This study looks at how reversible windows can minimize cooling and heating energy use while maintaining thermal comfort in buildings in Sweden and Spain. The growing need for energy-efficient structures and the potential advantages of reversible windows served as the driving forces behind this study. The approach taken in this study is a comparison of energy use of buildings where reversible windows were installed. The windowpanes had properties such that different solar heat transmittance coefficients were attained at the two states of the windows, being altered in spring and autumn. The windows were tested in two different buildings, one in each country, using IDA-ICE software in order to calculate the energy consumption both in winter and cooling, focusing in heating in winter and cooling in summer in order to know if there was a real energy saving compared to the base model used.The major findings indicate that reversible windows significantly reduce cooling and heating energy usage while maintaining thermal comfort levels that are on par with those of traditional windows in buildings. The effectiveness of reversible windows may, however, fluctuate throughout nations, depending on elements including climate, building design, and user behavior. Among themain findings of the study, the ones to be mentioned would be the total energy use reduction in the whole year that add up to 15 % in Sweden and 21 % in Spain and that most of the energy savings came in Summer for both Spain and Sweden. Additionally, the study also made findings regarding the role that awnings play in energy usage, determining that they may be truly significant in terms of reducing electricity bills. The awnings helped reduced the amount of energy used for both climates, in Madrid, the reduction was of 8 % , and in Stockholm it was of 4 % , these findings lead us to believe that the awnings are better suited to warmer climates. This study also investigates the economic viability of this novel kind of windows. The idea was to calculate the extra cost that could be associated to the installation of these newer reversible windows technologies by use of the NPV method to calculate the present value of the future energy savings to know if the money investment of the reversible windows is profitable or not. When comparing the reversible window to the base window both of which share the same U-value an extra 19 % of the base window installation cost could be associated to the new installation of reversible windows (for a 30-year period) for Stockholm, and a 25 % for Madrid. Changing already existing 2-pane windows of ordinary, less insulating quality for the reversible windows, the total energy use is reduced by about 50 % in Spain and in Sweden, but it seems that is just economical for the Swedish model, regarding the well-insulated buildings. An additional conclusion is that, compared to investing in reversible windows on all façades, an investment in reversible windows only on the Southern façade and base windows on the rest becomes a bit more economical, with 25 % allowed extra cost for the reversible windows in Stockholm climate and 27 % in Madrid; however clearly less energy is saved.According to the study’s findings, reversible windows have proven to be useful tools to reduce energy usage in both climates and locations. Meaning that they may play an important role to reduce the impact of the energy crisis that affects the current situation.Reversible windows can lower a building's energy costs and carbon footprint, which can have good economic and environmental effects. For architects, builders, and legislators interested in promoting energy-efficient buildings, the study's findings may be helpful. Reversible windows are highlighted in this research as a viable solution to lower energy use and enhance thermal comfort in buildings, particularly in areas with large temperature and solar radiation changes.

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Western Europe Functionalism ideas are born of the need for scientific and technological progress in producing new materials and building technologies.  Today energy efficiency has become one of the most important characteristics of any project, where functionalism reflects well-designed building components. Reducing energy consumption, improving energy efficiency and minimizing greenhouse emission in the building is vital for the planet's survival. This study intends to provide expertise in design and construction disciplines to use the idea concept of Fallingwater and Villa Savoye, functionalist-style buildings, from the golden era of functionalism. This evaluation can help a new generation of designers and architects to improve the passive energy efficiency and daylight of studied concepts, pragmatic and organic. As a case study, the authors simulated and evaluated the energy efficiency of two conventional architecture designs stated above. Energy efficiency and daylight simulation of these functionalist-style buildings were executed using the BIM-based Building Energy Simulation (BES) tool. The indoor temperature variation and the amount of illuminance for each zone were assessed. The result indicates that the main temperature variation (mean air and operative temperature) in both buildings is not suitable for living and some parts of the regularly occupied floor receive too much direct sunlight. Based on the results, some passive energy-saving measures such as improving building orientation, material and shape, window wall ratio (WWR), adding external shading device, window position, and size are suggested to help researchers in the AEC industry in the future reforming process.

