
Georg ReichardVirginia Tech | VT · Myers-Lawson School of Construction
Georg Reichard
PhD
About
89
Publications
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Introduction
Dr. Georg Reichard is a Professor and Department Head of Building Construction and the Associate Director for Research in the Myers-Lawson School of Construction at Virginia Tech. His research deals with experimental and numerical methods, simulation and data models, in particular in the area of building sciences related to building envelopes and environmental systems.
Additional affiliations
March 2000 - December 2004
December 2004 - July 2011
April 2000 - December 2004
Education
August 1996 - April 2000
Publications
Publications (89)
Historically, in residential buildings in the U.S., designers saw no need for mechanical ventilation, due to relatively high infiltration rates and the option of manual ventilation through operable windows. Building practices today have moved to more stringent performance mandates including greater airtightness as enhanced energy efficiency becomes...
This research summarizes a student experiential learning project. The student project team, consisting of undergraduate and graduate architecture, engineering, and construction management students designed a single-family detached affordable home. During the iterative design process, simulations and physical prototypes were developed to inform syst...
Distributed market structures for local, transactive energy trading can be modeled with ecological systems, such as mycorrhizal networks, which have evolved to facilitate interplant carbon exchange in forest ecosystems. However, the complexity of these ecological systems can make it challenging to understand the effect that adopting these models co...
The resource distribution strategies of trees and plants in the forest are applied here as inspiration for the development of a blueprint for transactive, hybrid solar and storage microgrids. We used the Biomimicry Institute’s Biomimicry Spiral and their toolbox as a design methodology to inform the structural and functional characteristics of this...
Roof fastener systems are comprised of metal screws and plates used to attach roof membranes, cover boards, and insulation. These systems can have an adverse impact on the thermal performance of roof assemblies, as the components create thermal bridges that bypass the thermal resistance of insulation in the roof assembly. This in turn allows heat t...
This study reports an empirical analysis of an all-electric, Net zero energy housing (NZEH) development located in a mixed-humid climate zone (4A, Virginia, USA). Circuit-level energy monitors were used to measure energy consumption and energy production data (solar photovoltaic) at 1-hr intervals in six identical apartments over 24 months. The stu...
This study reports an empirical analysis of an all-electric, Net Zero Energy Housing (NZEH) development located in a mixed-humid climate zone (4A, Virginia, USA). Circuit-level energy monitors were used to measure energy consumption and energy production data (solar photovoltaic) at 1-hr intervals in six identical apartments over 24 months. The stu...
Minimizing environmental impacts over a building's life cycle is critical to achieving sustainable communities. Early design is the most critical step to improve construction's sustainability, as the majority of important decisions have not yet been made. However, the implementation of sustainability assessment in early design is data- and effort-i...
Minimizing environmental impacts over a building's life cycle is critical to achieving sustainable communities. Early design is the most critical step to improve construction's sustainability, as the majority of important decisions have not yet been made. However, the implementation of sustainability assessment in early design is data-and effort-in...
Minimizing environmental impacts over a building’s life cycle is critical to achieving sustainable communities. Early design is the most critical step to improve construction’s sustainability, as the majority of important decisions have not yet been made. However, the implementation of sustainability assessment in early design is data- and effort-i...
Nowadays periodic inspections of building façades are required to maintain a safe and
well-performed built environment. An Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) equipped with a high-definition or infrared camera can help capture numerous multi-spectral images or videos for closeup inspection of building façades. However, there is a lack of management and a...
Nowadays, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are frequently used for periodic visual inspection of building envelopes to detect unsafe conditions or vulnerable damages. Inspection practitioners have to manually examine the large amounts of high-resolution images collected by UAVs to identify anomalies or damages on building facades for reporting and r...
There is a growing trend in the application of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) systems for visual inspection of building facades. Current practices remain at a low efficiency to manage the large amount of UAV-collected close-range façade images to support the inspection and documentation of façade anomalies such as cracks and corrosions. This paper p...
