INESCC-DL - Resumos em Livros de Actas
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- Indoor air quality audit in two office buildings in PortugalPublication . Ramos, Joao; Pinto, FernandoThe indoor air quality that a building presents is not always from our knowledge. In fact, we may find ourselves exposed to an indoor air which can be harmful to human health, affecting the quality of life and productivity, which also will have economic repercussions at this level. Given the Portuguese law for energy and indoor air quality (IAQ) certification of large service buildings, the indoor air quality requirements were here presented and, in addition, this paper provides an overview of the current Portuguese IAQ technical procedures to audit existent buildings. It was also intended with this study to evaluate the indoor air quality experienced by the occupants of two office buildings, an old and a recent, with the same activity and occupancy, without air-conditioning systems, where were carried out indoor air quality characterizations and, in particular, have been assessed the CO2 concentration and the typical renewal air exchange rates in different zones of the buildings, as a ventilation effectiveness monitoring. During the building's regular occupancy period, the authors have been done monitoring campaigns, which took place in winter and summer seasons. They have been detected that the values of some parameters under review were non-compliance situations in winter, in contrast with the summer due to the increase of ventilation promoted by the occupants taking advantage of the favourable conditions of the Mediterranean weather. Consequently, the proposed IAQ audit approach may be helpful to characterize indoor air pollutants, to evaluate the ventilation effectiveness and to correlate it with the indoor air quality perception and self-control actions of the occupants.
- Assessing the influence of uncertainty in land cover mapping and digital elevation models on flood risk mappingPublication . Gonçalves, Luísa M.S.; Fonte, Cidália C.; Gomes, RicardoThis paper proposes an approach to assess the influence of the uncertainty present in the parameters dependent on the land cover and elevation data over the peak flow values and the subsequent delineation of flooded areas. The proposed approach was applied to produce vulnerability and risk maps that integrate uncertainty for the urban area of Leiria, Portugal. A SPOT-4 satellite image and DEMs of the region were used. The peak flow was computed using the Soil Conservation Service method and HECHMS, HEC-RAS, Matlab and ArcGIS software programs were used. The analysis of the results obtained for the presented case study enables the identification of the order of magnitude of uncertainty associated to the watershed peak flow value and the identification of the areas which are more susceptible to flood risk to be identified.
- Energy management in municipal solid waste treatment: A case study of a mechanical biological treatment facilityPublication . Bernardo, Hermano; Oliveira, Filipe Tadeu; Quintal, EdgarOver the last few years, mechanical biological treatment systems for municipal solid waste have been introduced in many European countries. In most cases, this was driven by the European Union Landfill Directive, which requires the diversion of biodegradable municipal waste from landfill to alternative processes. Although this type of treatment allows energy recovery from municipal solid waste, the process of mechanical biological treatment appears to be an intensive energy consumer, due to high demand of electricity consumed by process equipment. This paper presents the main results of an energy audit performed to a Mechanical Biological Treatment facility in Portugal, which due to the amount of energy consumed must comply with the Portuguese Program called Intensive Energy Consumption Management System – SGCIE. The program was created in 2008 to promote energy efficiency and energy consumption monitoring in intensive energy facilities (energy consumption higher than 500 toe per year). Facilities operators are required to perform energy audits and take actions to draw up an action plan for energy efficiency, establishing targets for energy consumption reduction and greenhouse gases emissions indexes. To implement actions that improve energy efficiency, it is necessary for the facilities operation to be associated with an effective energy management methodology, as well as an efficient facilities management procedure. The implementation of any energy management system should start with an energy audit, which was carried out to identify potential energy conservation measures for improving energy efficiency, and also typical energy consumption patterns and sector/equipment load profiles. This tool gives managers the information to support decision making on improving energy performance and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Results shown that there is a considerable potential for reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gases emissions on Mechanical Biological Treatment units. Here, as elsewhere in the industrial sector, energy efficiency can only be achieved through a continuous energy monitoring and management system.
- Study of the driver’s behavior when cornering and characterization of safe speed perceptionPublication . Brás, M.; Ferreira, Carlos Daniel Henriques; Neves, CarlosRecently, there has been a growing interest in research towards autonomous vehicles, aiming to improve efficiency, safety, comfort and to eliminate human errors. However, a question arises: what should set the speed of the vehicle? The road legal limit, the maximum possible given the traffic conditions, the road critical speed or any other matter? Moreover, it has been mentioned in literature that drivers feel unsafe when using cruise control systems, namely in cornering conditions. Therefore, to study the driver’s behaviour when cornering, a test vehicle was equipped with a dedicated data acquisition system to acquire the vehicle dynamics and the driver heart rate. Trials with volunteers were carried out on a 22 km selected route, consisting of multiple types of roads, from city roads to highways. Based on the field results, we propose a control strategy for the vehicle speed when cornering relating the curve radius with the centrifugal acceleration. The proposed control strategy could be easily adopted by advanced driver assistance systems and autonomous vehicles. The reproduction of a human-like behavior will enhance the perception of safety and comfort of both the driver and occupants.