The largest contributor to global warming from the construction and real estate sector comes from the emission of greenhouse gases during the production and usage phases of buildings. During production the leading contributor accounting for emissions is material production while the largest impact in the usage phase is due to energy used for heating, where the largest heat losses occur through building envelopes. Therefore, should the material selection for the building envelope be optimized both regarding the materials lifetime pollutant emissions as well as its effect on energy consumption during building use. The purpose of this paper is to review materials carbon footprint regarding its lifecycle and the effect on energy use of different exterior wall constructions during building use. To answer these questions different methods are applied such as case studies, theoretical studies and simulations. Investigated materials and exterior wall constructions are sandwich panels with a core of rock wool, CLT (cross laminated timber) combined with glass wool and CLT combined with hemp fiber insulation. The result of the study indicates that the climate impact from production of the investigated materials is small compared to the climate impact of energy use. However the study shows that the emissions from the production phase differ between materials. CLT combined with hemp fiber insulation or glass wool insulation has less of an effect on greenhouse emissions compared to sandwich panels. Furthermore, depending on the selection of dimensions for CLT and insulation there are possibilities to reduce energy consumption during building use and still maintain a lower level of emission from material production compared to sandwich panels. / Den största klimatpåverkan från bygg- och fastighetssektorn beror idag av växthusgasutsläpp under byggnaders produktionsskede och bruksskede. I produktionsskedet kommer den mest betydande andelen utsläpp från materialproduktion och i bruksskedet från energianvändning som beror av uppvärmning av fastigheter, där de största värmeförlusterna sker genom en byggnads klimatskal. Materialval i klimatskalet bör därför optimeras både med avseende på koldioxidutsläpp under dess livscykel och materialets påverkan på en byggnads energianvändning i bruksskedet (Boverket 2018:5), (Sveriges Byggindustrier 2014). Arbetets syfte är att redogöra för olika byggnadsmaterials klimatpåverkan, både med avseende på materialets livscykel och olika ytterväggskonstruktioners påverkan på energianvändning i byggnadens bruksskede. Målet är att skapa underlag inför val av material i en hallbyggnads klimatskal. Tre frågeställningar har formulerats med syftet i åtanke; Hur påverkas byggnadens energianvändning beroende på val av ytterväggskonstruktion?; Vilken klimatpåverkan har respektive ytterväggskonstruktion, med avseende på produkternas livscykler? och; Vad är byggnadens klimatpåverkan med avseende på materialproduktion och byggnadens energianvändning?. För att svara på frågeställningar tillämpas flera metoder. En fallstudie ger arbetet en utgångspunkt och en litteraturstudie skapar underlag för att analysera material och produkters klimatpåverkan. Utifrån insamlade fakta simuleras aktuell byggnad och given energianvändning kan omvandlas till klimatpåverkan. Material och ytterväggskonstruktioner som undersöks är sandwichpaneler med stenullsisolering, som referenskonstruktion. Vilken jämförs med KL-trä kombinerat med glasullsisolering respektive hampafiberisolering. Valet av studerade material åligger i att forskning visar på att kombinationen av massiva trästommar och isoleringsmaterial i klimatskalet kan bidra till att minska byggnaders energianvändning. Studien visar att klimatpåverkan från tillverkningsskedet för ytterväggarnas material är lågt i jämförelse med klimatpåverkan orsakad av bruksskedets energianvändning. Det framgår emellertid att konstruktionerna sinsemellan skiljer sig åt utsläppsmässigt vid produktion av material. Att använda KL-trä kombinerat med glasullsisolering eller hampafiberisolering ger lägre klimatpåverkan i förhållande till sandwichpanel. Beroende på val av dimensioner av KL-trä och isolering finns också möjlighet till att minska energianvändningen i byggnadens bruksskede och erhålla lägre klimatpåverkan vid materialproduktion i jämförelse med sandwichpaneler.

