November 2009. The new Directive was then formally adopted on May 19, 2010. Among other clarifications and new provisions, the EPBD recast introduces a benchmarking mechanism for national energy performance requirements for the purpose of determining cost-optimal levels to be used by Member States for comparing and setting these requirements. The previous EPBD set out a general framework to assess the energy performance of buildings and required Member States to define maximum values for energy delivered to meet the energy demand associated with the standardised use of the building. However it did not contain requirements or guidance related to the ambition level of such requirements. As a consequence, building regulations in the various Member States have been developed by the use of different approaches (influenced by different building traditions, political processes and individual market conditions) and resulted in different ambition levels where in many cases cost optimality principles could justify higher ambitions. The EPBD recast now requests that Member States shall ensure that minimum energy performance requirements for buildings are set 'with a view to achieving cost-optimal levels'. The cost optimum level shall be calculated in accordance with a comparative methodology. The objective of this report is to contribute to the ongoing discussion in Europe around the details of such a methodology by describing possible details on how to calculate cost optimal levels and pointing towards important factors and

The homeostasis solution – Mechanical homeostasis in architecturally homeostatic buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wang, Lin-Shu; Ma, Peizheng

2016-01-01

Highlights: • Architectural homeostatic buildings (AHBs) make sense because of the laws of physics. • However, high efficiency can be obtained only with AHBs and equipment considered as systems. • Mechanical homeostasis facilitates AHB-equipment system synergy with heat extraction. • Entropically speaking a building needs neither energy nor a fixed amount of heat, but its homeostatic existence. • Homeostatic buildings can reduce building energy consumption from 80% to 90%. - Abstract: We already know, for energy-saving potential, the necessary architectural features in well-designed buildings: high performance building envelope, sufficient interior thermal mass, and hydronic-network activated radiant surfaces for cooling and heating. Buildings with these features may be referred to as architecturally homeostatic buildings (AHBs); such a building-system is thermally semi-autonomous in the sense that its temperature variation stays within a certain range even without conditioning equipment, and, with conditioning equipment in operation, its thermal regulation is handled by its hydronic heat-distribution-network for controlling the temperature level of the building. At the present time conventional HVAC equipment is used for maintaining the heat-distribution-network: this arrangement, however, has resulted in great energy saving only for AHBs with accessible natural water bodies. In operation of general AHBs, a case is made here for a new kind of mechanical equipment having the attribute of mechanical homeostasis (MH). MH is a new energy transformation concept in a triadic framework. Superlative energy efficiency is predicted as a result of combined improvements in higher triadCOPs and lower total (inducted + removed) heat rates—evincing existence of synergy in architectural and mechanical homeostasis, which together will be referred to as the homeostasis solution.

Feature hashing for fast image retrieval

Science.gov (United States)

Yan, Lingyu; Fu, Jiarun; Zhang, Hongxin; Yuan, Lu; Xu, Hui

2018-03-01

Currently, researches on content based image retrieval mainly focus on robust feature extraction. However, due to the exponential growth of online images, it is necessary to consider searching among large scale images, which is very timeconsuming and unscalable. Hence, we need to pay much attention to the efficiency of image retrieval. In this paper, we propose a feature hashing method for image retrieval which not only generates compact fingerprint for image representation, but also prevents huge semantic loss during the process of hashing. To generate the fingerprint, an objective function of semantic loss is constructed and minimized, which combine the influence of both the neighborhood structure of feature data and mapping error. Since the machine learning based hashing effectively preserves neighborhood structure of data, it yields visual words with strong discriminability. Furthermore, the generated binary codes leads image representation building to be of low-complexity, making it efficient and scalable to large scale databases. Experimental results show good performance of our approach.

Process of technical performance: essential features and their economic view

OpenAIRE

Zhylinska, O.

2010-01-01

Essential features of technical performance have been defined in the context of similarity of its components such as research and development, training of technical/engineering personnel and providing technical services. Also peculiarities of economic view have been examined in terms of information model of managing.

Performance Assessment of Maintenance Practices in Government Office Buildings: Case Study of Parcel E, Putrajaya

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Awg Husaini A.I.

2014-03-01

Full Text Available Building maintenance practices must be taken into consideration by building facility managers or building owners. They involve daily operations to ensure that end users can work or live comfortably and safely. Through effective maintenance practices, the functions of the existing building facilities can be maintained and meet the needs of the building users. Maintenance practices must be effective in aspects such as planning, organization and supervision in order to maintain the building at a satisfactory level of performance all the time. A study was conducted on a Federal government office building in Parcel E, Putrajaya to determine the maintenance aspects of the management of the facility. To achieve the objectives of this study a questionnaire survey was used to obtain the required data. The outcomes indicate that the aspects of building maintenance practice and the effectiveness of the maintenance management in government office buildings can influence the satisfaction of the end user. However, some aspects of the current building maintenance practices seem to need improvements in order to enhance the building maintenance management. The recommendations of this study will help in the effective management of the facility and maintenance management practices.

Exploration of available feature detection and identification systems and their performance on radiographs

Science.gov (United States)

Wantuch, Andrew C.; Vita, Joshua A.; Jimenez, Edward S.; Bray, Iliana E.

2016-10-01

Despite object detection, recognition, and identification being very active areas of computer vision research, many of the available tools to aid in these processes are designed with only photographs in mind. Although some algorithms used specifically for feature detection and identification may not take explicit advantage of the colors available in the image, they still under-perform on radiographs, which are grayscale images. We are especially interested in the robustness of these algorithms, specifically their performance on a preexisting database of X-ray radiographs in compressed JPEG form, with multiple ways of describing pixel information. We will review various aspects of the performance of available feature detection and identification systems, including MATLABs Computer Vision toolbox, VLFeat, and OpenCV on our non-ideal database. In the process, we will explore possible reasons for the algorithms' lessened ability to detect and identify features from the X-ray radiographs.

Smart buildings: Energy efficient conditioning of building occupants

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Zeiler, W.; Houten, van M.A.; Boxem, G.; Vehler, R.; Verhoeven, M.; Fremouw, M.

2009-01-01

To further optimize energy performance of buildings, intelligent building control offers new possibilities. Intelligent Software Agents (ISA) can be implemented at different levels of building automation. Individual agents for individual climate control for each user of the building in combination

Architectural approach to the energy performance of buildings in a hot-dry climate with special reference to Egypt

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hamdy, I F

1986-01-01

A thesis is presented on the changing approach to architectural design of buildings in a hot, dry climate in view of the increased recognition of the importance of energy efficiency. The thermal performance of buildings in Egypt is used as an example and the nature of the local climate and human requirements are also studied. Other effects on the thermal performance considered include building form, orientation and surrounding conditions. An evaluative computer model is constructed and its applications allow the prediction on the energy performance of changing design parameters.

