Tag Archive: Universities

  1. Norwich University of the Arts draws on HeatingSave for lowering bills, extensive heating control

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    Norwich University of the Arts (NUA) is an independent specialist arts, design and media University with a 165 year reputation for excellence. It is dedicated to providing vocational, practice based courses which allow students to enter an exciting and challenging community of artists, designers and makers who share their passions and interests.

    Whilst the institution’s history can be traced back to 1845, it is contemporary and forward thinking with industry standard facilities in its city centre campus, which houses around 250 members of staff and students at any given moment.

    According to Mr. Andy Wilton, Estates Manager for the Norwich University of the Arts, the institution had been considering for years the prospect of installing a system that would grant them a superior level of control over the central heating system comprising 3 gas-fired boilers and numerous radiators, while in the same time helping them reduce the overall functioning costs.

    After doing quite a bit of shopping around and evaluating the best available options, the University’s management board decided to choose a HeatingSave Small Business system. “HeatingSave matched our requirements. Plus, your representative also managed to convey the information regarding the system in a very straightforward and convincing way, and that played an important part in the decision process as well.” (more…)

  2. University of Salford Uses HeatingSave Energy & Environmental Monitoring System

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    The Smart Heritage Building Performance Measurement for Sustainability (HBIM) project focuses on studying methods for smart energy and environmental performance measurement in heritage buildings, for sustainability and heritage preservation purposes.

    The University of Salford’s Applied Buildings and Energy Research Group (ABERG) is one of the main partners in this research initiative and, as part of the project, has installed a HeatingSave Energy & Environmental Monitoring System in Joule House, a Grade II listed Georgian house, recognised as a heritage site by the City of Salford. The data collected from the heritage occupied building will be analysed for sustainability impact and building health effects.

    The three story structure was the home of scientific pioneer James Prescott Joule. The scientist was born at the house in Salford in 1819 and lived there until 1854. During his time there, he conducted experiments in the basement of the building, studying heat and how it related to mechanical work. This led to the first law of thermodynamics and the naming of an international unit of energy after him.

    The original building, comprised early 19th century bricks and welsh slate had a two story extension added and is currently used as offices by staff at the University.

    Dr. Richard Fitton MRICS is a Lecturer in Energy Efficiency in the School of the Built Environment. He leads the monitoring work undertaken within ABERG and is involved in a number of projects with regards to co-heating, U Value measurement, as well as product and retrofit package testing within the Energy House.

    Richard was directly involved in the selection of HeatingSave as the building performance monitoring system for the Joule House project. When asked what motivated to use the HeatingSave Energy & Environmental Monitoring System, Richard’s reply was “We had used HeatingSave before and found it to be very reliable.”

    “The HeatingSave Energy & Environmental Monitoring system is cost effective and stable. Even more importantly than that, HeatingSave, as a company, perfectly understands what we’re trying to achieve and offers us full support.” he added.

    The HeatingSave system was installed by ABERG staff on their test site at Joule House in the second half of 2016 and Richard described the process as simple and intuitive.

    In Richard’s own words, “The HeatingSave system was installed by university personnel. We haven’t encountered any major problems during the install.”

    Asked what he liked most about the HeatingSave system, Richard’s replied, “HeatingSave has made it easier to collect energy consumption data, as well as specific environmental data – temperatures, CO2, RH, VOC and occupancy.”

    The system collects internal and external temperature data, along with information on how the heating system works and details of energy use. It also monitors air quality including carbon dioxide, relative humidity, volatile organic compound levels and the way a building is used in terms of its occupancy, light and sound levels and the occupants’ activities and lifestyles

    Using a password protected standard internet connection, sensors can quickly be set up to review and quantitatively analyse the data with user-friendly software graphics, via a laptop, PC, mobile phone or tablet-based device.

    “The system is really good and easy to use.” he added.

    Richard also likes the HeatingSave Energy Monitor T3521 Hubs for being “very compact, easy to install and also cost-effective.” The Hub is the centrepiece of the HeatingSave Energy Monitoring System. It uses a high-performance, low-power an ARM Cortex-A8 processor to provide the computing power for the Linux based software system, while its compact design allows it to be quickly accessed via the web

    To each Hub you can add 100’s of wireless sensors of all types, even our wireless Thermostatic Radiator Valves (“TRV’s”) to provide a complete building heating management, only buying the sensors that you need.

