Introducing Energy Efficiency into SQALE

Energy Efficiency is becoming a key factor in software development, given the sharp growth of IT systems and their impact on worldwide energy consumption. We do believe that a quality process infrastructure should be able to consider the Energy Efficiency of a system since its early development: for this reason we propose to introduce Energy Efficiency into the existing quality models. We selected the SQALE model and we tailored it inserting Energy Efficiency as a sub-characteristic of efficiency. We also propose a set of six source code specific requirements for the Java language starting from guidelines currently suggested in the literature. We experienced two major challenges: the identification of measurable, automatically detectable requirements, and the lack of empirical validation on the guidelines currently present in the literature and in the industrial state of the practice as well. We describe an experiment plan to validate the six requirements and evaluate the impact of their violation on Energy Efficiency, which has been partially proved by preliminary results on C code. Having Energy Efficiency in a quality model and well verified code requirements to measure it, will enable a quality process that precisely assesses and monitors the impact of software on energy consumptio

Greening information management: final report

As the recent JISC report on ‘the ‘greening’ of ICT in education [1] highlights, the increasing reliance on ICT to underpin the business functions of higher education institutions has a heavy environmental impact, due mainly to the consumption of electricity to run computers and to cool data centres. While work is already under way to investigate how more energy efficient ICT can be introduced, to date there has been much less focus on the potential environmental benefits to be accrued from reducing the demand ‘at source’ through better data and information management. JISC thus commissioned the University of Strathclyde to undertake a study to gather evidence that establishes the efficacy of using information management options as components of Green ICT strategies within UK Higher Education environments, and to highlight existing practices which have the potential for wider replication

A dynamic simulation of low-carbon policy influences on endogenous electricity demand in an isolated island system

This paper considers the dynamics of electricity demand in response to changes arising from low-carbon policies and socio-economic developments. As part of an investigation into the evolution of such systems on small economically-developed islands, endogenous electricity demand and associated policies are studied for the Azorean island of São Miguel. A comprehensive System Dynamics (SD) model covering the period 2005 − 2050 is presented which captures both historical behaviours and real-world influences on the endogenous demand dynamics of an island-based electricity system. The impact of tourism, energy efficiency and electric vehicles (EV) expansion allied with associated policy options, are critically evaluated by the SD model using a series of scenarios. The model shows that energy efficiency measures exhibit the most significant long-term impact on electricity demand, while in contrast, policies to increase tourism have a much less direct impact and EV expansion has thought-provoking impacts on the long-term demand, although this is not as influential as energy efficiency measures

Life-cycle assessment of buildings: a Review

Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) is one of various management tools for evaluating environmental concerns. This paper reviews LCA from a buildings perspective. It highlights the need for its use within the building sector, and the importance of LCA as a decision making support tool. It discusses LCA methodologies and applications within the building sector, reviewing some of the life-cycle studies applied to buildings or building materials and component combinations within the last fifteen years in Europe and the United States. It highlights the problems of a lack of an internationally comparable and agreed data inventory and assessment methodology which hinder the application of LCA within the building industry. It identifies key areas for future research as (i) the whole process of construction, (ii) the relative weighting of different environmental impacts and (iii) applications in developing countries

Sustainability Assessment in Singular Structures, Foundations and Structural Rehabilitation in Spanish Legislation

The objective of this work is twofold: to determine the scope of the tools currently available for the assessment of sustainability of structures in Spanish legislation; and to identify environmental aspects that have yet to be covered, especially in the case of foundations and of measures aimed at the structural rehabilitation of singular buildings. To this end, the method proposed in the Spanish Instruction of Structural Concrete is applied to the particular case of the supported foundations of the Cylindrical and Colonel buildings in the construction of the new Faculties of Law and of Work Sciences, of the University of Seville during the period between 2005 and 2008. This case was chosen for its special uniqueness and for its inclusion of environmental aspects that remain outside the scope of existing methods. Most of these aspects are also of great relevance in structural rehabilitation activities carried out in urban environments and neighbourhoods, where a major surge is currently underway due to the economic crisis that has hit projects of newly constructed buildings. By virtue of the work carried out in recent years in the field of sustainability and the environment by several research groups at the University of Seville, a number of alternatives are proposed for the quantification of those aspects that remain to be considered. These techniques are based on tools that allow the agents to intervene in a flexible and effective way in the project implementation phase

