Passive cooling for buildings is an important architectural design strategy to save energy and reduce carbon emission in the climate of UK. The project will explore the possibility to use reanalysis weather data in meteorology field to estimate the change of passive cooling potential from the past to the future in the UK.
Department: Construction Management & Engineering
Supervised by: Zhiwen Luo
Passive cooling using natural ventilation is regarded as one of the important building technologies to reduce energy consumption and promote sustainability in the built environment. The passive cooling potential is highly restricted and influenced by outdoor climate at both mesoscale and urban scale. Traditional design for passive cooling uses TMY (typical meteorological year) data which is based on a limited number of measurement stations across the world. TMY suffers its inherited shortcomings of limited spatial and temporal coverage, which prohibits the accurate estimation of passive cooling potential. To address this, working closely with colleague in the Meteorology Department, we propose to apply climate reanalysis data which refers to the use of archival data from combined observations and global climate simulation into passive cooling potential estimation instead of TMY data. The unique benefit using climate reanalysis data is due to its greatly improved spatial domain and time period.
The student will be responsible for conducting literature review, data collection and analysis, presentation and write-up of the results. The reanalysis climate data (1980-2015) will be analysed first, and then fed into the previous passive cooling potential model developed by Dr Luo. The passive cooling potential will be estimated in the UK to show the changes over the time and spatial variation. The key outcome of the project will be a series of passive cooling potential maps in the UK which could serve a good guidance for passive cooling design. The student will have the opportunity to present the results at the research group meeting, and then write-up a preliminary report.
The student is expected to have a background in meteorology, environment science or mathematics/physics with a keen interest and enthusiasm for the study of environmental design for architecture and buildings. Competence with computers and statistics is desirable. Previous experience of handling ‘big data’ will be especially welcome.
The student will gain hands on experience in all stages of the research process from start to finish, including reviewing the literature, sourcing the data, analyzing the data, and presenting and writing up the results. The supervisor will work closely with the student at all stages to help them develop new skills and expertise in each area. If the study results in publishable findings, the student would be involved in the write-up of the results and included as an author on any publications. General transferable skills to be developed include team-working, computing and analytical skills, report writing and presentations skills.
School of the Built Enviornment
9am-5pm
Monday 05 July 2021 - Friday 13 August 2021
The post will be advertised centrally on the UROP website between 22nd February and 9th April 2021. Interested students should send their CV and a covering letter outlining their motivation for the placement and the relevant skills and experience they will bring to the project to Dr Zhiwen Luo (z.luo@reading.ac.uk). Short listed candidates will be interviewed.