Energy Performance and Optimal Control of Air-conditioned Buildings Integrated with Phase Change Materials

Science.gov (United States)

Zhu, Na

This thesis presents an overview of the previous research work on dynamic characteristics and energy performance of buildings due to the integration of PCMs. The research work on dynamic characteristics and energy performance of buildings using PCMs both with and without air-conditioning is reviewed. Since the particular interest in using PCMs for free cooling and peak load shifting, specific research efforts on both subjects are reviewed separately. A simplified physical dynamic model of building structures integrated with SSPCM (shaped-stabilized phase change material) is developed and validated in this study. The simplified physical model represents the wall by 3 resistances and 2 capacitances and the PCM layer by 4 resistances and 2 capacitances respectively while the key issue is the parameter identification of the model. This thesis also presents the studies on the thermodynamic characteristics of buildings enhanced by PCM and on the investigation of the impacts of PCM on the building cooling load and peak cooling demand at different climates and seasons as well as the optimal operation and control strategies to reduce the energy consumption and energy cost by reducing the air-conditioning energy consumption and peak load. An office building floor with typical variable air volume (VAV) air-conditioning system is used and simulated as the reference building in the comparison study. The envelopes of the studied building are further enhanced by integrating the PCM layers. The building system is tested in two selected cities of typical climates in China including Hong Kong and Beijing. The cold charge and discharge processes, the operation and control strategies of night ventilation and the air temperature set-point reset strategy for minimizing the energy consumption and electricity cost are studied. This thesis presents the simulation test platform, the test results on the cold storage and discharge processes, the air-conditioning energy consumption and demand

Intelligent seismic risk mitigation system on structure building

Science.gov (United States)

Suryanita, R.; Maizir, H.; Yuniorto, E.; Jingga, H.

2018-01-01

Indonesia located on the Pacific Ring of Fire, is one of the highest-risk seismic zone in the world. The strong ground motion might cause catastrophic collapse of the building which leads to casualties and property damages. Therefore, it is imperative to properly design the structural response of building against seismic hazard. Seismic-resistant building design process requires structural analysis to be performed to obtain the necessary building responses. However, the structural analysis could be very difficult and time consuming. This study aims to predict the structural response includes displacement, velocity, and acceleration of multi-storey building with the fixed floor plan using Artificial Neural Network (ANN) method based on the 2010 Indonesian seismic hazard map. By varying the building height, soil condition, and seismic location in 47 cities in Indonesia, 6345 data sets were obtained and fed into the ANN model for the learning process. The trained ANN can predict the displacement, velocity, and acceleration responses with up to 96% of predicted rate. The trained ANN architecture and weight factors were later used to build a simple tool in Visual Basic program which possesses the features for prediction of structural response as mentioned previously.

Dynamic Simulation of the Green Roofs Impact on Building Energy Performance, Case Study of Antananarivo, Madagascar

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hery Tiana Rakotondramiarana

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Green roofs improve building energy performance and constitute an alternative to sustainable buildings. A green roof model is dynamically coupled with a building thermal model to assess its energy performance that takes into account the indoor air temperature dynamic changes. Under the climate conditions in Antananarivo, we compared green and conventional roofs. The present study shows that green roofs protect the roof structure under extreme temperature and large temperature fluctuations. For the case of Antananarivo, the amplitude of the temperature fluctuations at the top face of the support is reduced by 28 °C when using green roof. The impact of the green roof on indoor air temperature and energy demand is investigated. The vegetation decreases the maximum indoor air temperature and improves the building thermal comfort during summer days. It has no effect on the minimum indoor air temperature, but additional soil thickness can increase it. In addition, a global sensitivity analysis, which is carried out on the proposed model without considering any specific weather data, allows us to identify the most influential parameters on the energy demand. It has been found that green roofs have almost insignificant thermal impact in insulated buildings; however, their potential prevails over the building envelope and weather characteristics in the case of non-insulated building.

Improving Building Performance through Integrating Constructability in the Design Process

OpenAIRE

Ezzat Othman, Ayman Ahmed

2011-01-01

The traditional procurment approaches commonly adopted in construction projects and the involvement of multitude of various project participants with diverse objectives, skills and interests tended to separate design from construction.This separation obstructs contractors from providing designers with construction feedback and suggestions for design improvement, which ultimately hampers the improvement of building performance. Because of the importance of the design phase and the vit...

Urban weather data and building models for the inclusion of the urban heat island effect in building performance simulation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Palme

2017-10-01

Full Text Available This data article presents files supporting calculation for urban heat island (UHI inclusion in building performance simulation (BPS. Methodology is used in the research article “From urban climate to energy consumption. Enhancing building performance simulation by including the urban heat island effect” (Palme et al., 2017 [1]. In this research, a Geographical Information System (GIS study is done in order to statistically represent the most important urban scenarios of four South-American cities (Guayaquil, Lima, Antofagasta and Valparaíso. Then, a Principal Component Analysis (PCA is done to obtain reference Urban Tissues Categories (UTC to be used in urban weather simulation. The urban weather files are generated by using the Urban Weather Generator (UWG software (version 4.1 beta. Finally, BPS is run out with the Transient System Simulation (TRNSYS software (version 17. In this data paper, four sets of data are presented: 1 PCA data (excel to explain how to group different urban samples in representative UTC; 2 UWG data (text to reproduce the Urban Weather Generation for the UTC used in the four cities (4 UTC in Lima, Guayaquil, Antofagasta and 5 UTC in Valparaíso; 3 weather data (text with the resulting rural and urban weather; 4 BPS models (text data containing the TRNSYS models (four building models.

Building Energy Management Open Source Software

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

2017-06-20

This is the repository for Building Energy Management Open Source Software (BEMOSS), which is an open source operating system that is engineered to improve sensing and control of equipment in small- and medium-sized commercial buildings. BEMOSS offers the following key features: (1) Open source, open architecture – BEMOSS is an open source operating system that is built upon VOLTTRON – a distributed agent platform developed by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). BEMOSS was designed to make it easy for hardware manufacturers to seamlessly interface their devices with BEMOSS. Software developers can also contribute to adding additional BEMOSS functionalities and applications. (2) Plug & play – BEMOSS was designed to automatically discover supported load controllers (including smart thermostats, VAV/RTUs, lighting load controllers and plug load controllers) in commercial buildings. (3) Interoperability – BEMOSS was designed to work with load control devices form different manufacturers that operate on different communication technologies and data exchange protocols. (4) Cost effectiveness – Implementation of BEMOSS deemed to be cost-effective as it was built upon a robust open source platform that can operate on a low-cost single-board computer, such as Odroid. This feature could contribute to its rapid deployment in small- or medium-sized commercial buildings. (5) Scalability and ease of deployment – With its multi-node architecture, BEMOSS provides a distributed architecture where load controllers in a multi-floor and high occupancy building could be monitored and controlled by multiple single-board computers hosting BEMOSS. This makes it possible for a building engineer to deploy BEMOSS in one zone of a building, be comfortable with its operation, and later on expand the deployment to the entire building to make it more energy efficient. (6) Ability to provide local and remote monitoring – BEMOSS provides both local and remote monitoring

Building form and environmental performance: archetypes, analysis and an arid climate

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ratti, C.; Raydan, D.; Steemers, K. [Department of Architecture, The Martin Centre for Architectural and Urban Studies, University of Cambridge, Cambridge (United Kingdom)

2002-07-01

Leslie Martin and others at Cambridge University addressed the question 'What building forms make the best use of land?' in a number of influential papers published in the late 1960s. They selected six simplified urban arrays based on archetypal building forms. Then they analysed and compared the archetypes in terms of built potential and day lighting criteria, eventually reaching the conclusion that courtyards perform best. Their results, which inspired a generation of designers, are briefly reviewed here and reassessed in environmental terms using innovative computer analysis techniques. Furthermore, the implications of their question, which to date has not addressed the link with climate, are explored using a case study in a hot-arid region. (author)

Performance Improvement and Feature Enhancement of WriteOn

OpenAIRE

Chandrasekar, Samantha

2008-01-01

A Tablet PC is a portable computing device which combines a regular notebook computer with a digitizing screen that interacts with a complementary electronic pen stylus. The pen allows the user to input data by writing on or by tapping the screen. Like a regular notebook computer, the user can also perform tasks using the mouse and keyboard. A Tablet PC gives the users all the features of a regular notebook computer along with the support to recognize, process, and store electronic/digital in...

