Ambient sensorization for the furtherance of sustainability

Energy efficiency is regarded as an important objective in a world of limited resources. The sustainable use of energy is necessary for the continuity of life styles that do not jeopardize the future. Nevertheless, due to poor information about the impact of human actions on the environment, it is hard to promote and warn for sustainability. This work focuses on the use of ambient intelligence as a mean to constantly revise sustainability indicators in a way they may be used for user awareness and recommendation systems within communities. The approach in this research makes use of sustainable indicators monitored through ambient sensors which enable user accountability concerning their actions inside each environment. Also, it is possible to compare the effect of user actions in the environment, enabling decision making based on such comparison factors.(undefined

Information fusion for context awareness in intelligent environments

The development of intelligent environments requires handling of data perceived from users, received from environments and gathered from objects. Such data is often used to implement machine learning tasks in order to predict actions or to anticipate needs and wills, as well as to provide additional context in applications. Thus, it is often needed to perform operations upon collected data, such as pre-processing, information fusion of sensor data, and manage models from machine learning. These machine learning models may have impact on the performance of platforms and systems used to obtain intelligent environments. In this paper, it is addressed the issue of the development of middleware for intelligent systems, using techniques from information fusion and machine learning that provide context awareness and reduce the impact of information acquisition on both storage and energy efficiency. This discussion is presented in the context of PHESS, a project to ensure energetic sustainability, based on intelligent agents and multi-agent systems, where these techniques are applied

4th International Symposium on Ambient Intelligence (ISAmI 2013)

Ambient Intelligence (AmI) is a recent paradigm emerging from Artificial Intelligence (AI), where computers are used as proactive tools assisting people with their day-to-day activities, making everyone’s life more comfortable. Another main concern of AmI originates from the human computer interaction domain and focuses on offering ways to interact with systems in a more natural way by means user friendly interfaces. This field is evolving quickly as can be witnessed by the emerging natural language and gesture based types of interaction. The inclusion of computational power and communication technologies in everyday objects is growing and their embedding into our environments should be as invisible as possible. In order for AmI to be successful, human interaction with computing power and embedded systems in the surroundings should be smooth and happen without people actually noticing it. The only awareness people should have arises from AmI: more safety, comfort and wellbeing, emerging in a natural and inherent way. ISAmI is the International Symposium on Ambient Intelligence and aiming to bring together researchers from various disciplines that constitute the scientific field of Ambient Intelligence to present and discuss the latest results, new ideas, projects and lessons learned, namely in terms of software and applications, and aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines that are interested in all aspects of this area

Sensorização, fusão sensorial e dispositivos móveis : contribuições para a sustentabilidade de ambientes inteligentes

Dissertação de mestrado em Engenharia InformáticaA sustentabilidade está dependente das decisões que o ser humano toma no ambiente em que se envolve. Por outro lado, é necessário ter consciência sobre o impacto das suas ações no meio ambiente. O crescimento da tecnologia e da área científica de sistemas inteligentes tem sido cada vez maior, tornando-se parceiras do ser humano, e o seu potencial para Ambientes Inteligentes e sustentabilidade tem sido evidenciado nos últimos tempos. Para enriquecer a resposta do Ambiente Inteligente aos seus utilizadores poder-se-á recorrer a sensores dispostos no ambiente e à fusão sensorial e de informação. As recomendações e previsões produzidas têm como objetivo a avaliação e o estudo da sustentabilidade do ambiente, nomeadamente, da utilização equilibrada da energia. Dentro dos contextos de sensibilização, de prevenção das ações do utilizador e da sustentabilidade do ambiente em que o ser humano esteja inserido, existem outros objetivos a alcançar, nomeadamente, a fusão de informação como ferramenta na utilização em suporte tecnológicos. A necessidade de aliar este processamento de dados/informação ao desenvolvimento de um conjunto de plataformas que permitam ao utilizador perceber efeitos negativos ou positivos que as condições analisadas têm, passando por possíveis recomendações ao utilizador. Esta plataforma deliberativa e reativa apoiará, processos e práticas de consciencialização para a sustentabilidade, por forma a conseguir mudanças nos padrões de estilo de vida, de produção e consumo de energia. O presente trabalho incide sobre a integração das Tecnologias da Informação e Comunicação (TIC) no meio envolvente, com estratégias de sustentabilidade dentro da dimensão social, ambiental e económica. As TIC associadas a conceitos de inteligência ambiente e elementos físicos, como por exemplo, edifícios, permitem obter formas de melhorar aspectos como o consumo energético e o impacto ambiental, na medida em que podem gerir de forma eficiente o consumo de recursos e contribuir para a redução de desperdícios. Um exemplo de aplicação pode ser encontrado na plataforma de Agentes Inteligentes, denominada por PHESS, que com ligação a sensores que permite centralizar a recolha de dados e obter decisões através de processos deliberativos automaticamente. Esta dissertação foca-se na extensão da plataforma PHESS com processos de fusão sensorial e de informação e, ainda, na criação e da monitorização dos novos indicadores que permitem promover a sustentabilidade social, económica e ambiental proporcionando aos utilizadores novas possibilidades de acesso a serviços e de participação na comunidade. A utilização de sistemas inteligentes, auxiliam na ação sobre o meio e são, por isso, uma mais-valia para o conforto das pessoas e para a sustentabilidade do ambiente.Sustainability is dependent on the decisions that humans take in the environment in which they are involved. On the other hand, it is necessary to be aware of the impact of their actions on the environment. The growth of the technologicy and scientific area of intelligent systems has been greater, becoming a partner of the human being, and its potential for sustainability and Intelligent Environments have been evidenced in recent times. To enrich responses from intelligent environments to their users, sensor and information fusion techniques can be used with the help of sensor dispersed across the environment. Recommendations and forecasts produced aim to evaluate and study of environmental sustainability, namely balanced use of energy. Within a context of awareness, prevention of user’s actions and sustainability of the environment in which the human being is inserted, there are other objectives to be achieve, for instance, information fusion as a tool for use in technological support. The need to combine this data/information processing to develop a set of platforms to enable the user to assess the negative or positive conditions has been done through suggestions to the user. This deliberative and reactive platform should support processes and practices of sustainability awareness to promote changes in lifestyle patterns of production and consumption of energy. This work focuses on the integration of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in the environment with sustainability strategies within the social, environmental and economic dimensions. ICT associated with physical elements, such as buildings, can reduce energy consumption and environmental impact, in that it can efficiently manage resource consumption and help to reduce waste. An example can be demonstrated by the Intelligent Agents platform, called for PHESS, which with connection to sensors, provides a centralized collection of data and obtain decision through deliberative processes automatically. The work here detailed is focused on the extension of the PHESS platform with processes from sensor and information fusion and the creation and monitoring of new indicators that can promote social, economic and environmental sustainability giving people new access to services and to participate in the community. The use of intelligent systems, which help to act in the environment and therefore, are an asset for the comfort of people and the sustainability of the environment