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BOSSA: A multidimensional post-occupancy evaluation tool
Abstract
Research findings point to three methodological shortcomings of current post-occupancy evaluation (POE) tools: (1) contextualizing results, (2) adding instrumental data side by side to survey results and (3) producing meaningful feedback to its key stakeholders. This paper introduces the holistic BOSSA (Building Occupants Survey System Australia) and tools developed under this project's scope in close collaboration with industry. It aims to present and discuss the statistical analysis used in the BOSSA tool, distilling the survey results down to nine indoor environmental quality (IEQ) dimensions and their association with four overall indices. Principal component analysis (PCA) extracted nine IEQ dimensions that were uncorrelated with each other: spatial comfort, indoor air quality, personal control, noise distraction and privacy, connection to the outdoor environment, building image and maintenance, individual space, thermal comfort, and visual comfort. Four separate multiple regression analyses were conducted, one for each global evaluation item as an independent variable: work area comfort, building satisfaction, productivity and health. This statistical analysis provided the rational basis of BOSSA's scoring system, designed to simplify how occupant survey results are communicated to key stakeholders from the property industry and researchers.
... Within this changing paradigm, a need for more advanced, digital methods to understand the use of space and improve its design has risen [45,46]; POE and other methods [47,48] The rise in searches for the term 'coliving' in 2015 was likely due to an increase of these facilities in New York City and companies beginning to expand this typology outside of the tech world [33]. Spain is now the country with the fourth highest interest globally, according to Google, and the first in Europe. ...
... Post-Occupancy Evaluation (POE) is the methodology of obtaining feedback on the use of spaces in a building and its performance for the users [43,44]. Within this changing paradigm, a need for more advanced, digital methods to understand the use of space and improve its design has risen [45,46]; POE and other methods [47,48] are becoming essential to analyzing the current use of spaces, predict performance and ensure housing resiliency [17,[49][50][51][52][53]. Recent studies have shown how POE could improve electricity performance predicted during the design of non-residential spaces [54]; a similar method has been applied for coliving residential spaces. ...
... Within this changing paradigm, a need for more advanced digital methods to understand the use of space and improve its design arose [45,46]; POE and other methods [47,48] are becoming essential to analyze the current use of spaces, predict performance and ensure housing resiliency [17,[49][50][51][52][53]. Recent studies have shown how POE could improve electricity performance predicted during the design of non-residential spaces [54]; a similar method has been applied for coliving residential spaces. ...
Sustainable spaces are those that are optimized, accessible, promote user experience and aim to reduce CO2 emissions while enhancing users’ well-being and comfort. The purpose of this paper is to present a methodology that was developed during the COVID-19 pandemic to understand and improve the use of coliving spaces based on remote Post-Occupancy Evaluation (POE) analysis of the digital trail generated by the users. Applying the POE methodology based on data collection from IT infrastructure enabled to identify opportunities to improve the future design of human-centered spaces. The residential market, design-wise traditional for centuries, is now facing a high-speed adaptation to the changing needs, accelerated by the COVID-19 crisis. New ways of living and shared spaces like Coliving are escalating. Technology is both an enabler of this shift in housing and the solution to operating and managing these new buildings. This paper demonstrates, through the case study of a Coliving space located in Madrid, Spain, the benefits of implementing data analysis of the digital trail collected from in-built IT systems such as smart locks, Wi-Fi networks and electric consumption devices. The conclusion is that analysing the available data from the digital infrastructure of coliving buildings can enable practitioners to improve the future design of residential spaces.
... White-collar workers, dismissed from their fixed workstations, were able to use their mobile devices to move and work freely within a wider variety of spaces, inside and outside the office [24]. Nevertheless, they still seek work environments that stimulate networking and collaborative possibilities [25], which has led to the growing popularity of coworking spaces [6,24,26], known to enhance performance and social networks [27]. ...
... Within this changing paradigm, there is a need for more advanced, digital methods to understand the use of space and improve its design [27,28]; post-occupancy evaluation (POE) and other methods [29,30] are becoming essential in analyzing the current use of workspaces and predicting workspace occupancy, use, and working dynamics. ...
... Location tracking systems such as sensors, Wi-Fi, or facial recognition are currently used to understand space dynamics [17,18,43], user behavior [44,45], and energy consumption [46]. Other buildings such as malls or outdoor spaces often use location and occupancy analytics for security or understanding behavioral patterns [27,45,47]. ...
Data are required for optimizing workplace design, assessing user experience, and ensuring wellbeing. This research focuses on the benefits of incorporating post-occupancy evaluation (POE) data analysis by studying the digital trail of employees generated by the existing Wi-Fi infrastructure of the office. The objective is to enable a safe return to offices through compliance with COVID-19 space-capacity regulations and in consideration of the health and wellbeing of employees. Workplaces, teams, and people have become more digitalized and therefore more mobile due to the globalization of knowledge and cutting-edge technological innovations, a process that has been accelerated by the COVID-19 crisis. Now, hybrid work and fully remote working routines are increasing in a significant number of companies. Nevertheless, with the return to the office, understanding how to calibrate spatial capacity is now key for workplaces and companies. Traditional assessment methods are obsolete; new methods that respond to mobility, changing occupancy rates, and comfort are essential. This paper analyzes, through the case study of a pre-COVID-19 activity-based office, the advantages of using digital indoor-location techniques (such as Wi-Fi networks, which additionally have the advantage of being previously installed in the majority of these spaces). The paper demonstrates that the incorporation of digital POE of user trends enabled a more seamless, accurate, and scalable return to a new normal office work scenario and an improved post-COVID-19 design of workplaces.
... In response to these challenges, surveys have been used to provide a quick and cost-effective way of assessing and analysing occupant experiences with their indoor spaces. Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) surveys are a popular method of collecting these types of building user insights (Leaman & Bordass 2001;Zimmerman & Martin 2001;Zagreus et al. 2004;Candido et al. 2016;Li et al. 2018). Over the years, the content of these tools has shifted (Peretti & Schiavon 2011), and each theoretical approach presents its own unique set of strengths and weaknesses (Vischer 1989). ...
... Creating this norm is useful for building owners and operators working to make informed decisions about future building adjustments (Vischer 1989). In 2015, the developers of the Building Occupant Survey System Australia (BOSSA) (Candido et al. 2016) presented data on the development of their tool's measurement and benchmark properties. However, in general, little critical examination has been given to the content and measurement properties of tools such as these. ...
