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- Sustainability Performance of Buildings in the Project Stage—Residence StudentsPublication . Heleno, Lizete; Baptista, Pedro; Marta Gregório; Oliveira, Nelson S.; Monteiro, SilviaIn recent years, the concept of sustainable construction has been promoted by demand and by regulations. Several methodologies to assess the sustainability of the construction have been spread across the world, by several countries for almost all continents. This study focuses on the most used construction sustainability assessment methodologies, which were compared with the Portuguese methodology, LiderA. It was found that the LiderA is the sustainability system with the greatest number of relevant criteria, considering the three dimensions of sustainability, environment, economy and social. Considering the 5 phases of the construction life cycle, the importance to apply these methodologies in construction is crucial in the early phases. It can help to draft the sustainability classification of the building. To apply the LiderA was used a residence of students, a building composed of apartments, in the phase of planning. All of the 40 criteria from the LiderA were classified from F to A++, according to the project of the residence of students. The final classification, as it was projected, was A, meaning that the building has an environmental performance 50% higher than usual practice. The category of criteria with the highest contribution was the category of quality of service and resilience, with a percentage of achievement greater than 50%. The local dynamics and the resources category were the categories with the lowest contribution, and they have the potential to be reevaluated by the building promoter, since it has the potential to improve the sustainability classification of the residence of students.
- Sustainability Assessment of Building Rehabilitation Solutions: The Mid 70s Portuguese BuildingPublication . Reis, Alexandre; Heleno, Lizete; Monteiro, Silvia; Oliveira, Nelson S.The Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) establishes improvements to buildings’ comfort conditions and energy performance, bringing them closer to buildings with almost zero energy needs, namely the Nearly Zero Energy Building (NZEBs). The assessment tools for sustainable construction, more recognized internationally, are LEED and BREEAM, and in Portugal is the LiderA. The application of those tools promotes energy efficiency and decarbonization of buildings, as referred to in the Portuguese Long-Term Strategy for Building Renovation (LTRS-PT) until 2050. In this case, a house representative of the construction of the period between 1971 and 1980 in Portugal was chosen to evaluate environmental sustainability using LiderA. In the current conditions, the LiderA rating class of the house was D. To improve the performance of the building were identified balanced rehabilitation solutions without excessive automation. The presented solutions should avoid transforming the house into a complicated device with operational difficulties or specialized operation. In this way, the proposed interventions in the building and systems are based on renewable sources, prioritizing energy and water efficiency. Furthermore, as a contribution to the health and well-being of the occupants, we considered measures related to indoor air quality (IAQ) and noise minimization. In addition, the encouragement of native species has contributed to ecological enhancement. With that proposals, the house rating class using LiderA improved from class D to class A+.
- Low Cost Smart Homes for EldersPublication . Ferreira, Gabriel; Penicheiro, Paulo; Bernardo, Ruben; Mendes, Luís; Barroso, João; Pereira, AntónioThe increase in life expectancy and the consequent aging of the general population pose, nowadays, major challenges to modern societies. Most elderly people have the usual problems related to old age, like health chronic problems and sensory and cognitive impairments. Besides that, in today’s modern societies, where families have less and less time to look after for their old relatives, the isolation of the elderly is a real concern and a very current problem, which is enhanced if the elders live alone. To solve or, at least, mitigate that problem, it was developed a smart home for elders that is presented and described in this paper. The developed assistive home system, which is based on available technology, can ensure the quality of life, safety and well-being of all older adults that want or desire to live in the comfort of their home, near to their friends and in their neighborhood, instead of living in elder care centers.
- Indicator-Based Evolutionary Level Set Approximation: Mixed Mutation Strategy and Extended AnalysisPublication . Liu, Lai-Yee; Basto-Fernandes, Vitor; Yevseyeva, Iryna; Kok, Joost; Emmerich, MichaelThe aim of evolutionary level set approximation is to find a finite representation of a level set of a given black box function. The problem of level set approximation plays a vital role in solving problems, for instance in fault detection in water distribution systems, engineering design, parameter identification in gene regulatory networks, and in drug discovery. The goal is to create algorithms that quickly converge to feasible solutions and then achieve a good coverage of the level set. The population based search scheme of evolutionary algorithms makes this type of algorithms well suited to target such problems. In this paper, the focus is on continuous black box functions and we propose a challenging benchmark for this problem domain and propose dual mutation strategies, that balance between global exploration and local refinement. Moreover, the article investigates the role of different indicators for measuring the coverage of the level set approximation. The results are promising and show that even for difficult problems in moderate dimension the proposed evolutionary level set approximation algorithm (ELSA) can serve as a versatile and robust meta-heuristic.