Syftet med en integrerad projekteringsprocess är att information tidigt skall tas fram och att projektörer skall kunna arbeta parallellt, exempelvis genom en gemensam BIM-modell. Revit och IDA Indoor climate an energy, även kallat IDA ICE, har i denna rapport visat sig vara två mycket effektiva verktyg som tillåter att information både kan tas fram, i form av energianalyser, men även kommuniceras digitalt med hjälp av så kallade IFC-exporter. Då projektörer får möjlighet att jobba i en gemensam modell kan de arbeta parallellt vilket innebär att information kan tillföras både tidigare och snabbare i projekteringsprocessen. I Revit kan arkitekten enkelt skapa olika utformningsförslag och jämföra dessa med avseende på energianvändning. Analyser från denna studie har visat att energisimuleringar i Revit kan användas för att utforska olika utformningsalternativ och därmed finna optimeringsmöjligheter med avseende på energi och inomhusmiljö. Resultaten kan däremot inte användas för att få en uppfattning om hur man förhåller sig till exempelvis ställda energikrav då framförallt energibehovet för värme och kyla tenderar att överdriva. Då byggnaden modellerats i Revit kan arkitektmodellen exporteras genom filformatet IFC till exempelvis IDA Indoor climate and energy för att låta energispecialister göra detaljerade energi och inomhusmiljösimuleringar. Geometrisk information, namn på ingående material och konstruktionsdelar, samt information om rum vilka utgör klimatzoner, inkluderas i IFC-exporten till IDA ICE. Vad gäller rumsnumrering bör en enhetlig så kallad funktionsnumrering tillämpas eftersom man annars riskerar att generera olika rumsnummer i Revit och IDA ICE. Termisk information som angetts för material i Revit och som ingår i konstruktionsdelarna importeras ej utan måste anges manuellt. Ett viktigt moment i denna typ av projekteringsprocess är att granska IFC-modellen för att försäkra sig om att arkitektmodellen är korrekt exporterad. Granskning bör göras i IDA ICE men det kan vara en stor fördel att granska modellen i exempelvis Solibri model checker innan modellen exporteras eftersom programmet gör det möjligt att enkelt studera arkitektmodellen och dess innehåll. Att arbeta med denna typ av BIM-projektering kan anses vara mycket användbar, dels då den innebär ett tidseffektivare projekteringsarbete och ger möjligheter för att tidigt optimera byggnadens utformning med avseende på energi och inomhusmiljö. Dels för att den minimerar antalet handpåläggningar som annars måste göras av energispecialisten vilket i sin tur skulle kunna leda till att felaktig information anges i IDA ICE och att resultaten från en energianalys därmed blir av sämre kvalité. / Revit and IDA Indoor Climate an energy, also called IDA ICE, have in this report proved to be two very effective tools in an integrated design process, where the aim is to early involve different actors whom can work parallel in a common building information model, called BIM. In Revit, architects can easily create different design proposals and compare them due to energy use and indoor climate. Analyses from this study have shown that the energy simulations in Revit can be used to explore various design alternatives in order to find optimization opportunities due to energy need and indoor environment. The results can’t be used to get an apprehension on how the buildings energy performance relates to according energy demands. When the building has been modeled in Revit, the architecture model can be exported through an IFC file to IDA ICE to allow energy specialists create detailed simulations of energy needs and the indoor climate. Geometric information, names of materials and structural components as well as information about the rooms, are included in an IFC export to IDA ICE. An important part of this type of design process is to review the IFC model to ensure that the architectural model is properly exported, according to geometric information and names and information of rooms and components. Working with this type of BIM process can be considered very useful, because it involves a time-efficient design process and provide opportunities for early optimize the design of the building in terms of energy needs and indoor environment. It also minimizes the number of manually specified compounds that would otherwise been done by energy specialist, which could mean that incorrect information is given in IDA ICE and the results of an energy simulation could be of inferior quality.