This article analyses the integration of green building with the largest low-income housing production programme in the US and the innovativeness of state housing agencies. Drawing on policy innovation literature, panel data and regression analysis are employed to quantify associations between state-level characteristics and the adoption of green b...
There has been a trend in applying imaging techniques in building facade inspection, such as laser scanning, infrared thermography, high definition camera, etc. Utilizing such techniques creates a large amount of multi-sourced image data for building facade inspections. However, there is a lack of an effective way to manage these massive image data...
Smart cities, here defined as cities utilizing big data along with information and communication technologies (ICT), such as the internet of things (IoT) and location based services (LBS), have provided opportunities for the development of personalized and accessible public services and experiences. Parts of public service facilities, such as schoo...
The Mycorrho-grid is a blockchain-based microgrid inspired by the way trees collect and distribute resources through mycorrhizal networks in the forest. It was first developed in conjunction with Virginia Tech's grand-prize winning TreeHAUS entry in the 2019 Solar Decathlon Design Challenge and is expanded upon here with a focus on further potentia...
The TreeHaus is a design for a net-positive, regenerative housing development inspired by the way trees collect and distribute resources in the forest. The goal of the project is to create a building that strengthens its surrounding environment and municipality by imagining it as a constituent of its contextual ecology. The TreeHaus will harness en...
The present article analyzes the integration of green building policy and practice with the largest low-income housing production program in the US and the innovativeness of its housing agencies. Drawing on policy innovation literature, panel data and regression analysis are employed to quantify associations between state-level characteristics and...
Over the past years, a growing trend of utilizing camera-equipped drones for periodical building facade inspection has emerged. Building façade anomalies, such as cracks and erosion, can be detected through analyzing drone-captured video, photographs, and infrared images. Such anomalies are known to have an impact on various building performance as...
Intentional and unintentional openings in a building’s envelope provide opportunities for unwanted pests to enter buildings. The brown marmorated stink bug, Halyomorpha halys (Stål), is one such pest, causing a significant domestic winter nuisance in many locations. One important means of pest control is exclusion, or blocking openings through whic...
Buildings are complex systems, yet architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals often perform their work without considering the human factors that affect the operational performance of the building system. The AEC industry currently employs a linear design and delivery approach, lacking verified performance standards and real-ti...
With the growing concern of climate change and more frequent and severe natural disaster events affecting the built environment, enhancing the performance and resilience of buildings has become increasingly vital. Stakeholders are seeking guidance towards improving both the individual performance of buildings and systems as well as their overall di...
Despite their impact on work performance, cognitive responses to thermal variations in buildings have not been accurately quantified. Practical limitations in individual laboratory experiments with limited participants often cause low statistical power and restrict generalizability. Thus, inconsistencies in individual studies motivate summary revie...
The U.S. government has included green building policy in affordable housing programs for years. However, little to no evidence is available to elucidate this policy's efficacy in the context of energy performance and financial savings. This paper reports a longitudinal study that investigates time effects of such policy on the energy performance i...
Buildings have a large impact on the environment consuming 40% of U.S. energy and 70% of U.S. electricity in 2015. Buildings are complex systems, yet architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals often perform their work lacking a formal post-occupancy feedback process that informs the efficacy of goals for building performance an...
Buildings continue to have a large impact on the environment consuming 40% of U.S. energy and 70% of U.S. electricity in 2015. Buildings are complex systems, yet architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals often perform their work lacking a formal post-occupancy feedback process that informs the efficacy of zero energy performan...
The practice of monitoring-based commissioning (MBCx) using energy management and information systems (EMIS) has been shown to enable and help sustain up to 20% energy savings in buildings. Despite research that has quantified the costs, benefits, and energy savings of MBCx, the process remains under-utilized. To understand why MBCx is not more fre...