... radiant versus all-air systems or mixed-mode versus air-conditioned) (Karmann et al. 2017;Brager & Baker 2009), or to assess green certification effectiveness (Altomonte et al. 2019). This focus on IEQ is echoed throughout other widely used POE tools (such as BOSSA: Candido et al. 2016; and the BUS Methodology: Leaman & Bordass 2001). These are undoubtedly important factors in understanding the functionality of a space, but as the definition shifts of how a successful building serves its occupants, so must the tools to measure that success. ...
Buildings influence diverse factors (e.g. health, wellbeing, productivity, and social connection). Occupants’ direct experiences with their indoor environments allow them to determine whether those spaces support or hinder the activities performed. However, most post-occupancy evaluations (POEs) focus solely on measuring people’s levels of comfort and environmental satisfaction. With increasing attention and interest in occupant health and wellness, there is a need to reassess whether occupant surveys are evaluating all they need to. An analysis is presented of data collected from a widely used online POE tool: The Center for the Built Environment’s (CBE) Occupant Survey (more than 90,000 respondents from approximately 900 buildings) in order to summarise its database and evaluate the survey’s structure and benchmarking metrics. A total of 68% of the respondents are satisfied with their workspace. Satisfaction is highest with spaces’ ease of interaction (75% satisfied), amount of light (74%), and cleanliness (71%). Dissatisfaction is highest with sound privacy (54% dissatisfied), temperature (39%), and noise level (34%). Correlation, principal component, and hierarchical clustering analyses identified seven distinct categories of measurement within the 16 satisfaction items. Results also revealed that a reduction in the scale may be possible. Based on these results, potential improvements and new directions are discussed for the future of POE tools.
... Nudging could also be applied to influence healthy nourishment (e.g. Arno and Thomas, 2016;Kroese et al., 2016) and encourage social contact and relaxation. ...
... Whereas a positive correlation of workplace factors on employee satisfaction is often subject of research for existing workplace types (Kim et al., 2016) there is no scientific knowledge on the effects of work satisfaction in corporate coworking spaces. ...
... Whereas Krupper (2015) and O'Neill(1994) identify a medium positive influence of communication on satisfaction in traditional work environments, the focus on creative space and communication is regarded as essential in coworking spaces. Kim et al. (2016) state in their research that interaction between colleagues is better facilitated in non-territorial work. Especially in coworking spaces, the social aspects of work are becoming increasingly important such as "time for interaction, being creative and having private thinking time if the completion of a given task requires it" (Fuzi, Gryszkiewicz, and Sikora, 2018). ...
Purpose: Opposed to underlying assumptions of ABW offices, previous empirical studies ascertained a tendency that employees do not frequently switch between different activity settings. Even though ABW is more and more becoming the default office concept, employees’ switching behaviour has not been investigated in depth. This study aims to understand employees’ switching behaviour by determining reasons to switch and not to switch and various influencing factors of switching behaviour.
Theory: Switching behaviour is defined as switching between different places within an office building with work-related, preference-based and/or social purpose, including breaks. Switching behaviour is divided into mandatory and voluntary switching. Mandatory switching is switching due to scheduled activities (meetings) as well as switching due to confidentiality issues. Voluntary switching refers to discretionary switching that may be motivated by a perceived mismatch between either activity or preference, and environment. According to previous research, dissatisfaction with environment can cause switching between different settings in an ABW office.
Design/methodology/approach: A questionnaire study was conducted across Switzerland and Belgium, and 124 employees from various organizations and departments participated in the questionnaire. Frequency analyses were conducted to determine reasons (not) to switch, and multinomial logistic regression analyses were performed to identify influencing factors of switching frequency.
Findings: Findings show that the majority of the respondents switch multiple times a day, which runs counter to the previous research. In addition, the study revealed clear evidence that mandatory switching frequency is independent of various factors suggested in this study. This indicates that the distinction of mandatory and voluntary switching is valid. Furthermore, privacy, acoustics, distraction, proximity to team/colleagues were ascertained as reasons to switch, and place preference/attachment, proximity to team were determined as reasons not to switch.
Originality / Value: Overall, this study contributed to understanding switching behaviour better by defining, distinguishing switching behaviour, and identifying reasons (not) to switch and influencing factors of switching frequency. These findings can provide more knowledge of switching behaviour to workplace or facility management practitioners so that they can understand their employees’ needs and behaviour better and integrate this into workplace concepts and design.
... In commercial office buildings, it is common practice to assess the long-term satisfaction of occupants using POE surveys (e.g. BUS survey [18], CBE survey [19], BOSSA survey [20], etc.). Although these surveys are conducted at a point of time, their questions are often general and applicable for longer term insights (three to six months or more [8]). ...
... To address the aim of this study, we conducted secondary data analyses using the Building Occupants Survey System Australia (BOSSA) database [20] and the Sentient Ambient Monitoring of Buildings in Australia (SAMBA) IEQ measurement database [29], both of which were developed by the Indoor Environmental Quality Lab at The University of Sydney. Fig. 1 outlines the overall methodology. ...
... BOSSA is a POE survey tool designed to automate the process of collecting occupants' subjective assessments of their indoor environment [20]. Respondents are asked to rate their satisfaction with core building elements and functions such as overall design, physical environments, building maintenance, etc. ...
Thermal comfort standards have suggested a number of physical indices which can be calculated from either building simulations or in situ physical monitoring to assess the long-term thermal comfort of a space. However, the prohibitively high cost of sensor technologies has limited the applications of these physical indices, and their usefulness has never been established using data collected in real buildings. This paper is the first assessment of the six types of existing indices (23 total) found in standards and five types of new indices (36 total) and their correlation with the long-term thermal satisfaction of building occupants. Correlation analyses were based on continuous thermal comfort measurements and post-occupancy evaluation surveys from four air-conditioned office buildings in Sydney, Australia. We found that the majority of existing indices, especially those based on predicted mean vote (PMV) and predicted percentage dissatisfied (PPD) metrics, have a weak correlation with thermal satisfaction. The percentage of time outside a temperature range was the best-performing index from the standards (r=-0.63). A new index based on the percentage of time that daily temperature range is greater than a threshold reported the strongest correlation (r=-0.8) with thermal satisfaction for this dataset. The results suggest that occupants’ long-term thermal comfort is influenced more by pronounced excursions beyond some acceptable temperature range and large variations in daily temperature than the average experience over time. These findings support the use of continuous monitoring technologies for long-term thermal comfort evaluation and inform potential amendments of international thermal comfort standards.
