704 research outputs found
Solar energy data analytics: PV deployment and land use
No full textEU targets for sustainable development call for strong changes in the current energy systems as well as committed protection of environmental resources. This target conflicts if a policy is not going to promote the compatible solutions to both the issues. This is the case of the additional renewable energy sources to be exploited for increasing the share in the electricity mix and in the gross final energy consumption. Solar energy is, currently, the cheapest solution in Southern European Countries, like Italy. In this paper, thanks to the availability of three open databases provided by National Institutions, the authors compared the historic trends and policy scenarios for soil consumption, electricity consumption, and renewable electricity production to check correlations. The provincial scale was chosen as resolution of the analysis. The deviations from the policy scenarios was then addressed to identify the demand for policy recommendations and pathways to promote in order to achieve the target for renewable electricity share as well as the reduction in soli consumption trend in 2030. The role of renewables integrated in the existing contexts, such as building integrated photovoltaics, is considered a key driver for solving this issue.Building Physic
Energy retrofitting effects on the energy flexibility of dwellings
No full textElectrification of the built environment is foreseen as a main driver for energy transition for more effective, electric renewable capacity firming. Direct and on-time use of electricity is the best way to integrate them, but the current energy demand of residential building stock is often mainly fuel-based. Switching from fuel to electric-driven heating systems could play a key role. Yet, it implies modifications in the building stock due to the change in the temperature of the supplied heat by new heat pumps compared to existing boilers and in power demand to the electricity meter. Conventional energy retrofitting scenarios are usually evaluated in terms of cost-effective energy saving, while the effects on the electrification and flexibility are neglected. In this paper, the improvement of the building envelope and the installations of electric-driven space heating and domestic hot water production systems is analyzed for 419 dwellings. The dwellings database was built by means of a survey among the students attending the Faculty of Architecture at Sapienza University of Rome. A set of key performance indicators were selected for energy and environmental performance. The changes in the energy flexibility led to the viable participation of all the dwellings to a demand response programme.Building Physic
D projects
No full textHydrogen coming from renewable electricity is identified by energy policies as promising strategy due to its greening effect on power generation and its use as driver of a renewable fuel economy. The decrease in renewable electricity production costs as well as the balancing and power stability issues induced by the dramatic expansion of renewable energy installations drive the market and the policy to account for hydrogen as a solution. In this chapter, an overview of the Research & Development projects funded by the European Union in the field of solar hydrogen is presented. Further details about the reached and foreseen levelized cost of solar hydrogen values are reported in comparison with other production pathways together with the essential literature
Power to Gas and Hydrogen applications to energy systems at different scales – Building, District and National level
No full textStarchitecture: Scenes, Actors and Spectacles in Contemporary Cities
No full textHow and why do spectacular buildings get commissioned and procured? What are their visible urban effects? What can urban planners, architects, and policymakers learn in order to engage in more successful citymaking?
In recent years, media and critical attention has been lavished on famous architects, and the contributions of their designs to the branding of cities. The post-“Bilbao effect” global landscape is one where cities compete for the highest-profile skyscrapers, cultural projects, and high-profile developments designed by star architects whom even casual readers know by first name: Frank Gehry, Bjarke Ingels, Jean Nouvel, Zaha Hadid, Norman Foster, Rem Koolhaas. Far less is known about the decision-making processes behind these projects and their subsequent urban effects.