Integrated Building Design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Heiselberg, Per

In the first half of the 20th century, HVAC systems and artificial lighting were developed to meet indoor comfort needs. Before the introduction of mechanical systems, climate - not building style or appearance - was the major determinant of building form. Comfort was achieved through passive means...... and architectural features built into the design. However, with the advent of new technologies, architects were no longer constrained by the need to ensure that buildings had ample daylighting, remained airy and cool in the summer and warm in the winter. Since HVAC systems and artificial lighting could satisfy...

Silicene Flowers: A Dual Stabilized Silicon Building Block for High-Performance Lithium Battery Anodes.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Xinghao; Qiu, Xiongying; Kong, Debin; Zhou, Lu; Li, Zihao; Li, Xianglong; Zhi, Linjie

2017-07-25

Nanostructuring is a transformative way to improve the structure stability of high capacity silicon for lithium batteries. Yet, the interface instability issue remains and even propagates in the existing nanostructured silicon building blocks. Here we demonstrate an intrinsically dual stabilized silicon building block, namely silicene flowers, to simultaneously address the structure and interface stability issues. These original Si building blocks as lithium battery anodes exhibit extraordinary combined performance including high gravimetric capacity (2000 mAh g -1 at 800 mA g -1 ), high volumetric capacity (1799 mAh cm -3 ), remarkable rate capability (950 mAh g -1 at 8 A g -1 ), and excellent cycling stability (1100 mA h g -1 at 2000 mA g -1 over 600 cycles). Paired with a conventional cathode, the fabricated full cells deliver extraordinarily high specific energy and energy density (543 Wh kg ca -1 and 1257 Wh L ca -1 , respectively) based on the cathode and anode, which are 152% and 239% of their commercial counterparts using graphite anodes. Coupled with a simple, cost-effective, scalable synthesis approach, this silicon building block offers a horizon for the development of high-performance batteries.

The impact of feature selection on one and two-class classification performance for plant microRNAs.

Science.gov (United States)

Khalifa, Waleed; Yousef, Malik; Saçar Demirci, Müşerref Duygu; Allmer, Jens

2016-01-01

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short nucleotide sequences that form a typical hairpin structure which is recognized by a complex enzyme machinery. It ultimately leads to the incorporation of 18-24 nt long mature miRNAs into RISC where they act as recognition keys to aid in regulation of target mRNAs. It is involved to determine miRNAs experimentally and, therefore, machine learning is used to complement such endeavors. The success of machine learning mostly depends on proper input data and appropriate features for parameterization of the data. Although, in general, two-class classification (TCC) is used in the field; because negative examples are hard to come by, one-class classification (OCC) has been tried for pre-miRNA detection. Since both positive and negative examples are currently somewhat limited, feature selection can prove to be vital for furthering the field of pre-miRNA detection. In this study, we compare the performance of OCC and TCC using eight feature selection methods and seven different plant species providing positive pre-miRNA examples. Feature selection was very successful for OCC where the best feature selection method achieved an average accuracy of 95.6%, thereby being ∼29% better than the worst method which achieved 66.9% accuracy. While the performance is comparable to TCC, which performs up to 3% better than OCC, TCC is much less affected by feature selection and its largest performance gap is ∼13% which only occurs for two of the feature selection methodologies. We conclude that feature selection is crucially important for OCC and that it can perform on par with TCC given the proper set of features.

The impact of feature selection on one and two-class classification performance for plant microRNAs

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Waleed Khalifa

2016-06-01

Full Text Available MicroRNAs (miRNAs are short nucleotide sequences that form a typical hairpin structure which is recognized by a complex enzyme machinery. It ultimately leads to the incorporation of 18–24 nt long mature miRNAs into RISC where they act as recognition keys to aid in regulation of target mRNAs. It is involved to determine miRNAs experimentally and, therefore, machine learning is used to complement such endeavors. The success of machine learning mostly depends on proper input data and appropriate features for parameterization of the data. Although, in general, two-class classification (TCC is used in the field; because negative examples are hard to come by, one-class classification (OCC has been tried for pre-miRNA detection. Since both positive and negative examples are currently somewhat limited, feature selection can prove to be vital for furthering the field of pre-miRNA detection. In this study, we compare the performance of OCC and TCC using eight feature selection methods and seven different plant species providing positive pre-miRNA examples. Feature selection was very successful for OCC where the best feature selection method achieved an average accuracy of 95.6%, thereby being ∼29% better than the worst method which achieved 66.9% accuracy. While the performance is comparable to TCC, which performs up to 3% better than OCC, TCC is much less affected by feature selection and its largest performance gap is ∼13% which only occurs for two of the feature selection methodologies. We conclude that feature selection is crucially important for OCC and that it can perform on par with TCC given the proper set of features.

Towards the development of performance based guidelines for using Phase Change Materials in lightweight buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Poudel, Niraj

Incorporating Phase Change Materials (PCMs) in construction materials can increase the thermal mass of a building. With this increase in thermal mass, PCMs are known to reduce the heating and cooling loads of a building significantly. During the past 10 years, studies have estimated potential reduction of energy consumption of buildings between 10 and 30 percent. This wide range is due to the large number of parameters that effect energy consumption and make the process of selecting the optimal type and amount of PCM challenging. In fact, extensive engineering studies are generally necessary to determine the practicality of PCM in any specific case. As a result, architects and engineers are reluctant to use PCM because of the lack of such a comprehensive study. In the United States, eight climate zones are identified on the basis of annual degree heating and degree cooling days. For a given building in a given climate, there exists an optimal melting temperature and enthalpy that can reduce the energy consumption and the payback period. In this research, the optimal properties of PCM boards are determined for all 15 representative cities. Additional topics discussed in this research are the sensitivity of the optimal properties of PCM and the effect of the average cost of energy on the selection of PCM. The effect of six independent variables on the performance of PCM boards is presented in detail and the climate types where PCM boards perform optimally are narrowed down. In addition, a new procedure is presented to study the temporal and directional melting and solidifying trend of the PCM placed in buildings. The energy consumption and hourly data for the PCM enhanced buildings are determined numerically using the Department of Energy software EnergyPlus, which calculates the energy consumption for heating and cooling a building under any climate and operation schedule. The software is run on a computer cluster for a wide range of properties from which the

Dentate Gyrus circuitry features improve performance of sparse approximation algorithms.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Panagiotis C Petrantonakis

Full Text Available Memory-related activity in the Dentate Gyrus (DG is characterized by sparsity. Memory representations are seen as activated neuronal populations of granule cells, the main encoding cells in DG, which are estimated to engage 2-4% of the total population. This sparsity is assumed to enhance the ability of DG to perform pattern separation, one of the most valuable contributions of DG during memory formation. In this work, we investigate how features of the DG such as its excitatory and inhibitory connectivity diagram can be used to develop theoretical algorithms performing Sparse Approximation, a widely used strategy in the Signal Processing field. Sparse approximation stands for the algorithmic identification of few components from a dictionary that approximate a certain signal. The ability of DG to achieve pattern separation by sparsifing its representations is exploited here to improve the performance of the state of the art sparse approximation algorithm "Iterative Soft Thresholding" (IST by adding new algorithmic features inspired by the DG circuitry. Lateral inhibition of granule cells, either direct or indirect, via mossy cells, is shown to enhance the performance of the IST. Apart from revealing the potential of DG-inspired theoretical algorithms, this work presents new insights regarding the function of particular cell types in the pattern separation task of the DG.