Utilization of phase change materials (PCMs) in building enclosures as thermal energy storage systems (TES) has become a reappearing topic within the research community in recent years. PCMs represent an innovative solution that can contribute to the improvement of energy efficiency and thermal performance of buildings. This paper aims to present r...
In high-performing building enclosures, the reduction of heat losses can lead to higher accumulations of moisture from condensation and vapor diffusion phenomena, which in turn can lead to rot, corrosion, mold, and overall deterioration of buildings. Building construction professionals have the unique opportunity to catch design and construction er...
Utilization of various phase change materials (PCMs) in building enclosures as thermal energy storage systems (TES) has become a re-surfacing topic over the past decade. New technologies, such as encapsulated PCMs present opportunities for innovative solutions that can contribute to the improvement of energy and thermal performance of buildings. Ho...
The modern building industry sends products all over the world to improve building envelope performance. Though there are existing standards and tools to evaluate hygrothermal behavior of wall sections in different climates, they are often based on different assumptions and provide development teams with different insights. This paper attempts to c...
This paper focuses on possibilites for simple, low-cost, manual adjustable lighshelves in comparison to static light shelves, which typically do not utilize their optimal potential of daylight harvesting due to lack of access to optmization procedures. A framework is presented on how to identify optima for seasonal manually adjustable
light shelf c...
Climate change, resource availability, and subsequent energy efficiency in buildings have become international focus areas of research and policies, which are addressed differently in countries east and west of the Atlantic divide. This paper examines challenges and opportunities of transferring successful high-performance building programs, such a...
Resilient and sustainable multi-hazard building design can significantly benefit from a holistic approach that considers hazards in the context of the full building life-cycle. Sustainability of a building is dependent not only on well-defined impacts from initial design, construction and operation, but also those associated with uncertain future h...
The social, economic, and environmental impacts associated with natural hazards can threaten the sustainability of the building environment. Architects and engineers must consider the reconstruction impacts associated with unknown future extreme events that may occur during a building's lifetime jointly with initial construction impacts in order to...
Cement based facades (CBF) are considered to have good performance qualities and to be durable, sustainable and resilient due to their monolithic, continuity and mechanical capacity. Many studies can be found in the literature highlighting their improved performance when compared to some low cost/low weight residential applications, such as wood fr...
This paper discusses opportunities and various constraints that arise when attempting to meet the Department of Energy's (DOE) Zero Energy Ready Home (ZERH) Standard for townhouse developments. Besides a broader analysis of economical limits of performance for different consumption categories, the paper discusses the specific constraints that arise...
This paper assesses the opportunities of utilizing Phase Change Materials (PCMs) in building enclosure systems to improve energy performance and thermal comfort in buildings. The building sector continues to grow along with population growth, which will further increase energy consumption that is needed for space heating and cooling to provide ther...
Climate change is exacerbating natural disasters, and extreme weather events increase with intensity and frequency. This requires a more in-depth evaluation of regional climates and locations, where natural hazards, vulnerabilities, and potential impacts will vary. At the community level, private residences are crucial shelter systems to protect ag...
A systematic review of energy efficiency incentives that were available to homeowners was conducted across all 50 states. This review revealed that incentive portfolios vary largely with regard to the number of available incentives, the various types of incentives, the individual amounts that are made available, and the targeted equipment.
Of the $...
Residential energy consumption in the USA has been marked by a steady growth over the past decades in spite of the implementation of various energy efficiency policies. To develop effective energy efficiency policies for the residential sector, it is important to understand the causal factors and their effects on residential energy consumption. The...
Many existing homes in the United States waste energy due to various inefficient systems, energy consumption behaviors, and construction deficiencies. A great potential exists for homeowners to reduce their energy expenditures, which can be achieved through energy retrofit solutions applied to homes. Decisions to pursue a retrofit action in a home...
