This research presents an innovative approach to modeling and predicting the heating and
cooling demands of buildings using a simple and fast data-driven model. The research is set
within the context of Model Predictive Control (MPC) systems, which optimize building energy
use by predicting variables and adjusting control inputs accordingly, embodying the principles of industrial ecology by integrating technical, economic, and social dimensions of sustainability; enhancing energy efficiency, reducing CO2 emissions, and improving occupant comfort, which are key goals of industrial ecology. From the available modelling methods:
white, black, and grey box models, to model and predict the heating and cooling demand, a grey box model: multivariate linear regression model with as input actual data selected based on the thermal energy balance and Pearson correlation coefficients. A case study on two rooms: an office and a classroom in the Haagse Hogeschool in Delft serves as the practical application of the developed model. Several models are developed; static and dynamic models, and using different independent variables; indoor surface temperature, outdoor temperature, indoor air temperature, internal heat gains, wind speed and solar light intensity. An accuracy, expressed in the R2 value between 22.52% and 78.57% is achieved with modelling the heating and cooling demand. The developed models are not able to predict the heating and cooling demand, due to multicollinearity between independent variables, overfitting and endogeneity.

The building sector's substantial environmental impact, responsible for 40% of total energy consumption and one-third of CO2 emissions globally, emphasises the urgency to enhance energy efficiency. While there are potentials for energy savings, there are still challenges that need to be faced. In particular, a significant ‘performance gap’ exists between the predicted and actual energy usage in buildings. This gap, observed during the operational phase, poses challenges for realising high-performance buildings. The focus of this thesis will be on renovated office buildings, acknowledging their significance in sustainability efforts. A critical aspect of the performance gap is attributed to the operation and maintenance of the energy systems compared to the intended usage. The research will therefore address the critical main research question: “How can operation and maintenance-related energy performance gap in renovated office buildings be effectively addressed to meet the Paris Proof commitment targets?” By conducting literature reviews and employing a mixed-method approach, including both qualitative and quantitative methods combined, the study will utilise interviews and a case study, using data from advanced systems. Focusing on the complexities of influencing factors, specifically in operation and maintenance, the research aims to address the energy performance gap. Findings indicate that the main challenges are knowledge gaps among stakeholders due to fragmented collaboration, inadequate commissioning and monitoring, and tuning practices, including the lack of a feedback loop. A strategic roadmap of a restructured redevelopment process is proposed, emphasising enhanced commissioning practices, continuous monitoring, and improved stakeholder collaboration. The strategic roadmap therefore suggests practical steps for addressing the performance gap, fostering more energy-efficient building operations, and aiming for redeveloped office buildings to achieve the Paris Proof standards.

Nonintrusive Load Monitoring (NILM) can be used to disaggregate household energy
usage collected from a central meter to the level of individual appliances, but has so far mostly been applied in controlled, small-scale settings. Further potential such as the application for energy efficiency classification and management have remained largely untapped. In this research a machine learning model was developed and deployed to determine energy consumption, usage pattern and energy efficiency characteristics of real-life dishwasher usage based on smart meter data. The developed NILM system was deployed on a full year of smart meter data for nearly 130.000 households in the Netherlands. The analysis was accompanied by a survey to gain additional information on the households usage behaviour. The average energy consumption for all households was found to be 1.18kWh per wash, with dishwashers used 240 times per year on average. Dependencies are shown for household size, washing temperature, machine efficiency label as well as time of day, week and year. It was estimated that 9 in 10 households could reduce their dishwasher energy consumption, with an average saving potential of more than 30% per year. The developed method showed to be suitable to gain insight into average electricity consumption and usage patterns on an appliance level, non-intrusively and at large-scale. Additional survey data was shown to provide comparative insight between different user groups. The developed framework can be easily expanded for other major appliances and could be used to drive tailored consumer feedback on energy efficiency improvements within households.