... The feedback mechanism of POE is essential because it provides an opportunity to improve the sustainability of future projects whilst simultaneously offering invaluable 'cradle to grave' information on all phases of a building's lifecycle (O'Neill and Duvall, 2005;Way and Bordass, 2005;Candido et al., 2016). To achieve sustainability, POE processes must have common points of comparison with standardised metrics -irrespective of the building or setting in which the evaluation is undertaken (HEFCE, 2006;Hassanain et al., 2016). ...
... Without such attention toward implementing a formalised and replicable feedback mechanism across the built environment (cf. O'Neill and Duvall, 2005;Way and Bordass, 2005;Candido et al., 2016;Roberts et al., 2021), the sector's substantial environmental footprint will persist or indeed, expand. Furthermore, increasing focus upon circular economy within the AECO sector, facilitated by processes such as POE, has the potential to realise transformational change within the sector. ...
Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) enables designers and contractors to determine whether a building's performance ‘in-use’ meets the specifications prescribed ‘in-design’. Hence, POE presents an invaluable opportunity for stakeholders within the architecture, engineering, construction and operations (AECO) sector to learn from mistakes and improve the environmental performance of future designs. Against this contextual backdrop, this paper identifies the barriers to performing a POE implementation following a building's hand-over and use, and how these barriers inadvertently prevent sustainable development goals from being reached. A theoretical model is developed which enables building owners and users to implement a POE and thereby realise its innate potential to reduce the impact of the built environment upon the natural environment. An interpretivist philosophical stance is adopted to analyse both secondary and primary data collated using a three-stage waterfall process. First, a thematic content analysis is conducted utilising the transcript of a practitioner focus group convened to garner perspectives on the prominent barriers to POE implementation. Second, a scientometric analysis is undertaken to examine the prevailing body of knowledge (BoK) pertaining to sustainability, circular economy and barriers to POE implementation. Finally, a cross-comparative analysis of the emergent findings emanating from the previous two stages is conducted to ascertain whether academic literature is addressing the barriers identified by industry practitioners. The research reveals that despite the significant opportunities that POE presents to reduce the built environment's substantial impact upon the natural environment, only a relatively small proportion of the POE BoK explores this objective. Similarly, an even smaller proportion of literature examines the barriers to POE implementation and how to overcome them. The cross-comparative analysis undertaken highlights inconsistencies between practitioner requirements regarding implementation barriers and the proportion of the POE BoK pursuing this objective. Curiously, there is no literature delineating POE's potential to facilitate a circular economy within the built environment sector. A novel theoretical model emerges from this research which acts to bridge a gap between theory and practice and provides utility for researchers and practitioners alike to increase the interchange of knowledge pertaining to pertinent POE requirements. The resultant model establishes POE as a crucial environmental feedback mechanism for stakeholders within the AECO sector.
... The Building Occupant Survey System Australia (BOSSA) is a tool that contextualises survey results by systematically collecting information on the building and tenancy levels. It considers nine indoor environmental quality dimensions including spatial comfort, indoor air quality, personal control, noise distraction and privacy, connection to the outdoor environment, building image and maintenance, individual space, thermal comfort and visual comfort [23]. ...
... The Sustainable and Healthy Environments (SHE) Survey was developed by the University of Melbourne as a questionnaire to collect data about socio-demographics, occupancy and working arrangements, transportation, indoor environmental quality, water, office layout, ergonomics and aesthetics, nutrition, workplace wellness and engagement, sleep, health and well-being, personality and overall evaluation [23,27]. ...
Notwithstanding the increased number of regulations there is a general lack of awareness about Inclusive Design among building industry professionals. This is partly due to the scarcity of available tools to evaluate occupancy feedback on inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility. How can we implement a tool to evaluate occupancy feedback on inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility that works for the building industry? This study aims to inform the development of a post-occupancy method to evaluate Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEA) in the built environment. This article reports the results of a multifaceted Delphi study which culminated with co-designing the IDEA audit, a post-occupancy evaluation method to collect data on people's perceptions of inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility. With the IDEA audit, researchers, building owners, design teams, developers, facility managers, tenants, and organisation leaders can achieve a baseline of understanding of what people feel in regard to inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility, clearly identify pockets of inconsistency and use data to decide how to address challenges and points of exclusion.
... The most common method in field studies (e.g. [7][8][9][10][11]) is the use of subjective rating scales to measure occupant satisfaction with different IEQ items. These questions and scales are mostly disseminated through postoccupancy evaluation questionnaires. ...
... Candido et al. [8] Eighteen Australian office buildings, 2903 occupants, 31 IEQ questions New variables created from principal components were used to predict: work area comfort, building satisfaction, productivity, and health. ...
Studies often aim to determine which indoor environmental quality parameters best predict the overall workspace assessment. However, this method overlooks important differences distinguishing satisfied and dissatisfied occupant groups. We used a new analytical approach on 33671 post-occupancy evaluation responses to overcome this problem and better understand workspace satisfaction in office buildings. Principal components analysis reduced satisfaction votes with 15 different IEQ items into two principal components related to: 1) privacy and amount of space, and 2) cleanliness and maintenance. We grouped the data by occupants that were either satisfied or dissatisfied with their workspace. Principal component 1 explained half of the variability in the dataset and reliably distinguished occupants satisfied with their workspace from those that were dissatisfied. We used support vector machine to classify the satisfied and dissatisfied groups based on principal components 1 and 2. Classification of occupant satisfaction with the overall workspace was highly accurate (approximately 90%) and based predominantly on the component related to privacy and amount of space. Further analyses showed that occupants satisfied with their overall workspace were generally satisfied with all other IEQ items. There was greater independence between workspace attributes for those dissatisfied with their overall workspace. Issues of privacy and available space were an overwhelming determinant of occupant dissatisfaction irrespective of the success of other workspace attributes. These findings suggest that efforts to improve occupant satisfaction with workspaces should leverage designs that ensure privacy and provide sufficient space to support occupants in their work.
... BOSSA is another tool, dimensions of which are derived by applying factor analysis. It consists of nine (IEQ) dimensions, which are building image and maintenance, thermal comfort, individual space, spatial comfort, indoor air quality, personal control, noise distraction and privacy, connection to the outdoor environment, and visual comfort [32]. ...
