Semantic Data-Driven Models to Improve Energy Efficiency in Buildings and Cities

The assessment of building energy performance requires data from multiple domains (energy, architecture, planning, economy) and scales (building, district, city) to be processed with a diversity of applications used by experts from various fields. In order to properly assess the performance of the building stock, and to develop and apply the most effective energy efficiency measures, it is necessary to adopt a comprehensive, holistic approach. In this chapter, three research projects are presented which apply Semantic Web technologies to create energy data models from multiple data sources and domains in order to support decision making in energy efficient building renovation projects: SEMANCO, OptEEmAL, and OPTIMUS. A final reflection on the results achieved in these projects and their links to ongoing research on digital twins is presented.

Combining BIM, GIS, and IoT to Foster Energy Management and Simulation in Smart Cities

This chapter presents a novel distributed software infrastructure to enable energy management and simulation of novel control strategies in smart cities. In this context, the following heterogeneous information, describing the different entities in a city, needs to be taken into account to form a unified district information model: internet-of-things (IoT) devices, building information model, system information model, and georeferenced information system. IoT devices are crucial to monitor in (near-) real-time both building energy trends and environmental data. Thus, the proposed solution fulfills the integration and interoperability of such data sources providing also a correlation among them. Such correlation is the key feature to unlock management and simulation of novel energy policies aimed at optimizing the energy usage accounting also for its impact on building comfort. The platform has been deployed in a real-world district and a novel control policy for the heating distribution network has been developed and tested. Finally, experimental results are presented and discussed.

Smart City and Digital Twins

The chapter proposed aims at facing the various implications underlying the smart city concept based on digital twins. The structure of the text is articulated in three main themes: the use of the term “smart city” and the role that technologies had in its definition; the “3D city model” meaning and the integration procedures between BIM (building information modeling) and GIS (geographic information system); the classification of 3D city models by use cases. The chapter can provide researchers with a detailed dissertation aimed at clarifying both the theoretical and technical features belonging to smart city and its related innovative technologies.

From Sketches and Installations to Bioinspired 5D Printing Models

This chapter opens up discussions upon the relevance of interaction of representations and data visualization modes for smart cities design, planning, and development that occur beyond paper and computer drawing. Although many practitioners usually relate smart cities and digital twins design exclusively to CAD/CAM/CAE and BIM methods, processes, and tools, a wider pool of techniques and forms of expression might be the key to a more accurate and comprehensive way of simulating the several kinds of alterations that happen in the planned built environment. The chapter deals with the study of concepts that relate to both physical and virtual prototyping, which underlines an interdisciplinary approach to design and the impact of integrating biologically inspired principles from different backgrounds to the field of smart cities design. In this regard, biomimetics and additive manufacturing may play key roles in smart city's modeling design and the frontier technology of 5D printing reveals real-time decision-making programmable 4D printing process as a potential future development.

Smart Cities and Smart Societies

The post-shock scenario is outlined: an uncertain future with a “new normality.” The embryos of the new paradigm are alongside the powerful discontinuity generated by COVID-19. With examples and anecdotes from Shanghai and China, a transformation already underway is portrayed. No more perfect shock could be thought to reconsider the role of humans on this planet, on our cities. There is a crucial need for resilience of local systems, for short chains, for autonomous energy and food self-sufficiency, for decentralizing essential products. Security and contingency plans are needed and must operate on a global scale, but at the same time at the country and the city level. The future must be reinvented, acting in depth, for shifting from “exploitation” to “cooperation” with natural systems. Topics are education, work, services, transport, food safety.

A District Heating Socio-Technical System Approaching the Energy Transition

This chapter describes the results of a sociological investigation carried out within an EU-funded project. The project was aimed at creating a tool to visualise and compute energy data at an urban district level, with the broader aim to optimise the local district heating (DH) network's distribution policies. This chapter identifies the features of the main categories of actors (from the DH operator to final users) having a role within that network. Special attention is paid to the identification of the barriers and frictions preventing a stronger collaboration and communication among these actors to happen. It is argued that the identification and resolution, in situated and complex socio-technical systems, of these non-strictly-technical problems may be, at least in some cases, a pre-requisite for any ICT-based solution to deploy its full potential.

The DIM Approach for Digital Twin

In the era of connections and information and communication technologies, the building industry is facing the challenge of digitization at the building and urban scale. Several researches have been carried out to generate virtual city models to manage and represent a variety of data to reach the smart city concept. Therefore, the development of building/urban digital twins is directly linked to the definition of innovative methods and tools that are able to collect, organize, query heterogeneous data to make it available for the various involved actors. This chapter aims at presenting the district information modelling methodology that is strictly related to the digital twin concept, starting with data domains, arriving at the various tools developed to reach the users' needs.

Digital Twin for Smart School Buildings

Industry 4.0 is encouraging the introduction of pioneering technologies even in the construction industry. Along with the development of high technology, such as augmented reality, virtual reality, and cloud computing, the development of digital twin has been growing. This contribution aims to present the potential of digital twin in the construction field, suggesting a framework that outlines the many different possible applications in construction, with reference to school buildings. First, it summarizes the current overview of digital twin applications in building construction. Then it shows that significant steps that are being taken beyond the digital model, even if the implementation of the digital twin concept in its full meaning is still a long way off. The research is moving in this direction and the evolution of the current state of the art, combined with the experience gained in the industrial sector, will soon bring a new revolution in the construction industry.

BIM Simulation Lab

The architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) sector is facing the digital transformation by promoting the building information modelling (BIM) as a standard methodology for the digital managing of information along the whole lifecycle of a construction work. Although small-medium enterprises (SMEs) and public administrations (PAs) are aware of the BIM benefit, they ask for pilot actions and tools for testing BIM applications in their daily activities in order to measure benefits and difficulties in detail. This chapter discusses the BIM Simulation Lab initiative which aims at establishing a laboratory for an effective and efficient BIM implementation, by promoting a physical space and specific services for supporting the territory in the DT. The authors describe the concept of the lab and they introduce an assessment method that adopts an indirect approach of the BIM benefit assessment leveraging principles from construction cost estimation and probabilistic risk management.

Exploiting BIM and Sensor Data Through Web-Based CAFM

Technological progress and the evolution of the directives concerning the construction sector have led to a significant digitalization of information concerning buildings. One of the challenges that have arisen concerns the use of data in the phases of the life cycle following the construction. How can this information be exploited? Is it possible to use it directly in a facility management tool that is within the reach of expert users and not? The aim of this chapter is reporting the developed framework to support the management and maintenance operations in buildings, defined within the project AR4FM - Augmented Reality for Facility Management. In particular, AR4FM aims to create an innovative software ecosystem that uses the most modern technologies to support facility management (FM) operations through a set of bespoke applications. The first tool is the web-based ICT platform usable through web-browser, while the second tool refers to a mobile App, called AR4FM mobile app, which will enable visualization for both mobile and wearable devices, such as smart-glasses.