More than 60% of occupied homes in the U.S. were constructed before 1980, often wasting up to 60% of the consumed energy due to building envelope and systems deficits. Homeowners spend billions of dollars annually on energy bills, and there is a potential to dramatically reduce this expenditure. This return can be achieved through energy retrofit s...
Active daylight harvesting technologies currently available in the market often suffers from widespread market acceptability due to their high cost and imperfect performance. Passive systems typically cannot harvest higher potentials of daylight, which is dynamic over days, months, and seasons, due to their static nature. This research, using Clima...
There are probably more than a million fume hoods operated in laboratories throughout the United States. Most of these fume hoods still run under more or less continuous conditions and thus consume an enormous amount of energy per year. There seems to be a significant savings potential if the total exhausted volumes could be reduced while all safet...
This project report discusses a theoretical assessment model for investigating the savings potential of retrofit scenarios for curing barns.
The authors evaluated the most practical and also typical retrofit scenarios, such as envelope improvements and the installation of an automated control systems. In terms of their anticipated impact on energy...
This work is part of a regional initiative to build training and employment services into a career pathways system for the green building industry sector, with a particular focus on construction and retrofitting towards more energy-efficient buildings, and installation of alternative energy systems. It addressed the challenges of collecting and dis...
Energy consumption in the United States’ residential sector has been marked by a steady growth over the past few decades, in spite of the implementation of several energy efficiency policies. To develop effective energy policies for the residential sector, it is of utmost importance to study the various factors affecting residential energy consumpt...
This paper presents a numerical model to predict the vibro-acoustic responses of simplified residential structures exposed to sonic booms. The model is validated experimentally in a companion paper. The dynamics of the fluid-structure system, including their interaction, is computed in the time domain using a modal-decomposition approach. In the dy...
In a companion paper, a model was derived to predict the vibro-acoustic responses of simplified residential structures exposed to sonic booms. In the present paper, the experimental validation of the numerical model is presented. First, the experimental setup is described, including the structure, instrumentation, and external pressure loading. The...
Structural modal properties of single-room and two-room rectangular structures built with typical residential construction are extracted using only the vibration responses to (1) a sonic boom simulated with a linear distribution of detonating cord and (2) ambient excitation. Then, the acoustic modal properties of the cavities enclosed by the reside...
The intense complexity of interfaces in a construction project makes information technology (IT) applications a must for effective interface management (IM). This largely requires a unified, accurate, and efficient way of modeling interface information. Conventionally, interfaces are simply modeled as dependencies/relationships between project enti...
As a first step in the development of a model for predicting the noise transmission of sonic booms inside buildings, a numerical solution for the transmission of a shock wave with an arbitrary time history into a rectangular room with a plaster–wood wall is investigated. The dynamics of this fluid–structure system, including their interaction, is c...
Experiments performed to validate a model used to predict the transmission of weak sonic booms into a residential building are discussed in detail. The experimental effort encompassed the construction of a simple structure that retains the essential characteristics of a residential building, the instrumentation of this structure, and the production...
The authors present a comparative study on effectiveness of energy policies for the building sector that are presently implemented in selected countries in Europe versus selected states in the U.S. Socio-economic factors affecting energy consumption on both sides of the Atlantic are identified from a human behavior perspective. Various identified f...
Managing physical interface issues is currently a challenging task in most of construction projects due to the complexity of physical interfaces and the lack of experienced management personnel. This paper is a continued effort to introduce and also test a previously proposed interface object modelling method that aims to provide comprehensive inte...
The severity of interface issues and the necessity of interface management (IM) have not received adequate recognition from both industry and academia. The understanding of interface issues is still insufficient and the proposed or employed measures are unilateral, which result in unsatisfactory IM performance in construction projects. After establ...
As a first step in the development of a model for predicting the noise transmission of sonic booms inside buildings, an analytical formulation was carried for the transmission of a shock wave with an arbitrary time history into a single room with a window. In this model, only the window can vibrate and the remaining portion of the structure enclosi...