Performance assessment of earth pipe cooling system for low energy buildings in a subtropical climate

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ahmed, S.F.; Khan, M.M.K.; Amanullah, M.T.O.; Rasul, M.G.; Hassan, N.M.S.

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Earth pipe cooling performance was investigated in a subtropical climate in Australia. • A thermal model was developed using Fluent to assess the cooling performance. • A temperature reduction of around 2 °C was found for the earth pipe cooling system. • Annual energy savings of maximum 866.54 kW (8.82%) was achieved for a 27.23 m"3 room. - Abstract: Energy consumption in heating and cooling around the world has been a major contributor to global warming. Hence, many studies have been aimed at finding new techniques to save and control energy through energy efficient measures. Most of this energy is used in residential, agricultural and commercial buildings. It is therefore important to adopt energy efficiency measures in these buildings through new technologies and novel building designs. These new building designs can be developed by employing various passive cooling systems. Earth pipe cooling is one of these which can assist to save energy without using any customary mechanical units. This paper investigates the earth pipe cooling performance in a hot humid subtropical climate of Rockhampton, Australia. A thermal model is developed using ANSYS Fluent for measuring its performance. Impacts of air velocity, air temperature, relative humidity and soil temperature on room cooling performance are also assessed. A temperature reduction of around 2 °C was found for the system. This temperature reduction contributed to an energy saving of a maximum of 866.54 kW (8.82%) per year for a 27.23 m"3 room.

Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs in Conventional and High Performance School Buildings in the U.S.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lexuan Zhong

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs has been an indoor environmental quality (IEQ concern in schools and other buildings for many years. Newer designs, construction practices and building materials for “green” buildings and the use of “environmentally friendly” products have the promise of lowering chemical exposure. This study examines VOCs and IEQ parameters in 144 classrooms in 37 conventional and high performance elementary schools in the U.S. with the objectives of providing a comprehensive analysis and updating the literature. Tested schools were built or renovated in the past 15 years, and included comparable numbers of conventional, Energy Star, and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED-certified buildings. Indoor and outdoor VOC samples were collected and analyzed by thermal desorption, gas chromatography and mass spectroscopy for 94 compounds. Aromatics, alkanes and terpenes were the major compound groups detected. Most VOCs had mean concentrations below 5 µg/m3, and most indoor/outdoor concentration ratios ranged from one to 10. For 16 VOCs, the within-school variance of concentrations exceeded that between schools and, overall, no major differences in VOC concentrations were found between conventional and high performance buildings. While VOC concentrations have declined from levels measured in earlier decades, opportunities remain to improve indoor air quality (IAQ by limiting emissions from building-related sources and by increasing ventilation rates.

Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) in Conventional and High Performance School Buildings in the U.S.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhong, Lexuan; Su, Feng-Chiao; Batterman, Stuart

2017-01-21

Exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) has been an indoor environmental quality (IEQ) concern in schools and other buildings for many years. Newer designs, construction practices and building materials for "green" buildings and the use of "environmentally friendly" products have the promise of lowering chemical exposure. This study examines VOCs and IEQ parameters in 144 classrooms in 37 conventional and high performance elementary schools in the U.S. with the objectives of providing a comprehensive analysis and updating the literature. Tested schools were built or renovated in the past 15 years, and included comparable numbers of conventional, Energy Star, and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)-certified buildings. Indoor and outdoor VOC samples were collected and analyzed by thermal desorption, gas chromatography and mass spectroscopy for 94 compounds. Aromatics, alkanes and terpenes were the major compound groups detected. Most VOCs had mean concentrations below 5 µg/m³, and most indoor/outdoor concentration ratios ranged from one to 10. For 16 VOCs, the within-school variance of concentrations exceeded that between schools and, overall, no major differences in VOC concentrations were found between conventional and high performance buildings. While VOC concentrations have declined from levels measured in earlier decades, opportunities remain to improve indoor air quality (IAQ) by limiting emissions from building-related sources and by increasing ventilation rates.

A project management framework for enhanced productivity performance using building information modelling

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Longhui Liao

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Although the Singapore government has mandated submissions of building plans in building information modelling (BIM format since July 2013, this does not yet seem to lead to enhanced productivity performance. BIM collaboration between designers and downstream contractors appears to remain inadequate. While many studies have been conducted on using BIM for better project outcomes, studies that relate BIM with the identification of non-value adding activities in the project lifecycle and the reduction of the resulting wastes are at infancy stage. This paper aims to propose a project management framework for enhancing the productivity of building projects in Singapore, which forms Phase I of an ongoing research project. A two-pronged approach is presented. Firstly, non-value adding activities in the current project delivery process that uses BIM partially in Singapore are identified by comparing the typical current process with full BIM-based processes; such activities are cut down after process transformation in terms of people, process, and technology. Secondly, time savings derived from reducing the wastes caused by these activities are quantified. The proposed framework was validated by a case study of a local residential project. It was concluded that this framework provides a valuable tool for project teams to enhance productivity performance.

Analysis of the Energy Performance of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation's Philip Merrill Environmental Center

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Griffith, B.; Deru M.; Torcellini, P.; Ellis, P.

2005-04-01

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation designed their new headquarters building to minimize its environmental impact on the already highly polluted Chesapeake Bay by incorporating numerous high-performance energy saving features into the building design. CBF then contacted NREL to perform a nonbiased energy evaluation of the building. Because their building attracted much attention in the sustainable design community, an unbiased evaluation was necessary to help designers replicate successes and identify and correct problem areas. This report focuses on NREL's monitoring and analysis of the overall energy performance of the building.

Advancement of DOE's EnergyPlus Building Energy Simulation Payment

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Gu, Lixing [Florida Solar Energy Center, Cocoa, FL (United States); Shirey, Don [Florida Solar Energy Center, Cocoa, FL (United States); Raustad, Richard [Florida Solar Energy Center, Cocoa, FL (United States); Nigusse, Bereket [Florida Solar Energy Center, Cocoa, FL (United States); Sharma, Chandan [Florida Solar Energy Center, Cocoa, FL (United States); Lawrie, Linda [DHL Consulting, Bonn (Germany); Strand, Rick [Univ. of Illinois, Champaign, IL (United States); Pedersen, Curt [COPA, Panama City (Panama); Fisher, Dan [Oklahoma State Univ., Stillwater, OK (United States); Lee, Edwin [Oklahoma State Univ., Stillwater, OK (United States); Witte, Mike [GARD Analytics, Arlington Heights, IL (United States); Glazer, Jason [GARD Analytics, Arlington Heights, IL (United States); Barnaby, Chip [Wrightsoft, Lexington, MA (United States)

