{"628322":{"#nid":"628322","#data":{"type":"news","title":"High Performance Building Program Awarded $1.4 Million by U.S. Department of Energy to Develop Building Envelope Diagnostics and Modeling Using Drones","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EA research team led by assistant professor \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/arch.gatech.edu\/people\/tarek-rakha\u0022\u003ETarek Rakha\u003C\/a\u003E at the Georgia Tech School of Architecture has been awarded $1.4M in research funding (in addition to $370K cost share commitment) by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Energy\u0026nbsp;Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Building Technologies Office (BTO) under the Building\u0026nbsp;Energy\u0026nbsp;Efficiency\u0026nbsp;Frontiers\u0026nbsp;\u0026amp; Innovation Technologies (BENEFIT) program. BTO is investing in early-stage research and development for advanced building technologies and systems that will serve as a foundation for future reductions in building energy consumption.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EMore than half of all U.S. commercial buildings were built before 1970\u0026nbsp;and are inefficient relative to newer buildings. To address the ine\ufb03ciency of this older stock, retro\ufb01t programs rely on on-site auditing to collect information about buildings\u0026rsquo; envelope, lighting, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems on physics-based, whole-building energy modeling to identify and diagnose specific inefficiencies in these systems and to design and optimize energy-efficiency measure packages that address them.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EEnvelopes and windows account for over 50% of energy loads in buildings, but collecting detailed and actionable information about them is challenging. A primary challenge is the difficulty in accessing building exteriors above the first or second story. Using humans to perform this inspection is time-consuming, costly, dangerous, and error prone.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EThe research team is addressing this challenge in a three-year project called Aerial Intelligence for Retrofit Building Energy Modeling (AirBEM). AirBEM will complement human auditing of building interiors with the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs or drones) equipped with infrared sensors and onboard processors to audit the exterior envelope. The drones will use Computer Vision (CV) techniques to detect both materials and heat transfer anomalies which suggest construction defects such as air leaks.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;The aspiration for this work is to profoundly inform building retrofit design by radically enhancing the methods and modes of envelope audits,\u0026rdquo; said Tarek Rakha, who serves as Principle Investigator (PI) for the project. \u0026ldquo;We want to allow auditors to move past a small number of single-frame images for inspection; we want to enable retrofits to address specific building envelope issues, and want to develop 3D models that designers can interact with when developing retrofit plans.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EResearch, Development, and Demonstration (RD\u0026amp;D) will be led by Georgia Tech as the prime\u0026nbsp;recipient with academic partners including, associate professor \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/ecs.syr.edu\/faculty\/velipasalar\/\u0022\u003ESenem Velipasalar\u003C\/a\u003E and associate professor \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/eng-cs.syr.edu\/directory\/?peopleid=2947\u0022\u003EEd Bogucz\u003C\/a\u003E from the College of Engineering and Computer Science at Syracuse University, and professor \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/architecture.mit.edu\/faculty\/john-fern\u00e1ndez\u0022\u003EJohn Fern\u0026aacute;ndez\u003C\/a\u003E from the School of Architecture and Planning at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/patternrd.com\/team\/sandeep-ahuja\/\u0022\u003ESandeep Ahuja\u003C\/a\u003E from Pattern R+D software developers will serve as industry partner. RD\u0026amp;D conducted with DOE funding will advance AirBEM from a preliminary proof-of-concept to\u0026nbsp;develop a transformational cyber-physical system that automates diagnostic capabilities of the UAV platform.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EResearch team led by assistant professor, Tarek Rahka,\u0026nbsp;in the\u0026nbsp;Georgia Tech School of Architecture is\u0026nbsp;awarded $1.4M in research funding by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Energy\u0026nbsp;Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Building Technologies Office (BTO) under the Building\u0026nbsp;Energy\u0026nbsp;Efficiency\u0026nbsp;Frontiers\u0026nbsp;\u0026amp; Innovation Technologies (BENEFIT) program.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"U.S. Department of Energy provides funding for early-stage research and development for advanced building technologies and systems that will serve as a foundation for future reductions in building energy consumption."}],"uid":"34569","created_gmt":"2019-10-29 19:13:12","changed_gmt":"2019-10-29 19:13:12","author":"cwagster3","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2019-10-29T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2019-10-29T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"628320":{"id":"628320","type":"image","title":"Yasser El Masri (left) and Eleanna Panagoulia (right), incoming High Performance Building Lab (HPBL) PhD students joining Assistant Professor Tarek Rakha (center) this fall to start the AirBEM project.","body":null,"created":"1572376068","gmt_created":"2019-10-29 19:07:48","changed":"1572376068","gmt_changed":"2019-10-29 19:07:48","alt":"High Performance Building Lab Begins AirBIM Project","file":{"fid":"239288","name":"101719_HPB_DOEShoot_18.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/101719_HPB_DOEShoot_18.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/101719_HPB_DOEShoot_18.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":663587,"path_740":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/101719_HPB_DOEShoot_18.jpg?itok=U_7CdXAe"}}},"media_ids":["628320"],"groups":[{"id":"1221","name":"College of Design"},{"id":"48996","name":"School of Architecture"}],"categories":[{"id":"134","name":"Student and Faculty"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"},{"id":"137","name":"Architecture"}],"keywords":[{"id":"365","name":"Research"},{"id":"1186","name":"Research funding"},{"id":"364","name":"Funding"},{"id":"101","name":"Award"},{"id":"166890","name":"sustainability"},{"id":"34141","name":"Drones"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39531","name":"Energy and Sustainable Infrastructure"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cdiv\u003ECarmen New\u003C\/div\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cdiv\u003EMarketing \u0026amp; Events Coordinator II\u003C\/div\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cdiv\u003EGeorgia Institute of Technology | School of Architecture\u003C\/div\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/carmen.wagster@design.gatech.edu\u0022\u003Ecarmen.wagster@design.gatech.edu\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["carmen.wagster@design.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}