This paper aims to establish and clarify the close relationships between Interface Management (IM) and the two emerging construction management philosophies: lean construction and agile project management (APM). The applications of these two approaches face great challenges from a project's complexity. IM, managing and controlling interrelationship...
The large number and the complexity of interfaces in the building construction environment prevent management personnel from visualizing and managing various interface issues efficiently. Computers, in contrast, will be more capable of recording, tracking, checking, and controlling complicated interfaces within the computer integrated construction...
Im Kunststoff-Fensterbau werden bisher nur vereinzelt numerische Berechnungen in der Entwicklung eingesetzt. Dies liegt zum einen an der Komplexität der Systeme wie auch an der verfügbaren Software, zum anderen aber auch an den Grenzen der Modellierbarkeit in Simulationsprogrammen. Dieser Beitrag gibt einen Überblick der zunächst üblichen Anwendung...
This paper is about the merging of two software applications that allows building decision makers to consider code compliance and to use performance simulation tools from the early, schematic phases of building design. By making the capabilities of a code compliance tool available at the early schematic phases of building design, the hope and expec...
A new guidance concept is presented, which encourages third parties, like educators, to provide additional, comprehensive information to users of highly complex (e.g. simulation-) software, helping them to flatten the steep learning curve by understanding the impact of decisions made during the input/design process.
A new guidance concept is presented, which encourages third parties to provide additional comprehensive information to users of highly complex (e.g. simulation-) software, helping them to flatten the steep learning curve by understanding the impact of decisions made during the input/design process.
Gegenstand dieses Projektberichts ist die Berechnung von Verformungen von Fensterflügeln, die aus einer Isolierglasscheibe
mit umfassend verklebten Kunststoffprofilen bestehen und normal zur Fensterebene durch eine Flächenlast (Windlast) beansprucht werden. Dies geschieht mit Hilfe von numerischen Simulationen, wobei im
Speziellen die Finite Elemen...
Gegenstand dieses Projekts ist die Berechnung von Verformungen einer Isolierglasscheibe, die durch ein Kunststoffprofil umfasst ist und Teil einer Fassadenkonstruktion ist. Dies geschieht mit Hilfe von numerischen Simulationen, wobei im Speziellen die Finite Elemente Methode (FEM) zur Anwendung gelangt.
Die Tragwirkung der Isolierglasscheiben und d...
Die Entwicklung und Produktion von Kunststofferzeugnissen hat heute einen äußerst hohen Standard an Qualität erreicht, wie er von anderen, im Bauwesen durchaus üblicheren Materialien nur kaum eingehalten werden kann. Dennoch wird diesem Umstand bei Durchführung von statischen Berechnungen nach dem Stand der Technik noch nicht Rechnung getragen. Sin...
Gegenstand dieses Projektberichts ist die Berechnung von Querschnittswerten eines teilweise gelochten Stahlprofils,
die für eine Bemessung nach der Stabtheorie benötigt werden.
Im Rahmen dieser Berechnung werden teilweise idealisierte Annahmen getroffen, die aber für die einzelnen Ergebnisse nur von geringer Auswirkung sind.
In DVS 2207 Teil 25 wird von gerader Biegung ausgegangen. Anhand einer Berechnung untersucht dieser Bericht, ob bei der existierenden Versuchsanordnung wirklich von gerader Biegung ausgegangen werden kann, wenn ein unsymetrischer Querschnitt nicht normal zu seinen Hauptachsen belastet wird.
Es wurde hierzu das Verformungs- und Spannungsverhalten ei...
Based on the seven levels of principals of object-oriented programming described by B. Meyer [2], it is shown that with today's APL interpreters it is possible to combine array processing and object-oriented programming on a very high level of abstraction.
Based on the seven levels of principals of object-oriented programming described by B. Meyer [2], it is shown that with today's APL interpreters it is possible to combine array processing and object-oriented programming on a very high level of abstraction.