Search results for " EFFICIENCY"
showing 10 items of 1091 documents
Multicriteria evaluation of sustainable energy solutions for Colosseum
2017
Abstract Colosseum is a large office building in the capital region of Finland. The building owner operates on the highly competitive office rental market. With increasing emphasis on environmental responsibility, energy efficiency and sustainable energy solutions can provide competitive edge on the rental market. This study evaluates in terms of multiple criteria different alternatives to enhance the energy solutions of the building. The alternatives included different configurations of solar power, ground source heat, and roof constructions, along with district heating. Decision criteria included internal rate of return, energy efficiency, CO2 emissions, and attractiveness. Attractiveness…
Improving the sustainability of transportation: environmental and functional benefits of right-turn by pass lanes at roundabouts
2015
The functional performances of conventional roundabouts (single-lane and multi-lane) and innovative roundabouts (spiral, flower, C and turbo) can be improved through right-turn bypass lanes controlled by stop, yield or free-flow signs. The article presents evaluations of the emissions of air pollutants (carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particle pollution (PM10 and PM2.5)), fuel consumption and construction, management, energetic and environmental costs in roundabouts without or with bypass lanes (controlled by stop, yield or free-flow). The suggested methodology has a general character and can be applied as a multi-parametric criterion for choosing road intersections, although, in the prese…
Promotion of polygeneration for buildings applications through sector- and user-oriented “high efficiency CHP” eligibility criteria
2014
Abstract The eligibility criteria adopted to assess polygeneration plants as “highly efficient” can play a determinant role in favouring or discouraging the market growth of polygeneration systems, especially for buildings applications where economic viability is often more difficult to achieve. Based on the current European framework, in this paper the opportunity to adopt sector- and user-oriented criteria is discussed. After having identified three buildings with different uses (a large hotel, a hospital and an office building), the optimal lay-out and operation strategy of a polygeneration plant serving each building is determined; then, ex-post processing of economic and energetic resu…
An exploratory study for analyzing the energy savings obtainable by reshaping processes of sheet metal based components
2017
Abstract Producing materials causes about 25% of all anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Reshaping could be one of the most efficient strategy to foster material reuse and lower the environmental impact due to material production. Sheet metal forming processes can be applied to reshape sheet metal based component. This research field is still almost unexplored and the actual environmental impact saving potential has not been quantified. The present paper aims at starting to cover this research gap, a modeling effort to quantify the environmental impact saving of reshaping is proposed. Primary energy demand for conventional recycling and reshaping are quantified and compared. Primary energy savings…
A comprehensive tool for efficient design and operation of polygeneration-based energy μgrids serving a cluster of buildings. Part II: Analysis of th…
2013
Abstract The potential of polygeneration systems, in terms of profitability, energy saving and pollutant emissions reduction, highly depends on several factors such as plant efficiency, local normative and tariff conditions and reference technologies adopted to compare the results. In Part I of this paper a reliable tool was described, capable of optimizing the lay-out, design and operation of an integrated polygeneration system serving a cluster of buildings with their heat, cooling and power demand; the tool represents an excellent instrument to perform sensitivity analyses, thus enabling the analyst to formulate general design criteria and predict the effects of any change in the boundar…
Smart Cities and Municipal Building Regulation for Energy Efficiency
2015
The “Smart Cities & Communities Initiative” of the Strategic Energy Technology Plan is the strategic European response to lead cities and regions to a carbon free future. In this contest energy efficiency in buildings has a crucial role and must be considered in a holistic approach to the urban planning. In order to implement the minimum requirements stated by the European Directive about the Energy Performance of Buildings, and in order to consider different planning layers with the view to a smart city planning, local regulations are a key factor aiming at sustainable territorial planning. This paper investigates the possibility to draft a basic structure of Municipal Building Regulat…
Characterizing the "driver DNA" through CAN bus data analysis
2017
People's driving behavior is influenced by different human and environmental factors, and several attempts to characterize it have been proposed. Nowadays, the standardization of the CAN bus and the increase of the electronic components units in modern cars offer a large availability of sensors data that make possible a more reliable and direct characterization of driving styles. In this work, we propose the concept of "Driving DNA" as a way of describing the complexity of driving behavior through a set of individual and easy-to-measure quantities. These quantities are responsible for some aspects of the driver's behavior, just as -- in the metaphor -- genes are responsible for the tracts o…
Sustainable Transportation Management System for a Fleet of Electric Vehicles
2015
In the last few years, significant efforts have been devoted to developing intelligent and sustainable transportation to address pollution problems and fuel shortages. Transportation agencies in various countries, along with several standardization organizations, have proposed different types of energy sources (such as hydrogen, biodiesel, electric, and hybrid technologies) as alternatives to fossil fuel to achieve a more ecofriendly and sustainable environment. However, to achieve this goal, there are significant challenges that still need to be addressed. We present a survey on sustainable transportation systems that aim to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. We describe the ar…
Generation of a Test Reference Year (TRY): an application to the town of Palermo
2012
The improvement of the energy efficiency of buildings calls for the availability of tools for evaluating and simulating the thermal behaviour of buildings, needing as input climatic databases. These databases contain a very large amount of data, resulting in long computational time analysis. Therefore, simple aggregation methods are used, among which the test reference year (TRY). In this paper, a comparison between two statistical methodologies for compiling a TRY, the Belgian and the Sandia methods, is presented. Then, the two methods have been utilized for compiling the TRY for the town of Palermo, Italy, and compared both statistically and by means of two simple applications, obtaining …
Sustainability issues in sheet metal forming processes: an overview
2011
Abstract Environmental sustainability in manufacturing is nowadays an urgent and remarkable issue and the main concerns are related to more efficient use of materials and energy. In sheet metal forming processes there is still a lack of knowledge in this field mainly due to the need of a proper modelling of sustainability issues and factors to be taken into account. The aim of this paper is mainly to underline the state of the art from a forming point of view about the sustainability contributions offered in any phase of a product life cycle. Actually, a lack in terms of comprehensive contributions is present in the technical literature, thus, the authors try to give a sort of holistic visi…