2011-09-30

EnergyPlus{sup TM} is a new generation computer software analysis tool that has been developed, tested, and commercialized to support DOE's Building Technologies (BT) Program in terms of whole-building, component, and systems R&D (http://www.energyplus.gov). It is also being used to support evaluation and decision making of zero energy building (ZEB) energy efficiency and supply technologies during new building design and existing building retrofits. The 5-year project was managed by the National Energy Technology Laboratory and was divided into 5 budget period between 2006 and 2011. During the project period, 11 versions of EnergyPlus were released. This report summarizes work performed by an EnergyPlus development team led by the University of Central Florida's Florida Solar Energy Center (UCF/FSEC). The team members consist of DHL Consulting, C. O. Pedersen Associates, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Oklahoma State University, GARD Analytics, Inc., and WrightSoft Corporation. The project tasks involved new feature development, testing and validation, user support and training, and general EnergyPlus support. The team developed 146 new features during the 5-year period to advance the EnergyPlus capabilities. Annual contributions of new features are 7 in budget period 1, 19 in period 2, 36 in period 3, 41 in period 4, and 43 in period 5, respectively. The testing and validation task focused on running test suite and publishing report, developing new IEA test suite cases, testing and validating new source code, addressing change requests, and creating and testing installation package. The user support and training task provided support for users and interface developers, and organized and taught workshops. The general support task involved upgrading StarTeam (team sharing) software and updating existing utility software. The project met the DOE objectives and completed all tasks successfully. Although the EnergyPlus software was enhanced

Influence of High Level Features of HVS on Performance of FSIM

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

P. Dostal

2013-12-01

Full Text Available In this paper the influence of information about high level features of Human Visual System (HVS on objective quality assessment is studied. This was done by extending the existing full-reference objective image quality metric – FSIM – where the different importance of certain areas of image is considered using Phase Congruency (PC algorithm. Here, the estimation of Region of Interest (ROI based on this algorithm is complemented by Fixation Density Maps (FDM containing the information about high level features of HVS. Use of another low level features based algorithm (Phase Spectrum of Fourier Transform was also considered and compared to the PC algorithm. The performance was evaluated qualitatively on images reconstructed according to ROI and quantitatively on images from LIVE database. The correlation between subjective and objective tests was calculated using Pearson’s Correlation Coefficient and Spearman’s Rank Order Coefficient. The statistical significance of the difference between correlation coefficients was assessed by Fisher r-to-z transformation. The performance of the metric was also compared to other state-of-the-art image quality metrics (SSIM, MS-SSIM, and FSIM.

Performance demonstration and evaluation of the synergetic application of vanadium dioxide glazing and phase change material in passive buildings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Long, Linshuang; Ye, Hong; Gao, Yanfeng; Zou, Ruqiang

2014-01-01

Highlights: • VO 2 and PCM were combined in passive building application for the first time. • Synergetic performance of them is demonstrated in a full size room. • Synergetic application has a better performance than the solo ones. • The materials interact with each other in synergetic application. • ESI can be used to evaluate the performance of the synergetic application. - Abstract: One of the key methods to improve the energy saving performance of a building is to apply advanced materials or components to the building envelope. However, the two parts of a building’s envelope, the transparent one and the non-transparent one, are usually investigated individually by existing literature. In this study, vanadium dioxide (VO 2 ) glazing, an advanced energy-efficient element applied to the transparent parts of the building envelope, and phase change material (PCM), a typical thermal storage material used to improve the non-transparent parts of the building envelope, were adopted simultaneously for the first time. The synergetic performance of VO 2 glazing and PCM, demonstrated in a full-scale, lightweight, passive room, resulted in a significant improvement in the thermal comfort degree. The Energy Saving Index (ESI) is a simple and effective indicator that can be used to evaluate the passive application performance of a single energy-efficient material or component on a common standpoint. In this work, the index was broadened to evaluate the performance of more than one material, showing that ESI is feasible and favorable to analyze the coefficient application of several building materials and/or components. Using the ESI, the performance of the synergetic application was also compared with those of the sole materials, indicating that the synergetic application has a better performance during the cooling period. Furthermore the synergetic application involves an interplay rather than a simple combination of the energy-efficient materials. The

Performance of Buildings in the 2009 Western Sumatra Earthquake

Science.gov (United States)

Deierlein, G.; Hart, T.; Alexander, N.; Hausler, E.; Henderson, S.; Wood, K.; Cedillos, V.; Wijanto, S.; Cabrera, C.; Rudianto, S.

2009-12-01

The M7.6 earthquake of 30 September 2009 in Western Sumatra, Indonesia caused significant damage and collapse to hundreds of buildings and the deaths of 1,117 people. In Padang City, with a population of about 900,000 people, building collapse was the primary cause of deaths and serious injuries (313 deaths and 431 serious injuries). The predominant building construction types in Padang are concrete moment frames with brick infill and masonry bearing wall systems. Concrete frames are common in multistory commercial retail buildings, offices, schools, and hotels; and masonry bearing wall systems are primarily used in low-rise (usually single story) residential and school buildings. In general, buildings that collapsed did not conform to modern seismic engineering practices that are required by the current Indonesian building code and would be expected in regions of moderate to high seismicity. While collapse of multi-story concrete buildings was more prevalent in older buildings (more than 10 years old), there were several newer buildings that collapsed. Primary deficiencies identified in collapsed or severely damaged buildings included: (a) soft or weak stories that failed in either by sidesway mechanisms or shear failures followed by loss of axial capacity of columns, (b) lack of ductile reinforcing bar detailing in concrete beams, columns, and beam-column joints, (c) poor quality concrete and mortar materials and workmanship, (d) vulnerable building configurations and designs with incomplete or deficient load paths, and (e) out-of-plane wall failures in unreinforced (or marginally reinforced) masonry. While these deficiencies may be expected in older buildings, damage and collapse to some modern (or recently rennovated buildings) indicates a lack of enforcement of building code provisions for design and construction quality assurance. Many new buildings whose structural systems were undamaged were closed due to extensive earthquake damage to brick infill walls

A socio-technical system framework for risk-informed performance-based building regulation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Meacham, B.J.; Straalen, IJ.J. van

2017-01-01

Building regulatory systems have been evolving in recent decades, first with a transition to a functional or performance basis, and more recently with the introduction of new societal objectives, including those related to sustainability and climate change resiliency. Various policy and technical

Building thermography as a tool in energy audits and building commissioning procedure

Science.gov (United States)

Kauppinen, Timo

2007-04-01

A Building Commissioning-project (ToVa) was launched in Finland in the year 2003. A comprehensive commissioning procedure, including the building process and operation stage was developed in the project. This procedure will confirm the precise documentation of client's goals, definition of planning goals and the performance of the building. It is rather usual, that within 1-2 years after introduction the users complain about the defects or performance malfunctions of the building. Thermography is one important manual tool in verifying the thermal performance of the building envelope. In this paper the results of one pilot building (a school) will be presented. In surveying the condition and energy efficiency of buildings, various auxiliary means are needed. We can compare the consumption data of the target building with other, same type of buildings by benchmarking. Energy audit helps to localize and determine the energy saving potential. The most general and also most effective auxiliary means in monitoring the thermal performance of building envelopes is an infrared camera. In this presentation some examples of the use of thermography in energy audits are presented.