Managing climate in museums is always a challenging task since it should meet the needs of multiple stakeholders, namely the conservation of collections, the comfort of visitors, and the protection of historic buildings. The relative humidity is one of the most crucial parameters in this management process, and it is controlled by passive design and active design approaches. In the renovation of museums, it is preferable to optimize the passive design and minimize the use of the active design that results in substantial energy consumption and high cost. The application of hygroscopic materials is one of the most effective passive design strategies, and some of them are already used on construction, such as wood and plaster. Nevertheless, silica gel, as a kind of hygroscopic materials with higher moisture capacity, is only used in the display case currently. So, the goal of this thesis is to study its application in the exhibition room and evaluate its effect on the stabilization of relative humidity, reduction in ventilation flow rate, and decrease in energy demand. The research is also combined with a case study, which is the renovation of the National Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam, and the aim of clients is to achieve climate class A1 in the exhibition room. Model 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 with different complexity are created in Matlab/Simulink, which forms a schematic study of modeling. With the validation implemented in Design Builder, the accuracy of model 3.0 is proved, and it is determined as the main simulation tool. Model 3.0 consists of the thermal part, the hygric part, and the air handling unit part. In terms of simulation, it is based on the renovation plan of the National Holocaust Museum. A series of scenarios are defined at first, and the variables are the presence or absence of silica gel, the number of visitors, the ventilation flow rate, and the setpoint of humidity control. The simulation is done on two scales: one exhibition room and the whole building. With the amount of silica gel equal to 0.1% of the volume of the simulated object, the fluctuation of relative humidity reduces by a factor of 2 on the level of both room and building. Furthermore, 18.9% of energy for humidification and dehumidification can be saved. There is a possibility of decreasing the ventilation flow rate from 12 L/s per person to 6 L/s per person with almost 90% data meeting the A1 requirements at the same time.
The study shows the silica gel is capable of stabilizing the relative humidity fluctuation significantly with the additional benefits of energy savings and reduction in ventilation flow rate. It is recommended to apply this concept in practice as a trial, and further research about its hygrothermal performance can be done in the future.

The Dutch government claims that upgrading office buildings to an energy label C building is enough to reduce the environmental footprint of companies for now. Research has shown that when a building receives an energy label, it does not mean that the operational energy use of the building is in line with the received energy label; this results into an energy performance gap. The gap consists of the building-related energy use or the user related energy use. This research focusses on how the behaviour of office users can be influenced to reduce the energy performance of an office building in use. This research is divided into four parts. First the energy performance gap is discussed, afterwards measures which influence the energy performance of an office building are researched, followed by which factors stimulate pro-environmental behaviour and finally which methods are effective to implement the measures and behavioural changes. First, the energy performance gap can be explained by the difference between the theoretical energy label and the operational energy use. There are two possible causes for this gap: the building related energy use or the user related energy use. This research focusses on how to reduce the user-related energy by activating the user behaviour. Secondly, during this study a measurement list is developed to show possible measures to reduce the energy performance and environmental impact of a building. Significant change can be achieved, not by implementing these measures on a small scale (one office), but on a large scale (all offices). It is also the case that these types of measures will not always have a significant effect the environmental impact of the building or the energy use of the building, this depends on the current building characteristics. When a building already implements that measure, the impact will be less significant than when they do not use the measure. Third, pro-environmental behaviour (PEB) is a behaviour type that focusses on minimizing the negative impact of the consequences of human behaviour on the environment (V. Blok et al., 2015). Trough literature, interviews and the delphi panels it can be concluded that comfort, economic and intention play an important role in shaping pro-environmental behaviour (Kollmuss & Agyeman, 2002). The factors which do have the highest impact on encouraging and stimulating Pro-environmental behaviour according to the users and experts are: Intention to act, Perceived behaviour control, Social norms and Eco-communication. Finally, methods to activate these factors are related to the measure and how this measure affects the behaviour factors. In this research three examples of implementing measures are given. The three main methods to reduce the environmental impact of an office building and thereby activating the pro-environmental behaviour of the user are: Pro-environmental behaviour guidelines, Eco- communication platform and Social incentivesCombining the methods will get the optimum result of the measures which are implemented. These four parts combined answers the research question: How can the behaviour of office users be influenced to reduce the energy performance of office buildings in use? 