A unique combination of urban studies and photography, Starchitecture investigates projects designed by star architects in cities including Paris, New York, Abu Dhabi, Bilbao, and the architectural microcosm of the Vitra campus in Weil am Rhein, Germany. Author Davide Ponzini and photographer Michele Nastasi seek to explain and critique a growing global condition by revealing how starchitecture has been and continues to be deployed in cities around the world. The arguments they raise are vital to understanding the urban landscapes of today, and tomorrow
From in-situ measurement to regression and time series models: An overview of trends and prospects for building performance modelling
No full textData analysis methodologies are crucial to learn insights from data and to create more trust in the assumptions used for energy performance assessment. Indeed, continuous performance monitoring should become a more diffuse practice in order to improve our design and operation strategies for the future. This is an essential step to reduce incrementally the gap between simulated and measured performance. In fact, assumptions in simulation represent a significant source of uncertainty when estimating the energy performance of buildings. This uncertainty affects decision-making processes in multiple ways, from design of new and refurbished buildings to policy making. The research presented aims to highlight potential links between experimental approaches for test-facilities and methods and tools used for continuous performance monitoring, at the state of the art. In particular, we start by exploring the relation between in-situ measurement of thermal transmittance (U) and regression-based monitoring approaches, such as co-heating test and energy signature, for heat load coefficient (HLC) and solar aperture (gA) estimation. After that, we highlight some recent developments in simplified dynamic energy modelling using lumped parameter models. In particular, we want to underline the scalability of these techniques, considering relevant issues in current integrated engineer design perspective. These issues include, among others, the necessity of limiting the number of a sensors to be installed in buildings, the possibility of employing both experimental and real operation data (and compare them with design data as well) and, finally, the possibility to automate performance monitoring at multiple scales, from single components, to individual buildings, to building stock and cities.Building Physic
Procedures and Methodologies for the Control and Improvement of Energy-Environmental Quality in Construction
No full textBuilding performance from an energy and an environmental point of view is fundamental due to the large amount of GHG emissions related to the building sector [...
Parametric performance analysis and energy model calibration workflow integration - a scalable approach for buildings
No full textHigh efficiency paradigms and rigorous normative standards for new and existing buildings are fundamental components of sustainability and energy transitions strategies today. However, optimistic assumptions and simplifications are often considered in the design phase and, even when detailed simulation tools are used, the validation of simulation results remains an issue. Further, empirical evidences indicate that the gap between predicted and measured performance can be quite large owing to different types of errors made in the building life cycle phases. Consequently, the discrepancy between a priori performance assessment and a posteriori measured performance can hinder the development and diffusion of energy efficiency practices, especially considering the investment risk. The approach proposed in the research is rooted on the integration of parametric simulation techniques, adopted in the design phase, and inverse modelling techniques applied in Measurement and Verification (M&V) practice, i.e., model calibration, in the operation phase. The research focuses on the analysis of these technical aspects for a Passive House case study, showing an efficient and transparent way to link design and operation performance analysis, reducing effort in modelling and monitoring. The approach can be used to detect and highlight the impact of critical assumptions in the design phase as well as to guarantee the robustness of energy performance management in the operational phase, providing parametric performance boundaries to ease monitoring process and identification of insights in a simple, robust and scalable way.</p
Performance Indicators of Electricity Generation at Country Level—The Case of Italy
No full textPower Grids face significant variability in their operation, especially where there are high proportions of non-programmable renewable energy sources constituting the electricity mix. An accurate and up-to-date knowledge of operational data is essential to guaranteeing the optimal management of the network, and this aspect will be even more crucial for the full deployment of Smart Grids. This work presents a data analysis of the electricity production at the country level, by considering some performance indicators based on primary energy consumption, the share of renewable energy sources, and CO2 emissions. The results show a significant variability of the indicators, highlighting the need of an accurate knowledge of operational parameters as a support for future Smart Grid management algorithms based on multi-objective optimization of power generation. The renewable share of electricity production has a positive impact, both on the primary energy factor and on the CO2 emission factor. However, a strong increase of the renewable share requires that the supply/demand mismatching issues be dealt with through appropriate measures
Data Analysis of Heating Systems for Buildings—A Tool for Energy Planning, Policies and Systems Simulation
No full textHeating and cooling in buildings is a central aspect for adopting energy efficiency measures and implementing local policies for energy planning. The knowledge of features and performance of those existing systems is fundamental to conceiving realistic energy savings strategies. Thanks to Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) development and energy regulations’ progress, the amount of data able to be collected and processed allows detailed analyses on entire regions or even countries. However, big data need to be handled through proper analyses, to identify and highlight the main trends by selecting the most significant information. To do so, careful attention must be paid to data collection and preprocessing, for ensuring the coherence of the associated analyses and the accuracy of results and discussion. This work presents an insightful analysis on building heating systems of the most populated Italian region—Lombardy. From a dataset of almost 2.9 million of heating systems, selected reference values are presented, aiming at describing the features of current heating systems in households, offices and public buildings. Several aspects are considered, including the type of heating systems, their thermal power, fuels, age, nominal and measured efficiency. The results of this work can be a support for local energy planners and policy makers, and for a more accurate simulation of existing energy systems in buildings
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