Developing Key Parameters for Green Performance of Partition Wall Blocks

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Goh Cheng Siew

2016-01-01

Full Text Available To promote sustainable construction, it is important to consider green performance of construction materials throughout the life cycle. Selecting inappropriate materials could not only affect the functional performance but also preclude the achievement of green building performance as a whole. Green performance of construction materials has therefore been one of the primary considerations of green building assessment systems. Using partition wall blocks as an example, this paper examines green performance of building materials primarily from the cradle to gate boundaries. Nine key parameters are proposed for the green performance of partition wall blocks. Apart from environmental features, technical performance of partition wall blocks is also taken into consideration since it is the determinant of the lifecycle performance. This paper offers a roadmap to decision makers to make environmentally responsible choices for their materials of internal walls and partitions, and hence provides a potential sustainable solution for green buildings.

Performance curves of room air conditioners for building energy simulation tools

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Meissner, José W.; Abadie, Marc O.; Moura, Luís M.; Mendonça, Kátia C.; Mendes, Nathan

2014-01-01

Highlights: • Experimental characteristic curves for two room air conditioners are presented. • These results can be implemented in building simulation codes. • The energy consumption under different conditions can numerically determine. • The labeled higher energy efficiency product not always provides the best result. - Abstract: In order to improve the modeling of air conditioners in building simulation tools, the characteristic curves for total cooling capacity, sensible cooling capacity and energy efficiency ratio of two room units were determined. They were obtained by means of standard capacity tests on climatic chambers in a set of environmental conditions described by external dry- and internal wet bulb temperatures. Afterward, the performance of these two units and that of four other units, with and without taking into to account the thermodynamic variations of the surrounding environments on it, were compared using a whole building simulation program for simulating a conditioned space. The comparative analysis showed that the air conditioner with the higher energy efficiency rating not always provides the lowest power consumption in real conditions of use

Market attractiveness Energy Performance Certificate for Buildings. Analysis of the survey results. Country report for the Netherlands

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wobben, M.M.H.; Hoogelander, K.J.; Schorel, J.S.; Corpeleijn, M.F.; Hezelmans, A.; Verhoef, L.A.

2006-09-01

The STABLE project aims at launching a collaborative effort of national energy agencies and federations of building owners in order to establish a firm basis for market acceptance of building energy certification as defined in the Directive on the Energy Performance of Buildings. This report presents the results of a survey for the Netherlands. [nl

Effect of dominant features on neural network performance in the classification of mammographic lesions

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhimin Huo; Giger, M.L.; Metz, C.E.

1999-01-01

Two different classifiers, an artificial neural network (Ann) and a hybrid system (one step rule-based method followed by an artificial neural network) have been investigated to merge computer-extracted features in the task of differentiating between malignant and benign masses. A database consisting of 65 cases (38 malignant and 26 benign) was used in the study. A total of four computer-extracted features - spiculation, margin sharpness and two density-related measures - was used to characterize these masses. Results from our previous study showed that the hybrid system performed better than the ANN classifier. In our current study, to understand the difference between the two classifiers, we investigated their learning and decision-making processes by studying the relationships between the input features and the outputs. A correlation study showed that the outputs from the ANN-alone method correlated strongly with one of the input features (spiculation), yielding a correlation coefficient of 0.91, whereas the correlation coefficients (absolute value) for the other features ranged from 0.19 to 0.40. This strong correlation between the ANN output and spiculation measure indicates that the learning and decision-making processes of the ANN-alone method were dominated by the spiculation measure. Three-dimensional plots of the computer output as functions of the input features demonstrate that the ANN-alone method did not learn as effectively as the hybrid system in differentiating non-spiculated malignant masses from benign masses, thus resulting in an inferior performance at the high sensitivity levels. We found that with a limited database it is detrimental for an ANN to learn the significance of other features in the presence of a dominant feature. The hybrid system, which initially applied a rule concerning the value of the spiculation measure prior to employing an ANN, prevents over-learning from the dominant feature and performed better than the ANN-alone method

Design and optical performance of a nonimaging Fresnel transmissive concentrator for building integration applications

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chemisana, Daniel, E-mail: daniel.chemisana@macs.udl.cat [Applied Physics Section of the Polytechnic School (EPS), University of Lleida, 25001 Lleida (Spain); Ignasi Rosell, Joan [Applied Physics Section of the Polytechnic School (EPS), University of Lleida, 25001 Lleida (Spain)

2011-09-15

Highlights: {yields} The designed concentrator has an important potential for building integration. {yields} The device concentrates radiation toward a static receiver. {yields} Tracking performed by a single driver, representing an important mechanical advantage. {yields} The system reaches a global optical efficiency value of 56.38%. - Abstract: A transmissive Fresnel reflector is designed to match the needs of building integration for concentrating photovoltaic (PV), thermal (T) or hybrid photovoltaic/thermal (PVT) generation. The device concentrates radiation toward a static receiver by means of an array of reflectors which rotate collectively. All rotation axes are coplanar and parallel. A deep analytical ray tracing study has been made of the design characteristics and concentrator performance, thus determining the configuration which optimises efficiency. Numerous ray tracing numerical simulations have been performed which contrast and support the analytical results.

Design and optical performance of a nonimaging Fresnel transmissive concentrator for building integration applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chemisana, Daniel; Ignasi Rosell, Joan

2011-01-01

Highlights: → The designed concentrator has an important potential for building integration. → The device concentrates radiation toward a static receiver. → Tracking performed by a single driver, representing an important mechanical advantage. → The system reaches a global optical efficiency value of 56.38%. - Abstract: A transmissive Fresnel reflector is designed to match the needs of building integration for concentrating photovoltaic (PV), thermal (T) or hybrid photovoltaic/thermal (PVT) generation. The device concentrates radiation toward a static receiver by means of an array of reflectors which rotate collectively. All rotation axes are coplanar and parallel. A deep analytical ray tracing study has been made of the design characteristics and concentrator performance, thus determining the configuration which optimises efficiency. Numerous ray tracing numerical simulations have been performed which contrast and support the analytical results.

Opportunities for Using Building Information Modeling to Improve Worker Safety Performance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kasim Alomari

2017-02-01

Full Text Available Building information modelling (BIM enables the creation of a digital representation of a designed facility combined with additional information about the project attributes, performance criteria, and construction process. Users of BIM tools point to the ability to visualize the final design along with the construction process as a beneficial feature of using BIM. Knowing the construction process in relationship to a facility’s design benefits both safety professionals when planning worker safety measures for a project and designers when creating a project’s design. Success in using BIM to enhance safety partly depends on the familiarity of project personnel with BIM tools and the extent to which the tools can be used to identify and eliminate safety hazards. In a separate, ongoing study, the authors investigated the connection between BIM and safety to document the opportunities, barriers, and impacts. Utilizing an on-line survey of project engineers who work for construction firms together with a comprehensive literature review, the study found those who use BIM feel that it aids in communication of project information and project delivery, both of which have been found to have positive impacts on construction site safety. Further, utilizing the survey results, the authors apply the binary logistic regression econometric framework to better understand the factors that lead to safety professionals believing that BIM increases safety in the work place. In addition, according to the survey results, a large percentage of the engineers who use BIM feel that ultimately it helps to eliminate safety hazards and improve worker safety. The study findings suggest that improvements in safety performance across the construction industry may be due in part to increased use of BIM in the construction industry.