The air-conditioning of commercial buildings accounts for approximately 50% of the total energy consumed in India’s commercial sector. Reducing this load is a key step towards minimizing India's greenhouse gas emissions. One culprit is the routine use of fully glazed façades which are chosen for aesthetics but are neither energy efficient nor effective at providing adequate thermal comfort. A double skin façade (DSF) can help reduce the heat gain of a building by exhaustion heat through cavity ventilation, while still providing the aesthetics of a fully glazed façade. The higher thermal resistance can also help provide better indoor thermal comfort to occupants. However, due to the high cost of DSFs, their complex thermal behaviour and overheating risk in the cavity an assessment of the effectiveness of the system in warmer climates of India is needed. This study evaluates the energy saving potential and thermal comfort enhancements with mechanically ventilated DSFs in different climate zones of the Indian subcontinent. A numerical model created in the MATLAB/Simulink platform, employing the zonal approach and verified against Design Builder was used for simulating the thermal behaviour. Optimization of the façade design was based on three parameters: 1) cavity width, 2) cavity ventilation rate and 3) glazing systems. The sensitivity of these design parameters to the performance of the DSF was analysed before proposing optimized configurations for different sites based on their local climate. These optimized configurations are then evaluated against a single skin fully glazed façade. The parameters used for evaluating the energy saving potential are annual heat gain and annual heat loss. For thermal comfort and overheating risk, the temperature distributions were analysed. In comparison with a single skin façade, it is found that the façade orientations with the highest incident solar radiation, usually the South, East and West facing façades, provide the most improvement, up to 50% reduction in heat gain annually. Heat loss was reduced by 25-35% at each site, however, this proves to be irrelevant for sites with mild winters. This corresponded to the arid, semi-arid, humid subtropical and montane climate zones found in India. Thermal comfort was maintained by the DSF for both warm and cool walls. This was also found to be the case for the single skin façade, hence, no additional improvement to thermal comfort was achieved with respect to radiant asymmetries. Overheating in the cavity was mitigated through the application of tinted glazing in the external envelope, ventilation rates of up to 80AC/hr and larger cavity widths. Optical properties of the external envelope have the largest impact on the reduction in heat gain regardless of the façade’s spatial orientation and façades with low direct solar radiation were found to be insensitive to changes in cavity width and ventilation rate. The findings of the study suggest that DSFs have an important energy saving potential in warm climates and the design recommendation can be utilized to mitigate overheating and excess heat gain which is seen as an issue even in cooler climate zones.

Municipalities are aware that professionalizing their real estate management is necessary to become CO2 neutral before 2050 and that it even can create cost reduction and can add value in the long term. Many municipalities are now working on a specified portfolio identification while maintaining this portfolio. Some municipalities are ready to think about how to change their portfolio into one that is almost CO2 neutral. However, there are also municipalities that are struggling due to the lack of (energy) information of their portfolio and choosing the appropriate tools to help them achieve their goals. Some municipalities do work on the sustainability goal as seen at the benchmark of 2017, but here is also evident that around 25% of the public building stock is still categorized at label G, the worst label. Therefore the aim of the research is to provide insight into the facts, processes, possibilities, and challenges of sustainable strategies for municipalities to create an energy neutral real estate portfolio and given this national goal, provide a road map for municipalities. We can conclude from literature and case studies that there are special contracts, approaches, and guidelines municipalities can use to make their building portfolio energy neutral. However, there is not one uniform tool that can entirely transform the total building portfolio. So, the strategy tools need to be used for the right buildings at the right time with the right expertise and information. This approach needs to be in balance with the three added values of MREM, namely: political goals, financial policies, and user satisfaction. The considerations to set the pace of the energy transition is predominately based upon the financial possibilities, the amount of support of the council, the physical context, and the professionalization of the real estate department. The DAS-Framework and four C/P/MREM perspectives, used in the approach of the case studies, can help municipalities to structure and balance the values of the organization when making a sustainable strategy.