- Natural ventilation potential on thermal comfort of a light-steel-framing residential buildingPublication . Craveiro, A.; Lopes, A.; Santos, P.; Silva, L. daNowadays, given the increasing comfort requirements that are imposed on buildings and the overall energy concerns, it is not reasonable dissociate ventilation from the thermal comfort. In fact, ventilation, as passive strategy, when properly studied and implemented on a building, may contribute to the thermal performance increase, and also, to minimize the energy expenditure required to achieve comfortable conditions with consequent improvement of building energy efficiency. In order to predict natural ventilation potential on the comfort increase, as passive strategy in a purely climatic analysis, a simplistic analysis on two different European scenarios is presented using the Autodesk Ecotect weather tool. In addition, some outcomes of numerical simulations, using Design Builder software, aims to highlight the importance of natural ventilation on the thermal behaviour of a light-steel-framing residential building: CoolHaven building
- A Survey of Diversity Oriented Optimization: Problems, Indicators, and AlgorithmsPublication . Basto-Fernandes, Vitor; Yevseyeva, Iryna; Deutz, André; Emmerich, MichaelIn this chapter it is discussed, how the concept of diversity plays a crucial role in contemporary (multi-objective) optimization algorithms. It is shown that diversity maintenance can have a different purpose, such as improving global convergence reliability or finding alternative solutions to a (multi-objective) optimization problem. Moreover, different algorithms are reviewed that put special emphasis on diversity maintenance, such as multicriteria evolutionary optimization algorithms, multimodal optimization, artificial immune systems, and techniques from set oriented numerics. Diversity maintenance enters in different search operators and is used for different reasons in these algorithms. Among them we highlight evolutionary, swarm-based, artificial immune system-based, and indicator-based approaches to diversity optimization. In order to understand indicator-based approaches, we will review some of the most common diversity indices that can be used to quantitatively assess diversity. Based on the discussion, ’diversity oriented optimization’ is suggested as a term encompassing optimization techniques that adress diversity maintainance as a major ingredient of the search paradigm. To bring order into all these different approaches, an ontology on diversity oriented optimization is proposed. It provides a systematic overview of the various concepts, methods, and applications and it can be extended in the future work.
- Layer Thickness Evaluation Between Medical Imaging and Additive ManufacturingPublication . Almeida, Henrique A.; Vasco, Joel; Correia, Mário Simões; Ruben, Rui; Ruben, RuiAdditive manufacturing (AM) applied to the orthopaedic and surgical domains provided access to newer solutions for customised implants, customised scaffolds or even organ printing. These solutions are based on imagological data, gathered from CT-scans and/or MRI-scans. The compromise between patient’s radiation exposition and resolution along the focus direction plays an important role for the successful production of biological products. Scan detail can be increased with a thinner scanning thickness to obtain the required biological features for replication. On the other hand, a thinner scan thickness requires more scanning slices and therefore, higher exposition time to radiation. Literature shows that a maximum amount of radiation is admissible for humans, requiring an optimized approach concerning the acquisition of internal details of the human body tissues. State-of-the-art scans offer focus resolution in the range of 100 to 200 µm, although such resolution is not used for the patient’s protection. In fact, in clinical practice distance between slices are in the range of 1 to 6 mm. Concerning the AM processes that are able to use biocompatible materials, different layer thicknesses are available upon the final application in spite of the digital layer thickness that was applied during the medical imaging exam. The layer thickness during production also details the mechanical properties of the implant, with an additional aspect that the geometric data is based on information of a different layer thickness. This study intends to discuss the layer thickness used in medical imaging, the layer thickness used in AM systems providing public awareness of the operating gap between medical imaging systems and AM systems. A brief description of the accumulated errors is also presented.
- Design of Pyrolysis System to Convert Waste Plastic to FuelsPublication . Oliveira, Nelson S.; Pardo, Michael; Capela, Carlos; Gaspar, Marcelo; Vasco, Joel; Heleno, LizeteThe conventional recycling technology to process waste plastic, mechanical recycling, is not suitable to recycle waste thermoplastic with high content of contamination. Pyrolysis is a promising technology since it can convert into valuable products, such as fuels and monomers. This study focused on the design of the pyrolysis equipment for waste plastic based on polyolefins. The feeder of waste plastic is a worm screw conveyor that will be in a pre-heating system. The batch reactor has support for catalyzer and can operate between 300 up to 600 ºC with attached induction system for heating. The output flows into condenser in series to separate two liquid phases and gases, depending on its boiling point. The 3D model was done with SolidWorks, control system modelled in CADe SIMU and particle simulation with FloXpress.
- Production and Material Types for Pallets: A ReviewPublication . Pulgar, Alejandro; Oliveira, Nelson S.Pallets are used extensively in the supply chain for the transportation of goods between suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and retailers. This article reviews pallet production, its mechanical properties related to material options (according to European standards and industrial applications) and management systems. In the global supply chain, polymer, metal, and composites pallets compete in line with the concept of sustainable development. The supply chain requires pallets according to specific characteristics, such as sizing, maximum load capacity, durability (lifespan), cost and more information is needed about their environmental impacts. Some types of pallets (stringer and blocks) can have several configurations, number, width and spacing. Furthermore, the pallets management system is divided in three models; EMP (extensive management of pallets), TPO (transfer pallet’s ownership) and PR (pallet rent), where suppliers, distributors and retailers select the most suitable option. The systematic review of the literature identified 15 documents with the key methodological elements, such as, specifications, inventory data, goals, and system boundaries for a life cycle assessment of pallets.
- Reliability of AAL Systems Modeled as BPMN Business ProcessesPublication . Respício, Ana; Martinho, Ricardo; Domingos, DulceThe use of Ambient-Assisted Living (AAL) systems has been spreading across several countries, with the ultimate purpose of improving the quality of life of patients. These systems often reflect complex architectures including several components such as sensors, gateways, Information Systems or even actuators, as well as messaging and transmitting protocols. Failures in these systems can have severe impact on a monitored patient, and most components foresee some kind of compensation countermeasures to increase reliability. Nevertheless, these measures are often self-contained to a single component and do not address the overall AAL system reliability, disregarding precedent and successor activities and interactions that exist for each time a certain value is registered or a certain alert is triggered. In this paper, we propose a new approach to calculate the overall reliability of an AAL system. We take a Business Process Management (BPM) approach to model the activities and interactions between AAL components, using the Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) standard. By extending the BPMN standard to include reliability information, we can derive the overall reliability of a certain AAL system. To prove this approach, we also present a reliability study considering scenarios with single and pairwise reliability variations of AAL system components. With this approach, healthcare managers can benefit from important overall reliability information of an AAL system, and better allocate the appropriate resources (including hardware or health care professionals) to improve responsiveness of care to patients.