... Similarly, Zhang et al. (2019) [38] used SEM methodology for investigating the mediator effect of occupant satisfaction between IEQ, interior design, and performance in the context of libraries. To conclude, one group of studies that used SEM focused on determining the relevance of dimensions and their impact on occupant satisfaction in existing occupant satisfaction surveys [8,22,31,33,35,36], while the other group identified the dimensions related to occupant satisfaction [32,39] and their impact, along with their relationships with other factors, such as organizational commitment, job satisfaction, collaboration [34,37,38]. ...
Measuring occupant satisfaction and collecting feedback is critical for evaluating building performance, shaping comfort, effective decision-making in building improvements, and consequently enhancing the well-being of occupants. Numerous post-occupancy evaluation tools have been developed for examining occupant satisfaction in different building types; however, they are criticized in the recent studies for failing to (1) empirically examine the interrelated influence of a broad range of factors on occupant satisfaction, (2) include expert opinion from the industry in the indicator determination process, (3) collect contextual information along with the feedback in real-time and in a continuous manner and (4) provide effective mechanisms to integrate occupant feedback in the building models to enable visualization and performing queries on feedback items. The purpose of this paper is to develop an occupant satisfaction measurement model for monitoring the perceived performance of office buildings. A hierarchical structural model was developed based on the literature review, analysis of occupant feedback records in office buildings, and focus group meetings with facility managers to determine the constructs of occupant satisfaction. This model was empirically validated via structural equation modeling (SEM) using the survey data collected from 300 office occupants. The proposed SEM model, which adopts a total of 27 indicators across six dimensions, is found to be highly satisfactory indicating a strong association between dimensions and occupant satisfaction. The findings emphasize that building design and facility service dimensions need to be considered along with physical comfort dimensions when determining occupant satisfaction. The main contribution of the paper is the empirically validated, holistic, SEM model of occupant satisfaction, which is developed based on current practice and industry practitioners’ feedback and integrates building design and facility services with physical comfort dimensions. In the following phase of the research, the developed occupant satisfaction measurement model was used as the basis for designing a prototype, which enables decision-makers to collect occupant feedback continuously and integrate it with building information modeling to visualize and perform queries on feedback items. Eventually, this measurement model is expected to contribute to making more effective decisions based on the actual performance of the facility in the post-occupancy phase and enhance building performance as well as occupant well-being and productivity.
... The value of factor loads can also be a determinant for the validation of the criterion. In this study, criteria that presented a factorial load above 0.3 were considered as validated, such as the study by Candido et al. (2016), who made a factorial analysis for the selection criteria. ...
... Then, in Table 3, the result of the factorial analysis, together with the six factors, or dimensions, established for grouping the criteria, the respective factorial loads, the values of variance and commonality can be seen. In this research, all loads above 0.3 were considered valid, according to research by Candido et al. (2016), who did a factorial analysis for the criteria selection. ...
Light wood frame (LWF) is a construction system considered innovative in Latin American countries, which has been used as a strategy to mitigate housing deficits. Since this construction system is new in these countries, a rigorous assessment of their manufacturing, construction and use is essential. Thus, this research aims to develop a method to evaluate the performance of LWF buildings in Brazil to help builders optimise the construction system in the country. The study made use of the literature to identify valuable criteria for a building performance evaluation using qualitative tools, such as questionnaires and the Delphi technique, to select specific criteria for the LWF system. Finally, statistic tools, criteria groups and weights were generated. As a result, the study established a framework with 5 dimensions, 19 criteria and 41 sub-criteria, thus understanding which the most important criteria are to be evaluated during the LWF building performance evaluation. Finally, the criteria with the highest scores refer to structural durability, maintenance, sealing and control of thermal, acoustic, visual and air quality comfort.
... Four main domains are identified (Table 1), which coincides with the content of other surveys [18][19][20][21], but unlike these, this version is more salient for the South American social and economic context and does not only address "tangible" aspects of the building design, but also those related to occupant well-being. Personal and office-type characteristics are gathered, which include categorical, ordinal, and scalar data, to analyze two or more variables that could be grouped, with correlation. ...
Office-based environmental control systems are centralized and designed to control entire spaces, ignoring use dynamics and requirements, and despite being regulated by standardized comfort models, they fail to satisfy real occupants, mainly due to their varied individual characteristics. This research is field-based with a quantitative approach and correlational design. Its objective is to empirically demonstrate that open-plan design, where different users share the same space and generalized environmental conditions, lacks a holistic view of IEQ criteria and the integration of other factors that affect health and well-being. Four buildings are chosen in different Chilean cities, measuring temperatures and CO2 levels at different desks, and applying a survey, which was designed as part of the research to analyze the estimation of relationships between variables and to reveal the factors that cause differences among occupants. The results show that people’s satisfaction is multivariable and depends on other factors that positively or negatively stimulate their sensations and perceptions, such as, for example, the option to personally control their environmental conditions. Likewise, it is evident that to achieve comfort, health is being affected while in the building.
... Roskams and Haynes (2020) show that reducing the level of distraction results in higher productivity, which is in line with Roelofsen (2008). They also find that lower perceived distraction is associated with higher psychological comfort and enthusiasm, which is consistent with previous studies (Haynes 2008;Veitch et al. 2007;Candido et al. 2016). Roelofsen (2008) states that in an office where potentially disturbing conversations take place the ideal noise level should be around 45 dB (A) and never be higher than 48 dB (A). ...
This systematic review critically analyzes the relationship between office concepts and individual and organizational performance. Based on the current literature, we identify seven key dimensions to guide our understanding: office concept, work, personality fit, satisfaction, health, control paradigm, and enabling paradigm. Our systematic search yielded 429 published papers on office concepts and performance between 2005 and 2022. Rigorous selection criteria narrowed them down to 46 empirical articles included in this analysis. The results show that activity-based working not only negatively impacts performance but also affects employee satisfaction and health. Open-plan offices can reduce real-estate costs but lead to lower performance levels, thereby imposing a tax on productivity which outweighs the initial cost savings. Activity-based working has the potential to enhance collaboration and interaction but is dependent on a professional and proactive management. In most cases, especially for knowledge workers, the single office turns out to be the environment in which employees show the best individual and organizational performance.
... From a methodological perspective, a variety of scholarly work investigating the IEQ factors in relation to occupants' health, wellbeing and productivity are based on post occupation evaluation (POE) tools [19], such as BUS (Building Use Studies) Methodology [16,20], CBE (Centre for the Built Environmental) Berkeley Survey [21,22], Cost-Effective Open-Plan Environments (COPE) research [23], and BOSSA (Building Occupants Survey System Australia) [24]. Building on the IEQ related elements in these POE tools and findings from previous literature [8,11,25,26], this article focuses on the five IEQ aspects which affect the productivity of office workers, namely 1) thermal comfort [12,27,28], 2) indoor air quality [29,30], 3) lighting [31,32], 4) noise and acoustics [14,33,34], and 5) office layout [16,35]. ...