Evaluation of Heating, Ventilation, and Air conditioning (HVAC System Performance in an Administrative Building in Tehran (Iran

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

H. Mari Oriyad

2014-09-01

Full Text Available Introduction: One of the factors influencing on indoor air quality of the buildings is performance of HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. These systems supply clean and odorless air, with temperature, humidity, and air velocity within comfort ranges for the residents. The aim of this study was to evaluate performance HVAC system in an administrative building in Tehran. .Material and Method: A questionnaire, developed in their research was used to assess the building occupants’ perception about the performance of HVAC system. To evaluate the performance of HVAC systems, air velocities were measured in the diffusers using a thermal anemometer. Moreover, CO2 concentration, air temperature and relative humidity were measured in the whole floors of the building. Air distribution inside the building was evaluated using smoke test. .Results: Most of the studied people complained about the direction of airflow, thermal conditions and cigarette odor. The highest level of carbon dioxide was measured at 930 ppm inside the restaurant. The maximum and minimum air temperatures and relative humidity were measured 28.3-13.8° C and 28.4-23% respectively. Smoke test showed that the air distribution/direction wasn’t suitable in one third of air diffusers. .Conclusion: Improper air distribution / direction was the main problem with the studied HVAC system which could be corrected by adjusting and balancing of the system.

Designing an Earthquake-Resistant Building

Science.gov (United States)

English, Lyn D.; King, Donna T.

2016-01-01

How do cross-bracing, geometry, and base isolation help buildings withstand earthquakes? These important structural design features involve fundamental geometry that elementary school students can readily model and understand. The problem activity, Designing an Earthquake-Resistant Building, was undertaken by several classes of sixth- grade…

21 CFR 225.20 - Buildings.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-04-01

... CURRENT GOOD MANUFACTURING PRACTICE FOR MEDICATED FEEDS Construction and Maintenance of Facilities and Equipment § 225.20 Buildings. (a) The location, design, construction, and physical size of the buildings and other production facilities are factors important to the manufacture of medicated feed. The features of...

FAIR DAQ system: Performances and global DAQ management

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ordine, A.; Boiano, A.; Zaghi, A.

1997-01-01

We present on overview of the features of FAIR (FAst Inter-crate Readout), a novel open-quotes plug-n-playclose quotes trigger and readout oriented bus system. It provides for an effective low-cost homogeneous, highly extendible and scalable, front-end environment. Readout and event-building are performed, at the same time, without the need of CPUs, by means of a transparent hardware level protocol. The measured rate of data transfer and event-building can be as fast as 22ns/longword (1.44 Gbit/s). The measured performances will be discussed. The open-quotes plug-n-playclose quotes feature will be also presented in some detail along with the control system based on a network embedded in the bus

Neural network-based feature point descriptors for registration of optical and SAR images

Science.gov (United States)

Abulkhanov, Dmitry; Konovalenko, Ivan; Nikolaev, Dmitry; Savchik, Alexey; Shvets, Evgeny; Sidorchuk, Dmitry

2018-04-01

Registration of images of different nature is an important technique used in image fusion, change detection, efficient information representation and other problems of computer vision. Solving this task using feature-based approaches is usually more complex than registration of several optical images because traditional feature descriptors (SIFT, SURF, etc.) perform poorly when images have different nature. In this paper we consider the problem of registration of SAR and optical images. We train neural network to build feature point descriptors and use RANSAC algorithm to align found matches. Experimental results are presented that confirm the method's effectiveness.

Experimental validation of the buildings energy performance (PEC assessment methods with reference to occupied spaces heating

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cristian PETCU

2010-01-01

Full Text Available This paper is part of the series of pre-standardization research aimed to analyze the existing methods of calculating the Buildings Energy Performance (PEC in view of their correction of completing. The entire research activity aims to experimentally validate the PEC Calculation Algorithm as well as the comparative application, on the support of several case studies focused on representative buildings of the stock of buildings in Romania, of the PEC calculation methodology for buildings equipped with occupied spaces heating systems. The targets of the report are the experimental testing of the calculation models so far known (NP 048-2000, Mc 001-2006, SR EN 13790:2009, on the support provided by the CE INCERC Bucharest experimental building, together with the complex calculation algorithms specific to the dynamic modeling, for the evaluation of the occupied spaces heat demand in the cold season, specific to the traditional buildings and to modern buildings equipped with solar radiation passive systems, of the ventilated solar space type. The schedule of the measurements performed in the 2008-2009 cold season is presented as well as the primary processing of the measured data and the experimental validation of the heat demand monthly calculation methods, on the support of CE INCERC Bucharest. The calculation error per heating season (153 days of measurements between the measured heat demand and the calculated one was of 0.61%, an exceptional value confirming the phenomenological nature of the INCERC method, NP 048-2006. The mathematical model specific to the hourly thermal balance is recurrent – decisional with alternating paces. The experimental validation of the theoretical model is based on the measurements performed on the CE INCERC Bucharest building, within a time lag of 57 days (06.01-04.03.2009. The measurements performed on the CE INCERC Bucharest building confirm the accuracy of the hourly calculation model by comparison to the values

An empirical comparison of voluntary and mandatory building energy performance disclosure outcomes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gabe, Jeremy

2016-01-01

In 2010, the federal Australian government mandated the disclosure of energy performance ratings in advertisements for sale or lease of large commercial office properties. Prior to 2010, participation in the rating scheme was voluntary. This study first develops a theoretical model of mandatory disclosure policy effectiveness. Then, with a dataset of all ratings since inception of the voluntary regime in 1999, it tests the expectation that initial voluntary adopters have a greater tendency towards environmental stewardship and are more likely to manage and invest in environmental performance improvements, potentially dampening the effectiveness of mandatory disclosure policy. However, multiple statistical models of certification are unable to reject the null hypothesis that there is no difference in energy efficiency outcomes between the mandatory and voluntary adopters at equivalent stages. For urban policymakers, the extrapolation of voluntary adopter performance appears to be a good – perhaps even conservative – estimation of mandatory energy performance disclosure outcomes. - Highlights: •A theoretical model of building energy disclosure policy effectiveness is proposed. •Mandatory disclosure adopters reduce consumption similar to voluntary adopters. •Mandatory building energy disclosure in Australia has been effective. •Early adopters creating a market for energy retrofits is a likely reason for success.

Reflective coatings for interior and exterior of buildings and improving thermal performance

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Joudi, Ali; Svedung, Harald; Cehlin, Mathias; Rönnelid, Mats

2013-01-01

Highlights: ► Increase building energy efficiency by optimizing surface optical properties. ► Study different scenarios with both interior and exterior reflective coatings. ► Combined thermal effect of both interior and exterior reflective coatings. -- Abstract: The importance of reducing building energy usage and thriving for more energy efficient architectures, has nurtured creative solutions and smart choices of materials in the last few decades. Among those are optimizing surface optical properties for both interior and exterior claddings of the building. Development in the coil-coating steel industries has now made it possible to allocate correct optical properties for steel clad buildings with improved thermal performance. Although the importance of the exterior coating and solar gain are thoroughly studied in many literatures, the effect of interior cladding are less tackled, especially when considering a combination of both interior and exterior reflective coatings. This paper contemplates the thermal behavior of small cabins with reflective coatings on both interior and exterior cladding, under different conditions and climates with the aim to clarify and point out to the potential energy saving by smart choices of clad coatings.

