The moisture durability of an envelope component such as a wall or roof is difficult to predict. Moisture durability depends on all the construction materials used, as well as the climate, orientation, air tightness, and indoor conditions. Modern building codes require more insulation and tighter construction but provide little guidance about how to ensure these energy-efficient assemblies remain moisture durable. Furthermore, as new products and materials are introduced, builders are increasingly uncertain about the long-term durability of their building envelope designs. Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the US Department of Energy's Building America Program are applying a rule-based expert system methodology in a web tool to help designers determine whether a given wall design is likely to be moisture durable and provide expert guidance on moisture risk management specific to a wall design and climate. The expert system is populated with knowledge from both expert judgment and probabilistic hygrothermal simulation results.

New are R&D Staff at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paidup, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan).

Accompanying efforts worldwide to deploy sustainable building technologies shows a pressing need for expanded research on occupant behavior. Discourse is lacking concerning drivers of occupant behavior for energy conservation, especially in the case of commercial buildings. This paper explores potential determinants of occupant behavior for energy conservation in commercial buildings. This is investigated in a case study of a two-month energy conservation competition involving eight office buildings at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Four buildings achieved energy savings based on the previous year’s baseline. Potential challenges and success factors of occupant behavior for energy conservation during the competition were explored based on an explanatory research design incorporating energy data, participant interviews, and surveys. The findings suggest that both social and technological aspects may be important drivers of energy conservation. The determinants of occupant behavior for energy conservation in commercial buildings suggested for further research include bottom-up involvement, stakeholder relationship management, targeted information, real-time energy visualization, and mobile social platforms. This paper presents initial implications, with a need for further research on these propositions and on their impacts on occupant behavior. This paper aims to contribute to both academia and practitioners in the arena of commercial building sustainability.

No abstract

The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of Cynthia Simonson and her colleagues in conducting the two national experts Web meetings on multifamily energy audits held in November 2010, as well as developing the two extensive transcripts provided in Appendices B and C to this report. The contributions of all the Web meeting participants are also gratefully acknowledged. The meeting transcripts are valuable resources in themselves for anyone wishing to understand the current state of the art in energy audits for multifamily buildings, as well as for viewing all the good ideas for improving energy audits in the future. Input from the national experts meetings provided the basis for most of the scope of capabilities proposed in this plan for the Weatherization Assistant suite component (or possibly components) for multifamily buildings. FOREWORDThis development plan is based on extensive input from experts and practitioners from around the country involved in energy audits of multifamily buildings. The ideas from these meetings on means for improving energy auditing of multifamily buildings provided important direction to formulating the recommendations here, and also show a view of possible future improvements to the multifamily audit tools.The complexity of energy systems in multifamily buildings leads to complexity in options available to improve energy audits and analysis of energy efficiency measures. As an example, control systems adaptations are often needed to improve energy efficiency, but the wide range of possible configurations in multifamily buildings, together with the wide range of potential options for improving a controls arrangement or setup, lead to potential combinations of both that cannot be easily tabulated. Similarly, a wide range of operational changes or maintenance improvements, some of which might be needed in any given building, are not readily handled in any easy way. This plan lays out the main path for development of the proposed national multifamily energy audit tool. The planned development will meet the needs of the Weatherization Program for an improved tool.