    Data is constantly and automatically collected from the T3521 Hub’s by the cloud based HeatingSave Dashboard. The Dashboard can store billions of transactions for subsequent analysis and for consolidated visualisation of the data. It also provides drill-down views of the energy use and provides a clear understanding of the real impact of energy efficiency measures through pre-installation analysis and post-installation monitoring.

    “We use the graphs and the data visualization software developed by HeatingSave and they are very good.” commented Richard. “The cloud based HeatingSave Dashboard is easy to use and intuitive.” he added.

    Richard added that he is very happy with the quality of the after-sale service from HeatingSave, “We have called the HeatingSave help desk service on a couple of occasions and they have consistently delivered a very good level of service.”

    Would the University of Salford’s Applied Buildings and Energy Research Group recommend HeatingSave to other researchers in the energy efficiency segment? “Yes we would, and, in fact, we have already recommended the system to our colleagues at UWE Bristol and elsewhere” was the reply.

    The Research Group also plans to expand their use of the HeatingSave monitoring system. Says Richard, “We are currently looking at 2 new projects that will involve multiple HeatingSave energy and environmental monitors and sensors.”

    Summing up his experience of HeatingSave, Dr. Richard Fitton MRICS said, “HeatingSave delivers very good value for money. The system is very easy to use and the company behind it has proved to be very responsive to our needs.”

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    Customer Information

    Applied Buildings and Energy Research Group (ABERG)

    School of the Built Environment

    University of Salford

    G16a, Cockcroft Building

    Salford, Greater Manchester

    M5 4WT

    Phone: +44 (0) 161 295 6804

    Web: http://www.salford.ac.uk/research/best/research-groups/applied-buildings-and-energy

    Email: r.fitton@salford.ac.uk

  3. University of Newcastle’s SWAN centre uses the HeatingSave Energy Monitor for in-depth Research on Energy Efficiency

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    Established in 2006, Sir Joseph Swan Centre for Energy Research (or SWAN centre) is a community of sustainability and energy researchers and academics across various disciplines that involves biofuels and biomass, fuel cells and hydrogen, PV and solar thermal and sensing and monitoring technologies. It coordinates research across traditional discipline boundaries aiming to make a lasting contribution to some of the main global research challenges in the field of sustainability.

    One such challenge is to identify and demonstrate techniques that account for social and technical factors to radically reduce resource consumption, eliminate associated waste and mitigate pollution effects on whole ecosystems.

    As part of their efforts to tackle this challenge, the SWAN centre has launched a research programme that involves the thermal comfort and energy monitoring of a high performance dwelling built to Passive House standard with the aim of enabling a comparative and optimisation study. The programme will enable the monitoring and compilation of real world data in order to quantify the benefits of increased fabric insulation properties and air-tightness in a moderate climate similar to that of British Isles.

    The first test property is a two-storey detached single family house located in Durham, North East England. This is a new build timber construction (2014) that meets Passivhaus standards. The house comprises entrance hall, living room, dining room, kitchen, office room, utility room, family room, bathroom, three bedrooms and en-suite and features and advanced thermal design to passive house standards for the external wall, floor, roof, windows and doors. Heating, whole house ventilation, solar PV and rainwater harvesting systems are also incorporated.

    (more…)

  4. HeatingSave’s Energy & Environmental Monitoring system plays a critical role in University of the West of England’s Building Performance Monitoring Research Project

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    The Smart Heritage Building Performance Measurement for Sustainability (HBIM) project is an institutional-link collaboration studying methods for smart energy and environmental performance measurement in heritage buildings, for sustainability and heritage preservation purposes. The University of the West of England, the University of Salford, the British University in Egypt and Cairo University are the main partners in this research initiative.

    In this project several building performance monitoring systems have been installed into selected heritage occupied buildings, used as case studies, with the data being analysed for sustainability impact and building health effects. The final results will be benchmarked against current heritage conservation and sustainable performance measurement best practices.

