Your search

Solar shading devices, such as Venetian blinds, are effective in controlling heat and light gain in buildings. This study focuses on developing an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to automate the management of Venetian blinds in order to find a balance between energy savings and visual comfort. Typically, automatic control strategies rely on cut-off angles or maintaining appropriate indoor illuminance. However, finding the optimal trade-off between solar gain and daylight is challenging,...

Due to climate change, the intensity, duration and frequency of heatwaves are likely to increase in the coming years. Excessive heat events can increase local urban heat island intensity affecting the health and wellbeing of urban dwellers vulnerable to heat stress. Heat-Health Warning Systems (HHWSs) have been developed to warn the public of impending heat events and to advise on preventable negative health outcomes. However, metrics upon which action triggers are made in HHWSs rely on...

Due to climate change, the intensity, duration and frequency of heatwaves are likely to increase in the coming years. Excessive heat events can increase local urban heat island intensity affecting the health and wellbeing of urban dwellers vulnerable to heat stress. Heat-Health Warning Systems (HHWSs) have been developed to warn the public of impending heat events and to advise on preventable negative health outcomes. However, metrics upon which action triggers are made in HHWSs rely on...

Model-based optimal control has proven its effectiveness in optimizing the performance of central air-conditioning systems in terms of thermal comfort and energy efficiency. It was often assumed that temperature distribution in the entire air-conditioned space is uniform and can be represented by a single or averaged measurement in optimization. However, actual distribution in the air-conditioned space is usually uneven, which can affect thermal comfort and indoor air quality. The dynamics...

In an increasingly digital world, there are fast-paced developments in fields such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Data Mining, Digital Twins, Cyber-Physical Systems and the Internet of Things. This paper reviews and discusses how these new emerging areas relate to the traditional domain of building performance simulation. It explores the boundaries between building simulation and these other fields in order to identify conceptual differences and similarities, strengths and...

Abstract Enhancing community capacity towards resilience is key to reducing climate disaster risk, especially in Black immigrant communities in Canada. While there are many extreme climate change events occurring, such as hailstorms, floods, snowstorms, forest fires, droughts, and heat waves in western Canada, there is no known study that has explored resilience within sub‐Saharan African immigrant communities to climate disaster risks in western Canada. All these extreme climate change...

Teachers’ personal beliefs and understanding about science topics play a vital role in students learning. This is especially relevant for the teaching of climate change which is a scientifically complicated topic that can also be influenced by personal and political views. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with thirteen Pakistani chemistry teachers (grades 10 & 12) to understand their knowledge about the science of climate change as well as their beliefs and practices related...

Energy studies of buildings are becoming more widespread as stakeholders strive to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions. As a result, there is an increased need for novel numerical techniques to automatically calibrate building energy models (BEMs) for these energy studies. In this paper, a new automated building calibration methodology was developed, which uses a surrogate (i.e., meta) multilayer perceptron artificial neural network (ANN) to infer unknown building...

Anthropogenic climate change is a serious global environmental issue that threatens food and water security, energy production, and human health and wellbeing, ultimately jeopardizing the attainment of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). A good understanding of climate change is essential for societies to adapt to or mitigate it. Yet, studies reveal that most people have limited knowledge, misconceptions and misunderstanding about climate change. Sub-Saharan Africa is projected to...

This paper aims to develop long-term adaptation strategies for the existing Canadian school buildings under extreme current and future climates using a developed methodology based on global and local sensitivity analysis and Multi-Objective Optimization Genetic Algorithm. The calibrated simulation model based on indoor and outdoor measured temperature for a school of interest is used to evaluate the optimization strategies. This paper aims to search for the optimum school building design...

Despite the critical need for urban planners to address climate change, there is a limited understanding of planning professionals’ perceptions of their climate change competency. This paper reports results from a survey of Australian urban planning professionals, identifying their perceived climate change knowledge, skills, competencies, and everyday practice. The urban planning professionals surveyed had high levels of perceived climate change knowledge, but only a small number incorporate...

Despite the critical need for urban planners to address climate change, there is a limited understanding of planning professionals’ perceptions of their climate change competency. This paper reports results from a survey of Australian urban planning professionals, identifying their perceived climate change knowledge, skills, competencies, and everyday practice. The urban planning professionals surveyed had high levels of perceived climate change knowledge, but only a small number incorporate...

This paper investigates the use of dilated causal convolutional neural networks for fine-grained temporal forecasting of building zone states. Specifically, we build and evaluate models using a small set of exogenous features (e.g., external temperature) to autoregressively predict zone airflow setpoints every minute for a 24-h prediction window. We carefully explore the trade-off between generality and specificity in these models, training and evaluating them based on zone, zone type,...

Abstract Aim To assess knowledge, perception, and practices regarding climate change (CC) among university students and to investigate the relationships between knowledge levels and reported practices in response to CC. Subject and methods A cross-sectional study was conducted among 768 undergraduate students from the practical and theoretical faculties of Al-Azhar University for Girls in Cairo. Results Most (82.6%) students had heard the term CC and believed it affected their communities....

The revolution of the industry 4.0 presents a new era of digital transformation for the construction industry, advancing towards the concept of digital twins, while on the other hand it faces the global challenge of reducing carbon emissions from operational assets. The current research gap in the application of digital twins for achieving net zero were reviewed in this study, highlighting its potentials for enhancement in the built environment, and emphasizing the need for demonstration of...

Thermal comfort in learning environments influences the student’s focus and learning productivity. This study aims to evaluate and compare the adaptive thermal comfort of schoolchildren and their teachers in naturally ventilated primary schools in some selected cities in Imo State Nigeria. To achieve these objectives, the study analyzed the data collected from 330 pupils and 44 teachers in six surveyed classrooms in two types of classroom buildings. The recorded data in the surveyed...

Indoor light quality is the intensity and amount of illumination of interior spaces. Technological developments have led to the utilisation of artificial natural light. Illumination is crucial in the visibility of tasks. Quality of light can influence the visual comfort and ocular health of the students. Although Kenya lacks lighting standards for schools, ISO and CIE provide international guidelines on optimal illumination for various facilities. This study was conducted on public boarding...