Buildings play a central role for livability and carbon footprint of urban areas. Ambitious energy saving and emission reduction targets created a need for a new generation of decisionsupport methods and tools that allow for detailed analysis of urban energy on a large scale. Urban building energy modeling (UBEM) that has emerged recently is an efficient approach to assess energy performance of multiple buildings and system effects from urban energy interventions. However, the further upscale of UBEMs is significantly limited due to the lack of automation for building energy performance (BEP) simulations required for such models in large amounts. This thesis aimed to explore challenges for automation of BEP simulations, and to develop a prototype tool that would serve as a middleware between UBEM and BEP simulation engine, focusing on the IDA ICE simulation software. The result of this thesis is icepy — a tool for automation of BEP simulations in IDA ICE. It uses IDA ICE API and Lisp scripting to provide interaction between UBEM process and IDA ICE in order to generate initial simulation model (IDM), execute simulation and manage results in an automated way. Being implemented as a Python package, it allows to modify multiple IDMs or export simulation results with a few lines of code. The developed tool has been tested and validated for the case building in Minneberg, Stockholm. The automation capabilities provided by icepy has allowed to perform sensitivity analysis for building design parameters as was demonstrated for the window-to-wall ratio (WWR) and three various algorithms for window distribution. The resulting tool has limited functionality as it addressed building envelopes which is only one component of building simulation. However, it has proved to be an efficient approach to automate simulation process and has shown a good potential for further development of such tools. / Byggnader spelar en central roll för urbana områdens levbarhet och koldioxidavtryck. Ambitiösa mål för energibesparing och utsläppsminskning har skapat ett behov av en ny generation beslutsstödmetoder och verktyg som möjliggör detaljerad analys av städers energianvändning i stor skala. Urban byggnadsenergimodellering (UBEM) har nyligen utvecklats och är ett effektivt tillvägagångssätt för att bedöma energiprestanda för flera byggnader och systemeffekter för olika energiåtgärder inom den urban miljön. Den ytterligare uppskalningen av UBEM är dock begränsad på grund av bristen på automation av simulering som är inriktade på byggnadsenergiprestanda (BEP), vilket krävs för att hantera stora byggnadsbestånd. Det här examensarbetet syftar till att utforska utmaningar med automatisering av BEP-simuleringar och att utveckla en prototyp som ska fungera som en mellanprogramvara mellan UBEM och BEP-simuleringsmotorer, med fokus på IDA ICE(som är en simuleringsprogramvara). Resultatet av examensarbetet är icepy, som är ett verktyg för att automatisera BEP-simuleringar i IDA-ICE. Icepy använder IDA ICE API och Lispskript för att tillhandahålla interaktion mellan UBEM-processen och IDA ICE för att generera en initial simuleringsmodell (IDM), utför själva simuleringen och slutligen hanterar resultatet på ett automatiserat sätt. Genom att icepy implementeras som ett Pythonpaket kan den modifiera flera IDM:er och även exportera simuleringsresultat med några få kodrader. Området Minneberg i Stockholm har använts i en fallstudie för att validera och testa verktyget. Automatiseringsfunktionerna i icepy har möjliggjort känslighetsanalyser för olika byggnadsdesignparametrar, exempelvis studerades påverkan av olika värden på förhållandet mellan fönster och väggar genom användning av tre olika algoritmer för fönsterdistributioner. Det utvecklade verktyget har begränsningar i funktionalitet framförallt på grund av att enbart byggnadens ytterskal studerades i byggnadsenergisimuleringarna. Verktyget har dock visat sig vara ett effektivt tillvägagångssätt för att automatisera simuleringsprocesser, vilket visar på en god potential att också vidareutveckla dessa verktyg.