    The final deliverable of the project is an open-source web portal for expert data management, visualization, and analysis, combining all aspects of the case studies and their contextual information. This includes digital sensor data, models, measurement results, and calculation algorithms.

    The Centre for Architecture and the Built Environment at UWE Bristol is the project leader, being responsible for the portal development and also working on new ways of analysing, visualizing, and presenting data.

    They are also in charge of the Hassell Drive case study, which examines the effect of externally insulating late 20th century “No fines” solid walled homes in Bristol. A sample of these properties are to be monitored in terms of energy consumption and comfort levels before, and after insulation works have been carried out over the space of a single winter and summer, which is particularly advantageous for the HBIM project.

    “In order to evaluate building performance as part of the HBIM project, we required a system capable of monitoring multiple environmental parameters, such as temperature, energy expenditure, occupants’ comfort and energy efficiency before/after putting in the measures” commented Mr Ammar Alzaatreh, Research Associate at the Faculty of Environment and Technology (FET) within UWE Bristol.

    The HeatingSave Energy & Environmental Monitoring System was the solution of choice for monitoring the test buildings’ performance, especially since it came highly recommended by another partner in the project, the University of Salford.

    “The HeatingSave Energy Monitor was recommended by our colleagues at the University of Salford, where it is also currently being used for research purposes. Based on their feedback, we’ve decided to use it as well”, Ammar told the HeatingSave reporter.

    The HeatingSave Energy Monitor wireless management system collects information from Zig 2.4 Mhz wireless mesh network sensors located in the living rooms, main bedrooms, kitchens and bathrooms of the 4 test buildings. This data can be analysed for an indication of energy use (Gas and electricity meter) and thermal comfort within monitored zones.

    The system collects internal and external temperature data, along with information on how the heating system works and details of energy use. It also monitors air quality including carbon dioxide, relative humidity, volatile organic compound levels and the way a building is used in terms of its occupancy, light and sound levels and the occupants’ activities and lifestyles

    Using a password protected standard internet connection, sensors can quickly be set up to review and quantitatively analyse the data with user-friendly software graphics, via a laptop, PC, mobile phone or tablet-based device.

    “The installation process was really fast, the Energy Monitor is remarkably easy to set it up, as is adding all the wireless sensors. We required only minimum assistance from the HeatingSave helpdesk throughout” Ammar told the HeatingSave reporter.

    “In fact, this is what I like most about the HeatingSave system – just how user-friendly and fast it is to set up and use” he added.

    According to the UWE Bristol researcher, HeatingSave is not only dead easy to deploy in the field, but also very intuitive, requiring only minimal training to operate. “For training, we’ve relied mostly on the system’s User Manual, support from our colleagues from Salford University, who had used the system before, and the HeatingSave Help Desk. However, since the system is so intuitive, we have learned how to use it in a very short span of time” Ammar revealed.

    Researchers and scientists at the University of West of England are actively using the Heating Save Monitoring System and are very happy with the results it’s provided thus far. Says Ammar: “The system is currently working as intended, supplying the energy and environmental data. The software dashboard is really easy to use in order to access and process the environmental data and graphs. The remote management system is also very effective and convenient.”

    Data collected by the HeatingSave Monitoring System is presented using a Dashboard system that provides consolidated and drill down views of the energy use data and provides a clear understanding of the real impact of energy efficiency measures through pre-installation analysis and post-installation monitoring.

    Ammar added that he is very happy with the quality of the after-sale service from HeatingSave: “The HeatingSave help-desk support service is phenomenal, the best support service I have received from any company, ever. They were very prompt and quick to answer any questions and queries and sort out any problems.”

    Would the Centre for Architecture and the Built Environment at UWE Bristol recommend HeatingSave to other researchers in the energy efficiency segment? “Yes we would” was the reply.

    Summing up his experience of HeatingSave, Mr. Ammar Alzaatreh said: “HeatingSave is an easy to use, efficient, high-performance energy and environmental monitoring system perfect for data recording and analysis.”

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    Centre for Architecture and the Built Environment

    University of the West of England,

    Bristol,

    Web: http://www.hbim.org/

    Phone: +441179656261

    Email: ammar.alzaatreh@uwe.ac.uk