Expand the Modeling Capabilities of DOE's EnergyPlus Building Energy Simulation Program

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Don Shirey

2008-02-28

EnergyPlus{trademark} is a new generation computer software analysis tool that has been developed, tested, and commercialized to support DOE's Building Technologies (BT) Program in terms of whole-building, component, and systems R&D (http://www.energyplus.gov). It is also being used to support evaluation and decision making of zero energy building (ZEB) energy efficiency and supply technologies during new building design and existing building retrofits. Version 1.0 of EnergyPlus was released in April 2001, followed by semiannual updated versions over the ensuing seven-year period. This report summarizes work performed by the University of Central Florida's Florida Solar Energy Center (UCF/FSEC) to expand the modeling capabilities of EnergyPlus. The project tasks involved implementing, testing, and documenting the following new features or enhancement of existing features: (1) A model for packaged terminal heat pumps; (2) A model for gas engine-driven heat pumps with waste heat recovery; (3) Proper modeling of window screens; (4) Integrating and streamlining EnergyPlus air flow modeling capabilities; (5) Comfort-based controls for cooling and heating systems; and (6) An improved model for microturbine power generation with heat recovery. UCF/FSEC located existing mathematical models or generated new model for these features and incorporated them into EnergyPlus. The existing or new models were (re)written using Fortran 90/95 programming language and were integrated within EnergyPlus in accordance with the EnergyPlus Programming Standard and Module Developer's Guide. Each model/feature was thoroughly tested and identified errors were repaired. Upon completion of each model implementation, the existing EnergyPlus documentation (e.g., Input Output Reference and Engineering Document) was updated with information describing the new or enhanced feature. Reference data sets were generated for several of the features to aid program users in selecting proper

Solar Assisted Ground Source Heat Pump Performance in Nearly Zero Energy Building in Baltic Countries

Science.gov (United States)

Januševičius, Karolis; Streckienė, Giedrė

2013-12-01

In near zero energy buildings (NZEB) built in Baltic countries, heat production systems meet the challenge of large share domestic hot water demand and high required heating capacity. Due to passive solar design, cooling demand in residential buildings also needs an assessment and solution. Heat pump systems are a widespread solution to reduce energy use. A combination of heat pump and solar thermal collectors helps to meet standard requirements and increases the share of renewable energy use in total energy balance of country. The presented paper describes a simulation study of solar assisted heat pump systems carried out in TRNSYS. The purpose of this simulation was to investigate how the performance of a solar assisted heat pump combination varies in near zero energy building. Results of three systems were compared to autonomous (independent) systems simulated performance. Different solar assisted heat pump design solutions with serial and parallel solar thermal collector connections to the heat pump loop were modelled and a passive cooling possibility was assessed. Simulations were performed for three Baltic countries: Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

Behavioral Change and Building Performance: Strategies for Significant, Persistent, and Measurable Institutional Change

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Wolfe, Amy K.; Malone, Elizabeth L.; Heerwagen, Judith H.; Dion, Jerome P.

2014-04-01

The people who use Federal buildings — Federal employees, operations and maintenance staff, and the general public — can significantly impact a building’s environmental performance and the consumption of energy, water, and materials. Many factors influence building occupants’ use of resources (use behaviors) including work process requirements, ability to fulfill agency missions, new and possibly unfamiliar high-efficiency/high-performance building technologies; a lack of understanding, education, and training; inaccessible information or ineffective feedback mechanisms; and cultural norms and institutional rules and requirements, among others. While many strategies have been used to introduce new occupant use behaviors that promote sustainability and reduced resource consumption, few have been verified in the scientific literature or have properly documented case study results. This paper documents validated strategies that have been shown to encourage new use behaviors that can result in significant, persistent, and measureable reductions in resource consumption. From the peer-reviewed literature, the paper identifies relevant strategies for Federal facilities and commercial buildings that focus on the individual, groups of individuals (e.g., work groups), and institutions — their policies, requirements, and culture. The paper documents methods with evidence of success in changing use behaviors and enabling occupants to effectively interact with new technologies/designs. It also provides a case study of the strategies used at a Federal facility — Fort Carson, Colorado. The paper documents gaps in the current literature and approaches, and provides topics for future research.

Enhancing the Performance of LibSVM Classifier by Kernel F-Score Feature Selection

Science.gov (United States)

Sarojini, Balakrishnan; Ramaraj, Narayanasamy; Nickolas, Savarimuthu

Medical Data mining is the search for relationships and patterns within the medical datasets that could provide useful knowledge for effective clinical decisions. The inclusion of irrelevant, redundant and noisy features in the process model results in poor predictive accuracy. Much research work in data mining has gone into improving the predictive accuracy of the classifiers by applying the techniques of feature selection. Feature selection in medical data mining is appreciable as the diagnosis of the disease could be done in this patient-care activity with minimum number of significant features. The objective of this work is to show that selecting the more significant features would improve the performance of the classifier. We empirically evaluate the classification effectiveness of LibSVM classifier on the reduced feature subset of diabetes dataset. The evaluations suggest that the feature subset selected improves the predictive accuracy of the classifier and reduce false negatives and false positives.

Buildings interoperability landscape - Draft

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hardin, Dave B. [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Stephan, Eric G. [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Wang, Weimin [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Corbin, Charles D. [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Widergren, Steven E. [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)

2015-02-01

Buildings are an integral part of our nation’s energy economy. The advancement in information and communications technology (ICT) has revolutionized energy management in industrial facilities and large commercial buildings. As ICT costs decrease and capabilities increase, buildings automation and energy management features are transforming the small-medium commercial and residential buildings sectors. A vision of a connected world in which equipment and systems within buildings coordinate with each other to efficiently meet their owners’ and occupants’ needs, and where buildings regularly transact business with other buildings and service providers (such as gas and electric service providers) is emerging. However, while the technology to support this collaboration has been demonstrated at various degrees of maturity, the integration frameworks and ecosystems of products that support the ability to easily install, maintain, and evolve building systems and their equipment components are struggling to nurture the fledging business propositions of their proponents.

Courtyard as a Passive Cooling Strategy in Buildings

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Markus Bulus

2017-01-01

Full Text Available One of the most significant current discussions in the built environment, architectural practice, theory, and procedures is “Passive Design”. It is becoming very difficult to ignore the issues of passive architectural design strategies in buildings. Recent studies emphasized the need for passive architectural design strategies and the application of the courtyard as a passive design strategy for cooling in buildings. Also, that the courtyard is very suitable in almost all building typologies in all the climatic zones due to its passive tendencies for cooling. Its cooling potentials can be achieved only when design requirements are not ignored. The courtyard has social, cultural, religious, and environmental benefits. Despite its abundant advantages, research effort towards courtyard design requirements is very scarce. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to investigate the design of central courtyard as a passive cooling strategy for improving indoor thermal comfort in Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM Buildings. Courtyard design requirement such as the courtyard configurations, orientation, and natural features in courtyard buildings in UTM were investigated. Besides the design variants, courtyard usage in such buildings was also examined. The methodology of this study involved the developing of a checklist based on literature for the field survey. Forty-six (46 courtyards in thirty-two (32 buildings in UTM were surveyed, and the statistical description method was used to interpret and analyzed the data. The Results of this quantitative study shows that UTM central courtyards buildings were designed based on a cautious consideration to orientation and configurations to enhance their effective passive cooling potentials, however, only two courtyards had water pools. The study concluded that courtyards in UTM buildings are creatively designed but future experimental studies to appraise their thermal performances is required, and