Poor indoor environmental quality (IEQ) has been found to contribute significantly to productivity losses, with the extent of the contribution differing according to the type of office work in which workers are engaged. However, few studies focus specifically on the occupants of university office buildings where the work being undertaken involves a significant amount of academic research that is expected to require high levels of concentration, insight, creativity, and consistency than is needed in many other types of work. To develop a preliminary understanding of the IEQ factors affecting the productivity of people working in university office buildings, a pilot questionnaire was administered to postgraduate students to validate the IEQ factors that have been found to impact on productivity. To date, twelve postgraduate students from three different office buildings in The University of Auckland completed the questionnaire. The results showed that noise, temperature, air quality, and lighting were the factors most reported on with respect to effects on work productivity. The adopted IEQ factors in this questionnaire instrument is reliable. The findings from this study will help advance understanding of the IEQ factors affecting the productivity of workers in university office buildings, and provide insights for architects, building owners, office managers, and office users to help prevent or mitigate negative impacts on productivity by managing the IEQ conditions in workplaces. Future research will involve the analysis of data from staff as well as students to identify any possible differences that might exist between the two groups of workers engaged in academic research.
... In total, 1,066,891 samples are available in this dataset till now, and a majority of them are commercial and residential buildings. Other BPDs include the Database for Energy Consumption of Commercial buildings (DECC) in Japan [57] and the Building Occupants Survey System (BOSSA) in Australia [58]. The proposed data-driven approach is able to support the building retrofitting decisions based on the above BPDs. ...
The building performance simulation (BPS) based on physical models is a popular method to estimate the expected energy-savings of energy-efficient building retrofitting. However, many buildings, especially the older building constructed several decades ago, do not have full access to complete information for a BPS method. Incomplete information generally comes from the information that is missing, such as the U-value of part building components, due to incomplete documentation or component deterioration over time. It also comes from the case-specific incomplete information due to different documentation systems. Motivated by the available big data of real-life building performance datasets (BPDs), a data-driven approach is proposed to support the decision-making of building retrofitting selections under incomplete information conditions. The data-driven approach constructed a Performance Modelling with Data Imputation (PMDI) with integrated backpropagation neural networks, fuzzy C-means clustering, principal component analysis, and trimmed scores regression. An empirical study was conducted on real-life buildings in Sweden, and the results validated that the PMDI method can model the performance ranges of energy-efficient retrofitting for family house buildings with more than 90% confidence. For a target building in Stockholm, the suggested retrofitting measure is expected to save energy by 12,017~17,292 KWh/year.
... The overall indoor environment quality (IEQ) is not solely determined by the perception of acoustic quality, but also by the perception of lighting, air quality, thermal comfort, and acoustic comfort [38][39][40]. However, IEQ protocols were originally designed for residential and office buildings, and their implementation in medical facilities has been hampered by their inherent complexity [41,42]. ...
Although hospitals are notorious for poor acoustics, the acoustic environment is usually evaluated in silos, or in conjunction with few indoor environmental quality (IEQ) factors. With only anecdotcal evidence, it is important to first establish a holistic baseline perception of the hospital acoustic environment before commissioning costly measurement campaigns. A psychometric questionnaire based on the industry-standard IEQ survey and ISO 12913-2 soundscape standard was administered to examine the perceived indoor acoustic environment quality across major occupant groups (i.e. staff, patients, visitors) in an acute hospital in Singapore. Of the 16 IEQ factors examined, all occupant groups expressed the greatest dissatisfaction with noise levels and sound privacy. Notably, the staff were significantly more dissatisfied than the other groups in terms of sound privacy and overall IEQ. When assessing the overall quality (OQ) and appropriateness (OA) of the acoustic environment, OQ was similarly neutral across all groups, whereas the staff expressed significantly lower OA than both patients and visitors. The dissatisfaction in the acoustic environment could be attributed to the perceived dominance and annoyance of vocal and operational sounds across all occupant groups, as well as the environment set-up with most being housed in cohort rooms. Particularly, the staff were significantly more annoyed with vocal and operational sounds than patients and visitors. This study also yielded evidence that challenges the validity of the 5-item Weinstein noise sensitivity scale when used in an Asian context, as well as the applicability of the perceived affective quality circumplex model in ISO 12913-3 for indoor environments.
... Currently, Building User Survey (BUS) and Building Occupants Survey System Australia (BOSSA) are the only two officially accredited post-occupancy evaluation (POE) instruments within the National Australian Built Environment Rating System (NABERS) for commercial buildings used in Australia [34]. These surveys are robust and accessible Australian alternatives to other surveys currently in use by NABERS and Green Star Performance rating tools [35]. However, BOSSA has wider applications, BUS surveys were used in this study due to the narrower scope, more-wider presence globally and acceptance of the respective survey, and the license rights available with or for the case study buildings [28,34]. ...
Buildings are one of the highest emitters of greenhouse gases globally. To reduce the detrimental effects of buildings on the environment and recognise their potential for emissions reductions, a transition towards sustainable building solutions has been observed globally. This trend and the associated benefits have been discussed and argued for more than three decades now. However, the impacts of sustainable buildings are yet to be demonstrated at macro, meso, and micro levels in the community, as the actual versus expected performance of such buildings are still being questioned. Consequently, this entry discusses the concepts underpinning sustainable buildings outlining the drivers and practices to achieve sustainable built environment solutions from the design to operation stage using university buildings as a case study. The chapter also recommends evidence-based solutions on understanding the actual and perceived gaps to achieve expected performance using "Green Star" rated academic buildings in Australia.
... Ideally, the measurements are accompanied by administering a post-occupancy evaluation survey and interviews with inhabitants and, where appropriate, with designers and site managers. Fieldwork including measurements in situ and occupants' survey are aligned with the guidelines established by specialized references on post-occupancy evaluation [33][34][35][36]. ...
