EnRiMa workshop: Developments and challenges in ICT solutions for energy management of building and other facilities
Over 60 ICT and Energy Efficiency professionals from all over Europe contributed to the event. During the presentation and discussion, a comprehensive overview of the state of the art of both research and market deployment of ICT solutions for smart - or smarter - homes, buildings, mobility and electricity grids was offered. Alongside established international market players like Mitsubishi Corporation and Telefonica, European research institutes and academic organisations presented the outcome of several EU funded FP7 projects in the areas discussed above. In particular, the “Challenges, Opportunities, and Lessons Learned from Ongoing Research Projects” seminar organised by Minerva Consulting & Communication and D’Appolonia, featured the contribution of five EU-funded projects to the discussion on energy efficiency solutions for public buildings, social housing, and sporting facilities. The seminar opened with Enrico Sabbatini (Università Politecnica delle Marche, Italy) that delivered a presentation on SportE2, a project focusing on energy management for sport and fitness facilities. It aims to provide a solution for efficiently managing the 3 dimensions of energy flows: electricity generation, self-consumption, and exchange with the grid. The solution will consist in a modular Building Management System (BMS), integrating smart metering, control, optimal decision-making, and multi-facility management functiona-lities. Mr. Sabbatini stressed the importance of detailed energy audits as a fundamental means to first assess the energy performance of a building and then to recommend and implement energy efficiency solutions. Up next was Krystsina Bakhrankova (SINTEF, Norway) who introduced the EnRiMa project, a joint effort by several European partners aimed at providing a Decision Support System (DSS) for operators of public buildings. EnRiMa’s DSS will allow operators to manage the building’s energy flows and to meet its energy needs in a more efficient, economic and environmentally sustainable way. The DSS will operate on two complementary levels: strategic and operational. Ms. Bakhrankova’s speech was dedicated to explaining the peculiarities of managing energy flows at these two levels. On the strategic side, the building operator’s goal is usually to minimise the total investment, maintenance and production costs while considering their trade-off in terms of uncertainty parameters (such as energy demand) and environmental goals (such as CO2 emissions). The decisions to be taken are then about which technologies to install and decommission, which demand-side measures to implement, and how to manage the financial aspect of energy supply or generation contracts. The relevant constraints comprise, among others, long-term demand requirements, capacity of the installed technologies, their availabilities and lifetimes, efficiencies of the available technologies and ageing of the installed ones, energy balances and storage (e.g.: batteries and accumulators). The objective of the operational level is the same, i.e. to minimise the total costs while maximising user comfort. However, the focus is on short-term decisions such as the operating regime of the currently installed equipment. As a consequence, the constraints that the DSS has to take into account are also of a more immediate nature. For instance, the heat demand (defined as the energy needed to achieve the required temperature level), is determined considering, among others: ambient and external temperatures, air properties (e.g. specific heat capacity and density), building properties, required temperature limits, capacity constraints for each technology and the efficiencies of the installed equipment. EnRiMa’s DSS will have to seamlessly integrate the operational and strategic energy management levels in order to meet its specifications. Successively, Nicolas Salmon (NOVATEK, France) introduced the ESoHo project (Energy Efficiency in European Social Housing) and explored the issues of how building performance monitoring can be used to assess energy savings. The seminar followed with Piotr Dimansky (MOSTOTAL, Poland) offering a summary of the TIBUCON’s project work on identifying potential energy harvesting solutions for realising sensors for use in the built environment. The seminar was moderated by Christian Mastrodonato (D’Appolonia, Italy) who also introduced to the audience the EnergyWarden project. The project’s objectives are to develop an energy simulation tool together with a real-time controller, in order to optimise a building’s energy sourcing decisions. The device will allow controlling the existing installations of renewable energy sources (RES) in a given building and support the design and retrofit of additional energy equipment through the use of a simulator. It will also provide a powerful tool allowing the evaluation of building performance against policy goals and of RES installations’ real-life functioning against their expected performance (e.g. those based on the solar collector or photovoltaic (PV) module specifications). In his closing remarks, Mr. Mastrodonato stressed the complementarity of all the projects and issues presented during the seminar. He also advocated for better understanding, closer dialogue and more active cooperation between all the commercial and academic institutions involved in the energy efficiency and building sectors in order to ensure a solid future for the deployment of ICT solutions for energy management He finally promoted the participation to the ICT4E2B Forum, the Coordination Action funded by EC-DG INFSO with the aim to promote such a shared vision. Visit EnRiMa website (http://www.enrima-project.eu(si apre in una nuova finestra)) to download the full article with pictures and interviews of EnRiMa partner Krystsina Bakhrankova (SINTEF, Norway) and moderator, Christian Mastrodonato, at the following link: http://www.enrima-project.eu/news/enrima-project-workshop-ict-sustainable-homes-event-article-available-online-0(si apre in una nuova finestra)
Paesi
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Spain, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Sweden, Slovenia, Slovakia, United Kingdom