The Swedish residential sector uses 140 TWh of energy, making the residential sector the largest energy user. The Swedish single-family houses (SFHs) are responsible for 12 % of the final energy use. From those dwellings, there are 417 909 single-family houses built before 1930.On the basis of the above information, the Swedish residential building stock is considered to be of relatively high age. Due to this situation, there is a great potential for the implementation of energy saving measures. This work consists in a study case of a single-family house (SFH) built in Stråtjära which uses electricity and wood as energy carrier, the aim in this dwelling is to propose measures to reduce energy expenditure proposing cost-effective measures and reaching a minimum label of bronze category in the Miljöbyggnad energy use indicators. At first, a literature review was performed to observe the renovation strategies previously applied in similar studies. A quantitative and empirical approach was completed, where energy data from the bills of 2023-2024 together with on-site data collection were combined as a way to determine the energy entering and leaving the dwelling. The research was conducted with the help of the IDA ICE energy simulation program, to monitor the energy and ventilation performance of the dwelling. The results obtained from the simulation and hand calculations indicated that there was room to improve the property. Namely, the calculations concluded that the ventilation and the primary energy number need to be improved to meet the Swedish building regulations. Furthermore, the installation of photovoltaic (PV) modules to meet part of the electricity demand could helped to improve the energy situation. Finally, the reduction of electricity use was focused on the efficient use of electricity, avoiding the electricity consumption in unused rooms, such as the guest room, and the reduction of heat/thermal losses through the insulation of the envelop. The methodology used consisted of two different scenarios, one that meets the objectives of monetary savings and economic viability and the other that seeks to comply with the requirements imposed by the Swedish authorities in terms of energy efficiency.

Alfred Lord Tennyson's The Princess: A Medley has posed interpretative difficulties for readers since its 1847 debut. Critics, editors, and artists contemporary with Tennyson as well as in this century have puzzled over the poem's stance on the issue of the so-called Woman Question. Treating Tennyson as the first reader of the poem yields an understanding of the title character, Princess Ida, as an ambassador of Tennyson's optimistic and evolutionary views of human development and links his work to that of visionary educators of nineteenth-century England. Later artists, however, produced adaptations of the poem that twisted its hopefulness into satirical commentary, reduced its complexities to ease the task of reading, and put it to work in various causes, many ranged against the improvement of women's condition. In particular, a series of editions carried The Princess into various nations, classrooms, and homes, promoting interpretations that often obscure Tennyson's cautious optimism.

Diploma thesis "Comparison of systems and impacts of investment incentives in Czech Republic, Slovak Republic and Ireland" compares investment incentives in Czech Republic, Slovak Republic and Ireland in terms of their development and current situation. Furthermore it compares conditions under which investment incentives can be granted. It also compares their impact on foreign direct investments in terms of their inflow, structure and regional distribution in the country. Part of the thesis also deals with comparison of current situation in these countries in terms of investor's risk and international competitiveness when gaining investments.

Low-emissivity (low-E) window films are designed to improve the energy performance of windows and prevent indoor overheating by solar radiation. These films can be applied to different types of glazing units without the need for changing the whole window. This characteristic offers the possibility to improve the energy performance of the window of old and historic buildings for which preservation regulations say windows should remain more or less unchanged. This research aims to figure out to what extent a low-E window film can improve thermal comfort and energy performance of an old three-storey historic stone building in the cold climate of Mid-Sweden. In this research, first, with help of the simulation software “IDA ICE”, the entire building was modelled without window films in a one-year simulation. Second step was to add the low-E window films (3M Thinsulate Climate Control 75 (CC75)) to all the windows and repeat the simulation. Comparison between the results of the two cases revealed an improvement in energy use reduction as well as the thermal comfort when applying the films. For the application of the window films, a cost analysis using payback method was carried out which showed a long- time payback period. Although an investment with a long-time payback period is considered as a disadvantage, for historic buildings with very strict retrofit regulations specially when it comes to the building’s facades, application of the low-emissivity window films for better energy performance and thermal comfort is among the recommendable measures, but not necessarily the best.