There is a genuine concern that the current level of sustainability education provided in the mainstream architectural curricula is no longer sufficient to combat urgent climate challenges, and that a stronger interdisciplinary approach needs to be followed where architectural students are formed and empowered with a different pedagogical paradigm, better tools, and diverse sets of skills. This paper examines the various pedagogical approaches to the teaching and learning of environmental design principles and practice in architectural education with a focus on recurrent methods applied in specialist curricula in the UK. An in-depth analysis of a pedagogical case study based on the eight-year experience of the Architecture and Environmental Design MSc course at the University of Westminster is presented with reference to the pedagogical methods identified in the literature. A reflective exercise based on the specific methods adopted in the course and examples of students’ outputs and experiences allows a critical evaluation of the pedagogical case study. The paper concludes by highlighting the challenges and opportunities of introducing climate literacy at postgraduate level and the benefits of adopting a research-led approach based on collaborations with industry partners.
... ISD analysis of the BOSSA survey is shown in Figure 13. Also designed for sedentary office workers an extended service includes the instrumental measurement of IEQ factors [312]. Figure 13 Developed by author from [313]. ...
This review contributes to the debate regarding feedback needed by architects and building designers to improve the sustainability of their building designs. It utilizes the Integral Sustainable Design framework to harness a more comprehensive definition of sustainability to examine the breadth of currently possible feedback to building designers. The review acknowledges the multiple stakeholders that partake in different stages of a building project and focusses specifically on feedback from completed buildings for architects and designers. This review has endeavoured to summarize the range of current feedback which may be available to architects and draw conclusions regarding the usefulness of some of the assessment methods. There are some aspects of sustainability that have well developed and agreed feedback measures, such as energy use, embodied energy, and Indoor Air Quality. Other aspects about which there has been some research but no agreement on feedback include feeling safe, ecosystem services, and inclusiveness. This review reveals important feedback aspects not covered by either research, sustainability ratings schemes or post occupancy evaluation methods. Indeed, there are many aspects of the sustainability of school buildings about which very little is known, such as physical externalities and community services and the building's effect on socialisation and sense of place. Direct feedback in these areas will increase the pace of sustainability improvement in school design. However, further research is required to determine aspects about which architects desire feedback would find most useful and to develop efficient feedback methods. t.
... This was the reason why the conducted research focused on the study of human-environment relations, which is not widely described in relation to post-mining objects. The research used the basic elements of the post-occupancy evaluation method(Candido et al., 2016;Hay et al., 2017;Preiser et al., 1988;Zimring & Reizenstein, 1980) based on opinions and practical experiences of users, by identifying positive and negative reactions as well as deficits in relation to the functions of a given object (not introduced but expected by users). This approach enables positive changes to be made to existing objects and it is also important when designing new objects. ...
Abandoned mine lands are a common element of the contemporary landscape. In administrative practice, they are rated low, yet they are of interest to informal users and scientific and cultural communities. The aim of the research was to identify the possibilities of using qualitative research methods, applied in architecture, to create friendly, urban spaces with a universal character in the areas of abandoned quarries. The study was conducted in the Sadowa Góra quarry area in southern Poland, using Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE) method. The results of the conducted analysis confirm the effectiveness of the POE method in restoring abandoned mine lands to economically usable state by surveying users' opinions on accessibility, functionality, and visual quality. The applied methodology was used as an effective support for the transformation process of post‐mining areas and as a tool to optimize the costs of their reclamation and maintenance. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
... We used a subset of data from the post-occupancy evaluation survey called BOSSA [45] , which originally aims to assess occupants' satisfaction with the IEQ performance of the building in a separate and independent research project. We therefore characterize this data as external and secondary to this study. ...
The philosophy of building energy management is going through a paradigm change from traditional, often inefficient, user-controlled systems to one that is centrally automated with the aid of IoT-enabled technologies. In this context, occupants’ perceived control and building automation may seem to be in conflict. The inquiry of this study is rooted in a proposition that while building automation and centralized control systems are assumed to provide indoor comfort and conserve energy use, limiting occupants’ control over their work environment may result in dissatisfaction, and in turn decrease productivity. For assessing this hypothesis, data from the post-occupancy evaluation survey of a smart building in a university in Australia was used to analyze the relationships between perceived control, satisfaction, and perceived productivity. Using structural equation modeling, we have found a positive direct effect of occupants’ perceived control on overall satisfaction with their working area. Meanwhile, perceived control exerts an influence on perceived productivity through satisfaction. Furthermore, a field experiment conducted in the same building revealed the potential impact that occupant controllability can have on energy saving. We changed the default light settings from automatic on-and-off to manual-on and automatic-off, letting occupants choose themselves whether to switch the light on or not. Interestingly, about half of the participants usually kept the lights off, preferring daylight in their rooms. This also resulted in a reduction in lighting electricity use by 16.6% without any upfront investment and major technical modification. These findings emphasize the important role of perceived control on occupant satisfaction and productivity, as well as on the energy-saving potential of the user-in-the-loop automation of buildings.
... working from home). The survey also asked questions on satisfaction of work and building space (4 items, 7-point Likert scale, total mean score), air quality (1 item), lighting, thermal and ambience (5 items, 7-point Likert scale, total mean score) [37], and satisfaction with access to outdoor spaces (1-item, 7-point Likert scale). ...
Background:
There is increasing focus on designing workspaces that promote less sitting, more movement and interaction to improve physical and mental health.
Objective:
This study evaluates a natural intervention of a new workplace with active design features and its relocation to a greener and open space.
Methods:
An ecological model was used to understand how organisations implement change. Pre and post survey data from 221 matched cases of workers and accelerometery data (n = 50) were analysed.
Results:
Results show a decrease in occupational sitting (-20.65 mins/workday, p = 0.001) and an increase in workplace walking (+5.61 mins/workday, p = 0.001) using survey data, and accelerometery data (occupational sitting time: -31.0 mins/workday, p = 0.035, standing time: +22.0 mins/workday, p = 0.022, stepping time: +11.0 mins/workday, p = 0.001). Improvements in interaction, musculoskeletal pain and mental health were reported.
Conclusions:
Application of the ecological model shows that the organisation understands how to target the built environment and social/cultural environment but not how to target behaviour change at the individual level.
... Multiple researches utilized this approach including the holistic approach combining objective and subjective data utilised in the building occupancy survey system in Australia (Candido et al. 2016). Other similar studies include the works of Cakmak et al. (2014) andDe Giuli et al. (2014). ...