The Building Information Model and the IFC standard: analysis of the characteristics necessary for the acoustic and energy simulation of buildings

The new European Directive 2014/24 / EU requires for all member States the use of BIM procedures in the construction of public buildings. The countries belonging to the European Union shall be obliged to transpose the Directive and adapt their procedures to that effect. The paper analyzes the IFC format, the only recognized by the European Directive Standards for BIM procedures, in order to assess its use for simulations of buildings. IFC, described by the ISO 16739 (2013), is today a standard that describes the topology of the constructive elements of the building and what belongs to it overall. The format includes geometrical information on the room and on all building components, including details of the type for performance (transmittance, fire resistance, sound insulation), in other words it is an independent object file for the software producers to which, according to the European Directive, it will be compulsory to refer in the near future, during the different stages of the life of a building from the design phase, to management and possible demolition at the end of life. The IFC initiative began in 1994, when an industry consortium invested in the development of a set of C ++ classes that can support the development of integrated applications. Twelve US companies joined the consortium: these companies that were included initially are called the consortium "Industry Alliance for Interoperability". In September 1995 the Alliance opened up membership to all interested parties, and in 1997 changed its name to "International Alliance for Interoperability". The new alliance was reconstituted as a non-profit organization, with the aim of developing and promoting the '' Industry Foundation Class "(IFC) as a neutral data model for the building product that were useful to gather information throughout the life cycle of a building facility. Since 2005 the Alliance has been carrying out its activities through its national chapters called SMART building. The present study aims at evaluating the IFC, comparing the information and data contained in it, with other formats already used for energy simulations of buildings such as the gbXML (Green Building XML), highlighting the missing required information and proposing the inclusion of new ones to issue the energy and acoustic simulation. More generally the attention is focused to building physics simulation software devoted to exploit the BIM model potential enabling interoperability

Review of the environmental and organisational implications of cloud computing: final report.

Cloud computing – where elastic computing resources are delivered over the Internet by external service providers – is generating significant interest within HE and FE. In the cloud computing business model, organisations or individuals contract with a cloud computing service provider on a pay-per-use basis to access data centres, application software or web services from any location. This provides an elasticity of provision which the customer can scale up or down to meet demand. This form of utility computing potentially opens up a new paradigm in the provision of IT to support administrative and educational functions within HE and FE. Further, the economies of scale and increasingly energy efficient data centre technologies which underpin cloud services means that cloud solutions may also have a positive impact on carbon footprints. In response to the growing interest in cloud computing within UK HE and FE, JISC commissioned the University of Strathclyde to undertake a Review of the Environmental and Organisational Implications of Cloud Computing in Higher and Further Education [19]

Is small beautiful? A multicriteria assessment of small-scale energy technology applications in local governments

In its 2003 White Paper the UK government set ambitious renewable energy targets. Local governments and households have an increasing role in the overall energy system as consumers, suppliers of smaller-scale applications and citizens discussing energy projects. In this paper, we consider if small-scale or large-scale approaches to renewable energy provision can achieve energy targets in the most socially, economically and environmentally (SEE) effective way. We take a local case study of renewable energy provision in the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees in Yorkshire, UK, and apply a multi-criteria decision analysis methodology to compare the small-scale schemes implemented in Kirklees with large-scale alternatives. The results indicate that small-scale schemes are the most SEE effective, despite large-scale schemes being more financially viable. The selection of the criteria on which the alternatives are assessed and the assigned weights for each criterion are of crucial importance. It is thus very important to include the relevant stakeholders to elicit this information

How to collect data on household energy consumption

The existence of reliable, disaggregated information on residential fuel consumption and supply is essential to the formulation of sound household energy strategies. This report presents guidelines for designing and administering household energy surveys. The report is composed of four chapters. Following the introduction, chapter 1 presents the existing methodologies and the advantages and disadvantages of each. Chapter 3 discusses household energy surveying, from survey and questionaire design through fieldwork and data processing/analysis. Finally, in chapter 4, a checklist is presented for use as a quick reference during the creation of a household energy survey.Energy and Environment,Social Analysis,Energy Conservation&Efficiency,Engineering,Transport and Environment