Assessment and Optimization of Transportation and Building Systems
Transportation and building air and energy systems have a significant impact on local indoor, and outdoor air quality. With a focus on emerging transportation and building technologies, this theme will provide air improvement measures that can be implemented rapidly.
Emissions characterization and mitigation for transportation systems
The emissions from cars, trucks, busses, trains, aircraft and ships have significant health and climate impacts, and large vehicles (marine vessels, aircraft, long-haul trucks) will likely use combustion engines for many decades. New technologies and alternative fuels may be used to reduce regulated emissions, but the real-world impact of these must also be assessed. We intend to report source emission factors which will be of wide interest because there are no published real-world measurements for many of the novel technology/fuel combinations.
Integrating air quality monitoring into Smart City traffic infrastructure
UBC is home to the AURORA Connected Vehicle Testbed, which is a small community testbed for transportation innovations in wireless communication, including modifying driver behavior to improve safety and reduce congestion. Connected vehicles may also reduce emissions by promoting smooth traffic flow. The influence of these vehicle communications systems on emissions and fuel efficiency of individual vehicles will be identified using the RAIN’s scientific infrastructure. This will allow us to assess the contribution of connected vehicles (of different types) and changing traffic management to ambient pollutant concentrations.
Bi-directional influence of outdoor and indoor emissions on air quality
The objective of this research is to relate indoor and outdoor air quality across a range of building designs. RAIN sensors detecting concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), PM, and relevant air quality conditions will be deployed within and adjacent to at least eight buildings on the UBC campus. Some buildings will be considered typical in their design, and others will be prototypical net-zero energy buildings (e.g., UBC’s Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability). This approach offers a unique side-by-side comparison of code-compliant and code-surpassing buildings under the same environmental conditions.
Real-time air quality-driven building control
The RAIN team will undertake a unique experimental study exploring the relationship between outdoor and indoor air quality, building envelope characteristics and building ventilation control processes. The study will focus on multi-unit residential buildings with novel hybrid ventilation systems combining passive and mechanical elements.