Investigating the Role of Occupants, Complex Contextual Factors, and Norms on Residential Energy Consumption.

Human behavior in the built environment has repeatedly been found to have significant meaningful impact on energy consumption. As a consequence researchers have spent considerable efforts investigating various approaches to induce improved occupant behavior, with much recent attention on the use of normative approaches. However, it still remains unclear as to how occupants behave in buildings, how complex factors influence behavioral interventions, and what the long term effects of intervening are. With this background in mind, there are three broad goals in this research: (1) to improve our understanding of the impact of occupant decision making in residential energy consumption, (2) to enhance our understanding of how individual characteristics and complex contextual factors influence change in individual behavior and its diffusion through communities when subjected to normative intervention, and (3) to identify more effective normative behavioral strategies for reducing energy consumption in the built environment. In order to achieve these diverse research objectives, I conducted four interrelated studies based on an iterative research framework that applies an interdisciplinary research approach integrating field experiments with computational modeling. Through these studies it was found that: (1) vast quantities of energy are spent in unoccupied residences and that the percentage of energy consumed while unoccupied in a residence is unrelated to total use; (2) when applying behavior interventions social network structure can meaningfully affect how behavior diffuses and intervention outcome; (3) normative messaging duration positively influenced the durability of behavior change; (4) not all individuals were equally influenced by normative messaging with high norm individuals reducing energy consumption and low norm individuals increasing consumption; (5) by exploiting behavioral responses to normative messaging significant reductions in energy consumption could conceptually be achieved. These findings improve our understanding of occupant behavior, how occupants are influenced by social forces in the built environment, and how complex contextual factors moderate the diffusion of behavior. Further, the findings provide insight into how to improve the environmental sustainability of buildings through behavioral approaches.PhDCivil EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/113508/1/kyleand_1.pd

A multidisciplinary research approach to energy-related behavior in buildings

Occupant behavior in buildings is one of the key drivers of building energy performance. Closing the “performance gap” in the building sector requires a deeper understanding and consideration of the “human factor” in energy usage. For Europe and US to meet their challenging 2020 and 2050 energy and GHG reduction goals, we need to harness the potential savings of human behavior in buildings, in addition to deployment of energy efficient technologies and energy policies for buildings. Through involvement in international projects such as IEA ECBC Annex 53 and EBC Annex 66, the research conducted in the context of this thesis provided significant contributions to understand occupants’ interactions with building systems and to reduce their energy use in residential and commercial buildings over the entire building life cycle. The primary goal of this Ph.D. study is to explore and highlight the human factor in energy use as a fundamental aspect influencing the energy performance of buildings and maximizing energy efficiency – to the same extent as technological innovation. Scientific literature was reviewed to understand state-of-the-art gaps and limitations of research in the field. Human energy-related behavior in buildings emerges a stochastic and highly complex problem, which cannot be solved by one discipline alone. Typically, a technological-social dichotomy pertains to the human factor in reducing energy use in buildings. Progressing past that, this research integrates occupant behavior in a multidisciplinary approach that combines insights from the technical, analytical and social dimension. This is achieved by combining building physics (occupant behavior simulation in building energy models to quantify impact on building performance) and data science (data mining, analytics, modeling and profiling of behavioral patterns in buildings) with behavioral theories (engaging occupants and motivating energy-saving occupant behaviors) to provide multidisciplinary, innovative insights on human-centered energy efficiency in buildings. The systematic interconnection of these three dimensions is adopted at different scales. The building system is observed at the residential and commercial level. Data is gathered, then analyzed, modeled, standardized and simulated from the zone to the building level, up to the district scale. Concerning occupant behavior, this research focuses on individual, group and collective actions. Various stakeholders can benefit from this Ph.D. dissertation results. Audience of the research includes energy modelers, architects, HVAC engineers, operators, owners, policymakers, building technology vendors, as well as simulation program designers, implementers and evaluators. The connection between these different levels, research foci and targeted audience is not linear among the three observed systems. Rather, the multidisciplinary research approach to energy-related behavior in buildings proposed by this Ph.D. study has been adopted to explore solutions that could overcome the limitations and shortcomings in the state-of-the-art research

Occupant behavior and its impact on energy consumption of urban residential buildings