The applicability of building rating systems has gained attention for achieving indoor environmental quality. Considering the wider internationalized recognition of LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) and other rating systems, the case of Jordan provides a sense of particularity in consideration to its rather recent history in acknowledging these progressive standards. Utilizing a mixed approach based on paired comparisons between local LEED and non-LEED certified buildings, this research paper explores the level of satisfaction pertaining to Indoor Environmental Quality of building occupants. While it touches on the generality of such satisfaction, it proceeds to unpack and investigate how it resonates with the sustainability of the building measured through various means. The research outcomes reflected an overall appeal of LEED certified buildings and a decent level of comfort of their dwellers. Yet, it conveyed a vague, rather sporadic relation when comparing the subjective perception to the objective measures due to multiple potential reasons. The paper concludes by stressing the need for further appropriation of international environmental codes to better suit the local context. It lays a reliable foundation for further research, utilizing more case studies and exploring the applicability of rating systems in Jordan.
... Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) is a tool commonly used in the industry by construction companies for future improvements by collecting performance information during the occupancy stages (Candido et al. 2016). One of the key aspects of POE is customer satisfaction. ...
Construction industry spending in July 2020 was $1.3 trillion indicating significant growth in construction spending in the USA. This sector's growth can be attributed to strategic decisions of various organizations on broadening their company’s footprint into new markets. Such decisions require comprehension of job markets for successful expansion. This study focuses on utilizing post-occupancy evaluation of the quality of work on construction coating projects across the USA to understand the relationship between different regions and states and strategy to expand into new job markets. Network analysis utilized data from over two thousand owners collected over a period of four years. The study provides insights for construction-coating projects in relation to mobilization and footprint expansion. Specifically, the correlation of customer satisfaction for construction-coating contractors known as applicators working across the USA and understanding the relationship between region and states. The analysis identifies regions where jobs are performed by applicators from another region, highlighting business opportunities in the different regions across USA, while identifying poorly connected states. This study paves the way for future works that understand the footprint and connections with other states, especially for other trade applicators in the construction industry.
... Previous studies pointed out that taking spot measurements of IEQ at indicative locations in combination with occupant questionnaires can be problematic as neither the IEQ measurements nor the respondents' perceptions are spatio-temporally specific. Researchers have proposed to capture 'righthere-right-now' assessments of the workplace environment, conducting occupant survey multiple times with continuous IEQ measurements (Candido et al., 2016;Choi & Lee, 2018;Deuble & de Dear, 2014;Li et al., 2018;Roskams & Haynes, 2020). Despite the current techniques to collect accurate and reliable IEQ data such as a web-based survey along with a mobile IEQ assessment cart, energy management systems (EMS) and occupancy sensors, the IEQ assessment results do not seem to have been utilized in building management practice. ...
This paper reports the results of a comprehensive indoor environmental quality (IEQ) evaluation conducted in seven office buildings at an Australian university. A mix of objective and subjective assessments was carried out and a total of 519 staff participated in the survey from various non-academic departments. Three types of buildings were included in this study: ‘Heritage listed’ (c.1880–1890s), ‘Conventional’ (c.1960–1980s) and ‘Modern’ (post 2000) office buildings. Although the measured IEQ conditions were relatively good with no significant fluctuation across the selected buildings, the discrepancy between objective IEQ data and subjective occupant evaluations was noted. The Modern building type designed with fully double-glazed façades showed the highest levels of overall comfort and satisfaction and perceived productivity, whereas the Conventional building type constructed during the late 20th-century period, notable for deep floor plates, had the lowest. The heritage listed type buildings had lower window to wall ratios, yet displayed improved occupant satisfaction across all IEQ areas over the conventional type buildings. The results support that building renovation and regular maintenance can improve occupant comfort and satisfaction within offices. The findings could be useful for property managers looking for strategies to improve the performance of their building stock.
... As such, there are growing calls for traditional occupant surveys to be replaced by or complemented with repeated "right-here-right-now" assessments of the workplace environment, which can be easily combined with objective IEQ data collected through sensors (Candido et al., 2016;Choi & Lee, 2018;Deuble & de Dear, 2014;Li et al., 2018). ...
Purpose: The recent emergence of wireless environmental sensors has enabled workplace professionals to measure the indoor office environment in more detail than ever before. However, it remains unclear to what extent this technology can be used to improve working conditions for occupants. As such, the purpose of this project was to develop and refine a methodology for exploring the relationship between indoor environmental quality, comfort, and productivity. Theory: The research is grounded in the Environmental Demands-Resources (ED-R) model, which conceptualises the workplace environment as a composite of pathogenic environmental demands and salutogenic environmental resources. Design/Methodology/Approach: A pilot study was conducted at one office site, and subsequent data were also collected at two additional office sites. Across the three sites, 59 employees provided 670 momentary assessments of the workplace environment. Findings: The findings of the studies suggest that adherence to best-practice comfort policies is associated with higher levels of subjective environmental comfort, but only weakly. However, there were strong associations between subjective comfort and productivity. The results suggest that the most effective workplaces will both adhere to environmental comfort policies and allow users to craft local environmental conditions to their own preferences. Originality/Value: To our knowledge, these studies are the first to combine the use of environmental sensors in real workplaces with experiential measures of comfort. The results are valuable for facilities managers and other workplace professionals in the maintenance of effective workplace environments.
... At the same time, the workplace physical environment can provide many stressing factors, such as annoying lighting, undue noises, inappropriate equipment location or space overcrowding. The scientific literature on workplaces largely shows the benefits that specific layouts and physical features have on workers' wellbeing [18,19], laying the foundations of systematic evaluation tools adopted by quality certifications for these specific spaces. This knowledge is rarely transferred to healthcare workplaces, despite the deep impact it could have on both medical staff and patients. ...
Projects, plans and programmes for complex environments such as healthcare facilities need to be designed with specific consideration of the mul- titude of users, technologies and policies in order to address a sustainable and resilient development. Several Evidence Based Design (EBD) studies highlight the deep interrelation between built and natural systems with human or organizations- related outcomes, but the effect on healthcare staff such as Medical Doctors (MD) is still underexplored. The paper investigates the assessment of self-reported satis- faction and wellbeing of MDs in healthcare facilities. A multidimensional assess- ment model composed of 53 Likert scale questions has been developed from literature review and existing tools, and submitted to a statistically significant sample of workers in 2 different office settings of an Italian hospital. Since MDs spend a considerable amount of their working time in offices, the qualities of such space are very important. The study highlights and confirms that localiza- tion, indoor environment, natural and artificial light are relevant drivers for staff satisfaction and wellbeing. Further investigations on a wider and diverse sample are encouraged.
