Search results for "Architectural engineering"
showing 10 items of 158 documents
Aspects and issues of daylighting assessment: A review study
2016
Abstract Proper assessment of indoor daylighting conditions can significantly reduce energy consumption due to artificial lighting and can improve indoor visual comfort. This paper gives a critical review of the fundamental aspects of daylighting indices with the aim to provide a broad overview of methods and indices available to assess daylighting from varying points of view. Assessments cover distribution, availability over time and in specific climatic contexts, uniformity in the space, visual comfort issues and the relations between each of these aspects and a proper building and lighting design. A special focus on the assessment of indoor spatial and temporal uniformity is given. An an…
The overall classification of residential buildings: Possible role of tourist EU Ecolabel award scheme
2012
Abstract The debate on the environmental performance of buildings and their classification is continuously rising and deeply involves all actors of the sector, from researchers to technicians and from owners to real estate managers. In the field, the EU has created a panel that is currently working on defining the criteria for attributing an Ecolabel award to a building. However, despite the enormous efforts made by administrative and academic institutions, a suitable and widely available scheme for operators to assess the environmental performance of a building is far from being established. To help provide a solution to the problem, the possibility of adopting the EU Ecolabel scheme estab…
Toward a European Eco-label brand for residential buildings: Holistic or by-components approaches?
2011
The Eco-label scheme is becoming ever more important in the environmental certification of products and services, especially in light of the recent ambitious aim of containing greenhouse emissions and improving the efficiency of utilizing energy sources. A recently-introduced hypothesis concerns the European Eco-label scheme relating to buildings, in the awareness that the construction industry is of primary importance to the whole economic and social life of states. This scheme should adopt an integrated approach to environmental problems and include construction, day-to-day management, and the possible disposal of building materials, throughout the life cycle of the building. In addition,…
Technical‐economic evaluation of the effectiveness of measures applied to the artificial lighting system of a school
2021
Ensuring optimum interior lighting is a topic of great importance, as this influences not only the well-being of users but also the optimal performance of visual tasks. Lighting can be natural, but if not sufficient, it can be compensated with artificial lighting. This study highlights a methodology for designing a new lighting system that takes into account both technical and economic aspects. The method was applied to an existing school located in southern Italy, in which the electricity consumption is related to the current lighting system. The school is chosen as being representative of the construction type and layout of many local schools. In addition, the coexistence of several visua…
SmartBuildings: An AmI system for energy efficiency
2015
Nowadays, the increasing global awareness of the importance of energy saving in everyday life acts as a stimulus to provide innovative ICT solutions for sustainability. In this scenario, the growing interest in smart homes has been driven both by socioeconomic and technological expectations. One of the key aspects of being smart is the efficiency of the urban apparatus, which includes, among others, energy, transportation and buildings. The present work describes SmartBuildings, a novel Ambient Intelligence system, which aims at reducing the energy consumption of "legacy" buildings by means of artificial intelligence techniques applied on heterogeneous sensor networks. A prototype has been …
Evaluation of Daylight Availability for Energy Savings.
2015
Dynamic daylight simulations are very useful instruments in daylighting design process. They allow an in depth analysis of indoor daylight availability levels and define if they are adequate to perform a particular visual task. Their results can be used to design shading devices or lighting control systems and compare different technical solutions. The use of these simulations is likely to spread in the common design practice since some regulations and green building rating systems suggest their use. This paper presents dynamic daylight simulation results related to an open-plan office, performed with Autodesk 3ds Max Design ® , which is a calculation software validated by recent researches…
Definition and application of innovative control logics for residential energy optimization
2014
In this paper different innovative control logics for electric and thermal loads control in residential buildings are presented. The designed control logics are implementable in residential buildings thanks to Building Automation Control Systems (BACS) and Technical Building Management (TBM) systems. They have been tested using a simulation tool developed by the authors that is able to assess their effects on residential buildings having various characteristics and equipments. An application example is presented.
Designing an Energy Management System for smart houses
2015
Most advantages that the smart grid will bring derive from its capability of improving reliability performance and customers' responsiveness and encouraging greater efficiency decisions by the customers. In this optic, the paper presents an innovative Energy Management System for smart houses, allowing the optimization of the electricity cost and electrical energy consumption and, at the same time, preserving the end-user comfort.
Sounding objects in Europe
2014
Sound design has been shifting and enlarging its scope to those contexts and applications where interactivity is of primary importance. A chain of research projects funded by the European Commission has been playing a driving role in the definition of the new discipline of sonic interaction design. Such projects are briefly reviewed in order to outline a research thread that is expected to continue nourishing sound science and design.
Palermo: Living Labs for Urban Regeneration
2016
The case of Palermo is described in this chapter as an example of Human Smart City (HSC) approach transferred to an extremely weak urban context in Southern Italy. The case focuses on the processes boosted through the Territorial Living Lab established in the city to tackle the topic of citizen participation in the solution of the main city challenges. It was based on a model of incremental and adaptive process of interaction, within a co-creative ecosystem, with the aim of improving housing quality. The model was shared by the players involved in the social innovation process. It would not have been possible without the Living Lab approach and the innovative momentum of design thinking tra…