eViz project’s contribution to new EnerGAware project mentioned in press release

“The EnerGAware project builds on the EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council) funded project eViz (Energy Visualisation for Carbon Reduction), which aims to show people where energy is being lost in the home and how different behaviours impact upon energy usage.” Read more at: https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/news/social-media-and-gaming-used-to-enhance-energy-efficiency

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EnerGAware Project Kicks-off in Barcelona

The kick-off meeting of the EnerGAware (Energy Game for Awareness of energy efficiency in social housing communities) project took place on February 18-19, at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Spain. The kick-off meeting had the participation of representatives of the project partners as well as the Project Office, which will follow the project from the European Executive Agency for SMEs (EASME), which manages the Energy Efficiency topic of Horizon 2020. Dr Alba Fuertes, Dr Rory Jones, Dr Sabine Pahl and Prof. Pieter de Wilde all attended the meeting.

The EnerGAware project intends to achieve a 15-30% energy consumption and emissions reduction in a social housing pilot and increase the social tenants’ understanding and engagement in energy efficiency through the development of a serious game that will be linked to the actual energy consumption (smart meter data) of the game user’s home and embedded in social media and networking tools. The demonstrator pilot will be carried out in Plymouth, UK, with the participation of 100 homes.

New project: EnerGAware – Energy Game for Awareness of energy efficiency in social housing communities

A new eViz spin-off project called EnerGAware has been funded under the EU Horizon 2020 programme (EE 11 2014: New ICT-based solutions for energy efficiency). The team includes Dr Alba Fuertes, Dr Rory Jones, Dr Sabine Pahl and Prof. Pieter de Wilde, plus a host of European partners.

The main objective of the EnerGAware project is to achieve a 15-30% energy consumption and emissions reduction in a social housing pilot and increase the social tenants’ understanding and engagement in energy efficiency. The EnerGAware project will develop and test, in publically owned social housing, a serious game that will be linked to the actual energy consumption (smart meter data) of the game user’s home and embedded in social media and networking tools. The EnerGAware solution will provide an innovative IT ecosystem in which users can design their own virtual home and Avatar and learn about the potential energy savings from installing energy-efficiency measures and changing user behaviour. The user will need to learn to balance the energy consumption, comfort and financial cost of their actions. Energy savings achieved both virtually in the game, calculated by building performance simulation, and in reality, in the users’ actual homes, measured through smart meter data, will enable progression in the serious game. The social media features will provide users a platform to share data of their achievements, compete with each other, give energy advice, as well as, join together to form virtual energy communities.

EnerGAware

eg-ice 2014

egice

16-18 July 2014, Dr Shen Wei, Dr Yaqub Rafiq (Workshop organiser) and Professor Pieter de Wilde (Workshop organiser) attended the 21st International Workshop: Intelligent Computing in Engineering 2014, held at Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK. During the meeting, Dr Shen Wei presented a paper titled: Using artificial neural networks to assess reduction in residential energy demand by changing occupant behaviour, based on their research carried out in eViz.

1st/2nd National Meeting of Annex 66

1stOn the 7th Jan, 2014 and the 30th May, 2014, Dr Shen Wei was invited to attend the first and second national meetings for ANNEX 66: Definition and Simulation of Occupant Behavior in Buildings, held in the Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, and Tongji University, Shanghai, China. During the first meeting, Dr Wei made a presentation titled: Behavioural studies in Europe. During the second meeting, Dr Wei provided a presentation titled: A comparison of alternative occupant classification approaches for the modelling of window opening behaviour in buildings.

2nd

BSO14

bso 1423-24 June 2014, Professor Pieter de Wilde attended the 2nd conference of Building Simulation Optimisation, held in at the UCL, London, UK. During the meeting, Professor de Wilde presented a paper titled Extending the UK’s green deal with the consideration of occupant behaviour, based on the research carried out by the building technology team in eViz.

8th Windsor conference

windsor10-13 April 2014, Dr Shen Wei attended the 8th Windsor conference ‘Counting the Cost of Comfort in a Changing World’ and presented a paper titled Using building performance simulation to save residential space heating energy: A pilot test, coming from his research in eViz.

IEA ANNEX 66

iea12-14 March 2014, Professor Pieter de Wilde and Dr Shen Wei attended the first expert meeting of a new IEA project ANNEX 66: Definition and Simulation of Occupant Behavior in Buildings, held in Hong Kong. In that meeting the team from Plymouth University is one of the two institutions from the United Kingdom.

Congratulations!

Congratulations! Dr. Christine Boomsma passed the viva for her PhD thesis entitled “Visual Images as a Motivational Bridge to Pro-Environmental Behaviour: A Cognitive Approach”. External examiners were Dr. Paul Sparks from the University of Sussex and Dr. Lorraine Whitmarsh from Cardiff University.