Improving the energy efficiency of buildings cannot be circumvented to address two big challenges confronting us today - energy security and climate change. Operation of buildings alone accounted for 30% of global final energy consumption and 28% of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2018 (IEA, 2019). With rapid urbanization and growth in household income, especially among developing countries, energy demand from buildings may double or even triple by mid-century if we go with business as usual (IPCC, 2014). Energy reduction and decarbonization of buildings is hence critical for both ensuring energy security and mitigating climate change, where technology alone is not sufficient and the behaviors of building occupants have a role to play. This thesis explores human-building interactions and examines the impact of occupant behavior on energy consumption of residential buildings with empirical evidence from a large-scale survey in Beijing, China. The findings of this work can help us better understand various energy-related behaviors and how they influence building energy use at the city scale, adding to existing technology and policy solutions for improving building energy efficiency and contributing with empirical evidence to both building energy research and effective energy policy-making. To begin with, by a systematic review of research on occupant behavior and building energy performance, the energy-saving potential of occupant behavior is estimated to be in the range of 10-25% for residential buildings and 5-30% for commercial buildings. Four existing research gaps in the field have also been identified, namely the needs for understanding occupant behavior in a systematic framework; for stronger empirical evidence beyond individual buildings and at a larger city scale; for linking occupant behavior to socio-economic and policy variables; and for evaluating the role of occupant behavior in the effectiveness of building energy efficiency policy. Following the literature review, the thesis goes on to explore occupants' energy-related behavior in residential buildings. An in-depth and comprehensive picture of occupant behavior in Beijing households are presented: Purchase behavior is overall energy-efficient; air conditioning (AC), for both purchase and usage behaviors, plays a critical role as the residents usually have less energy efficient AC in their homes and use it more often and for a longer period of time than other devices; habitual behavior are consistent across all habitual categories. Furthermore, there is no single, straightforward and coherent pattern of behavior that can be explained by any single socio-economic factor. With a better understanding occupant behavior in buildings on the basis of the empirical data from Beijing, the thesis further examines the effect of occupant behavior on energy consumption of urban residential buildings. Several key findings emerge - i.e. occupant behavior overall explains about 25% of the variability in residential energy consumption, 28% in space heating energy and 12% in non-space-heating energy; purchase behavior explains the most variability; space heating option and fuel type of the primary kitchen stove are the two most influential purchase behaviors in residential energy use. The relationship between attitude and behavior relating to residential energy use is also investigated. The results show a mixed picture: An attitude-behavior gap exists for purchase behavior as the occupants generally don't behave consistently with their reported willingness to pay more for energy efficient products, but when it comes to the energy efficiency of household products, there is a consistency between attitude and behavior; likewise, for habitual behavior, the occupants display an attitude-behavior gap in terms of behavior relating to thermal comfort and lighting, whereas their habitual action towards unused appliances/equipment is consistent with their reported attitude

An assessment of the load modifying potential of model predictive controlled dynamic facades within the California context

California is making major strides towards meeting its greenhouse gas emission reduction goals with the transformation of its electrical grid to accommodate renewable generation, aggressive promotion of building energy efficiency, and increased emphasis on moving toward electrification of end uses (e.g., residential heating, etc.). As a result of this activity, the State is faced with significant challenges of systemwide resource adequacy, power quality and grid reliability that could be addressed in part with demand responsive (DR) load modifying strategies using controllable building technologies. Dynamic facades have the ability to potentially shift and shed loads at critical times of the day in combination with daylighting and HVAC controls. This study explores the technical potential of dynamic facades to support net load shape objectives. A model predictive controller (MPC) was designed based on reduced order thermal (Modelica) and window (Radiance) models. Using an automated workflow (involving JModelica.org and MPCPy), these models were converted and differentiated to formulate a non-linear optimization problem. A gradient-based, non-linear programming problem solver (IPOPT) was used to derive an optimal control strategy, then a post-optimization step was used to convert the solution to a discrete state for facade actuation. Continuous state modulation of the façade was also modeled. The performance of the MPC controller with and without activation of thermal mass was evaluated in a south-facing perimeter office zone with a three-zone electrochromic window for a clear sunny week during summer and winter periods in Oakland and Burbank, California. MPC strategies reduced total energy cost by 9–28% and critical coincident peak demand was reduced by up to 0.58 W/ft2-floor or 19–43% in the 4.6 m (15 ft) deep south zone on sunny summer days in Oakland compared to state-of-the-art heuristic control. Similar savings were achieved for the hotter, Burbank climate in Southern California. This outcome supports the argument that MPC control of dynamic facades can provide significant electricity cost reductions and net load management capabilities of benefit to both the building owner and evolving electrical grid

Occupant-Centric Simulation-Aided Building Design Theory, Application, and Case Studies

This book promotes occupants as a focal point for the design process

Editorial: SDEWES science - The path to a sustainable carbon neutral world

In 2021, the 16th SDEWES (Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems) Conference was held in Dubrovnik (Croatia), October 10th – 15th and delivered more than 690 contributions, presented in regular and 13 special sessions, with 7 invited lectures devoted to various sustainability topics. The Energy journal has continued its cooperation with SDEWES launching a special issue dedicated to this SDEWES Conference. The 29 selected papers cover a wide variety of issues in the fields of energy, water and environment, and all of them propose novel approaches or remarkable advances in well established research lines already explored in past SDEWES Conferences

Full Proceedings, 2018

Full conference proceedings for the 2018 International Building Physics Association Conference hosted at Syracuse University

Proceedings of the 9th Arab Society for Computer Aided Architectural Design (ASCAAD) international conference 2021 (ASCAAD 2021): architecture in the age of disruptive technologies: transformation and challenges.

The ASCAAD 2021 conference theme is Architecture in the age of disruptive technologies: transformation and challenges. The theme addresses the gradual shift in computational design from prototypical morphogenetic-centered associations in the architectural discourse. This imminent shift of focus is increasingly stirring a debate in the architectural community and is provoking a much needed critical questioning of the role of computation in architecture as a sole embodiment and enactment of technical dimensions, into one that rather deliberately pursues and embraces the humanities as an ultimate aspiration