Energy, Society and Place Research Unit
School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham
New major research project to focus on digital technologies and low carbon lifestyles
Dan van der Horst and Rosie Day have won EPSRC funding for a five-year research project in conjunction with Coventry University. Starting in December 2012 and with an overall budget of £1 million, the project, titled An Intelligent Digital Household Network to Transform Low Carbon Lifestyles is a collaboration between civil engineers, software engineers and social scientists, along with industrial and social housing partners.
The project will develop a state of the art energy and water monitoring system for houses with a user friendly dashboard for household members that displays more detailed and up to the moment consumption information than is currently possible with smart meters. From this it will also develop a gaming tool that will allow household members and others to try out different projected scenarios and compete with each other in being resource efficient.
After development, the system will be installed in 20 social housing units and trialled for a year with real households. The project also aims to create interactive educational packages for wider public engagement with energy and carbon reduction possibilities.
Wow. This research opportunity looks fantastic, what team skills will you be requiring. It would be great if we could collaborate on this project from Australia, University of Wollongong!!??
Thanks – please contact either Dan van der Horst (http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/staff/profiles/gees/vanderhorst-dan.aspx) or Rosie Day (http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/staff/profiles/gees/day-rosie.aspx) for further information.