Intelligent Human-Buildings Interactions Lab: Identify, Quantify and Guide Energy-saving Behavior at University Campus

Many studies merely focus on adoption energy retrofitting measures, rather than to bring a structured understanding of how these measures will influence occupant behavior and how the changes in occupant behavior will, in turn, impact expected energy savings.

As a result, the modeling and analysis of the interaction between energy retrofitting and occupants’ behaviors is insufficient.

The overall purpose of the research is to explore the interaction scenarios to identify, quantify and guide energy-saving behavior at University Campus. The main objectives of the research project are: 1.

Identify energy-related occupant behaviors under various energy retrofitting measures for recording and clustering behavioral patterns; 2.

Quantify the impacts of alternative behavior on energy consumption for better understanding the role of occupant in energy saving; 3.

Guide energy-saving behavior in an immersive, informative and deeply engaged environment for lasting behavior change at university campus.

To do so, an Intelligent Human-Buildings Interactions lab (IHBI) is established to investigate correlations between energy retrofitting measures and occupants’ behaviors experimentally. About 36,000 students live at Umeå university campus, implying the significant impact of the research.

The project will, publish a guide to outline how students can incorporated energy-saving behavior into daily routines and activities for promoting last behavior change.