Monitoring Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) in Buildings with Distributed Sensing

A major challenge in the built environment is the integration of energy and indoor environmental quality in the optimization of existing buildings. The UK’s target of net-zero energy buildings by 2050 brings in the need to optimize existing buildings for energy efficiency and to provide better indoor environmental quality (IEQ). The complications are the monitoring of the indoor environment for better indoor air quality (IAQ) and thermal comfort without compromising the energy efficiency of the building. This paper presents the use of high-density IEQ sensor data for real-time monitoring of the space for occupant comfort and air quality. The experiment takes place in an office building in Scotland where the IEQ sensors were installed. The initial results indicate that there is an uneven distribution of temperature in the office space and poor performance of IAQ in the meeting room during occupied hours. This paper describes the initial assessment of the office space for IAQ and thermal comfort using thresholds from ASHRAE and WELL standards for analyzing the quality of the space and discusses the future development of this framework for better thermal comfort and IAQ in the indoor environment.