... Available POE tools only measure the overall occupant satisfaction and fail to convey some contextual details that are necessary for facility managers in identifying specific problems and their root causes in buildings (Way and Bordass 2005;Leaman 2011;Gocer et al. 2015;Li et al. 2018). For example, the source of the problem, the related spatial information or building element, and the date and time of the complaint, which are critical for decision makers for improving the building performance, are not collected (Candido et al. 2016). POE tools have also been criticized for failing to collect occupant feedback in real time and in a continuous manner (Jazizadeh et al. 2011;Li et al. 2018). ...
Occupant feedback is not effectively used in the facility management (FM) phase for operations and maintenance activities as well as retrofit and refurbishment investment decisions. One of the reasons is related to incomplete or mostly unstructured occupant feedback data. The goal of this paper is (1) to formalize occupant feedback in office buildings by developing a semantic data model, and (2) to implement the semantic data model in a prototype to demonstrate that capturing and storing occupant feedback and integrating it with building information modeling (BIM) improves the experience of both occupants and FM personnel. Interviews were conducted with office occupants and facility managers, and use cases were created to develop the semantic data model. This data model was implemented in the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) schema and a case study was conducted, in which a prototype for collecting occupant feedback integrated with BIM was developed to test the proposed approach. The applicability, practicability, and usability of the system were measured via usability tests that were applied to the occupants and FM team members. The findings showed that the proposed semantic data model can be utilized to store occupant feedback in a structured manner and to integrate this information with BIM-enabled FM systems. This approach facilitates (1) continuous collection of occupant feedback along with the vital contextual information including geometric data, and (2) effective utilization of this information in FM operations by providing visualization and analysis capabilities.
... Visual comfort Daylighting [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23] Artificial lighting [7], [8], [24], [10], [25], [12], [13], [14], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30], [20], [31], [32], [21], [22], [33], [23], [34] Glare [7], [35], [10], [36], [11], [37], [12], [15], [16], [27], [28], [38], [39], [17], [18], [20], [32], [21], [40] Reflection [37] Visual privacy [12], [16], [39], [41], [20], [21], [33] View [42], [14], [15], [16], [38], [43], [18], [20], [32], [21], [44] As a result of frequency analysis and normative refinement processes, visual comfort criteria were identified as (1) daylight, (2) artificial light, (3) glare, (4) reflection, (5) visual privacy and (6) view. [46] defines visual comfort as the lighting conditions and the views from ones workspace. ...
Visual comfort is an important indicator of both occupant satisfaction and work performance. The main goal of this study is to present the visual comfort-related factors that influence occupant satisfaction. To achieve this goal, a detailed literature analysis was conducted to determine the main factors that can be used to evaluate the effect of visual comfort on the satisfaction of office workers. Afterward, interviews were conducted with 12 facility managers, and related work orders created by the facility management teams were investigated to determine visual comfort-related complaint types. Based on the collected data, a hierarchical structure of visual comfort factors was created. Finally, 308 office workers were surveyed to determine (1) the number of respondents with complaints related to each visual comfort factor, (2) the level of importance of the visual comfort related factors, and (3) office worker’s satisfaction levels for each factor. The findings reveal that the largest gap between the perceived importance and satisfaction appears in daylighting and visual privacy. The designers, facility managers, and renovators need to think of design strategies to provide more privacy and access to daylight to occupants in their working environments.
... The Center for the Built Environment's (CBE) Occupant Survey developed in 2000 is currently the most widely used standardized IEQ survey method [7,10,15,16]. Other widely used survey methods are Building Use Studies Ltd's PROBE, Overall Liking Score, and Building Occupants Survey System Australia [17][18][19][20]. ...
Occupant satisfaction surveys are widely used in laboratory and field research studies of indoor environmental quality. Field studies pose several challenges because researchers usually have no control over the indoor environments experienced by building occupants, it is difficult to recruit and retain participants, and data collection methods can be cumbersome. With this in mind, we developed a survey platform that uses real-time feedback to send targeted occupant surveys (TOS) at specific indoor environmental conditions and stops sending survey requests when collected responses reach the maximum surveys required. We performed a pilot study of the TOS platform with occupants of a radiant heated and cooled building to target survey responses at 16 radiant slab surface (infrared) temperatures evenly distributed from 15 to 30 °C. We developed metrics and ideal datasets to compare the TOS platform against other occupant survey distribution methods. The results show that this novel method has a higher approximation to characteristics of an ideal dataset; 41% compared to 23%, 19%, and 12% of other datasets in previous field studies. Our TOS method minimizes the number of times occupants are surveyed and ensures a more complete and balanced dataset. This allows researchers to more efficiently and reliably collect subjective data for occupant satisfaction studies.
... Visual comfort Daylighting [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23] Artificial lighting [7], [8], [24], [10], [25], [12], [13], [14], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30], [20], [31], [32], [21], [22], [33], [23], [34] Glare [7], [35], [10], [36], [11], [37], [12], [15], [16], [27], [28], [38], [39], [17], [18], [20], [32], [21], [40] Reflection [37] Visual privacy [12], [16], [39], [41], [20], [21], [33] View [42], [14], [15], [16], [38], [43], [18], [20], [32], [21], [44] As a result of frequency analysis and normative refinement processes, visual comfort criteria were identified as (1) daylight, (2) artificial light, (3) glare, (4) reflection, (5) visual privacy and (6) view. [46] defines visual comfort as the lighting conditions and the views from ones workspace. ...
Visual comfort is an important indicator of both occupant satisfaction and work performance. The main goal of this study is to present the visual comfort-related factors that influence occupant satisfaction. To achieve this goal, a detailed literature analysis was conducted to determine the main factors that can be used to evaluate the effect of visual comfort on the satisfaction of office workers. After-ward, interviews were conducted with 12 facility managers, and related work orders created by the facility management teams were investigated to determine visual comfort-related complaint types. Based on the collected data, a hierarchical structure of visual comfort factors was created. Finally, 308 office workers were surveyed to determine (1) the number of respondents with complaints related to each visual comfort factor, (2) the level of importance of the visual comfort-related factors, and (3) office worker?s satisfaction levels for each factor. The findings reveal that the largest gap between the perceived importance and satisfaction ap-pears in daylighting and visual privacy. The designers, facility managers, and renovators need to think of design strategies to provide more privacy and access to daylight to occupants in their working environments.
The construction of low-cost affordable housing in Malaysia is getting high in demand. Even though, the quality of the houses was reported not conforming with generally accepted standards of respectable. Survey through questionnaires on residences at three newly-completed low-cost affordable houses in Johor, Malaysia showed that quality of the housing was at an unsatisfactory level. Despite the existence of standard requirements in determining quality, there is still a significant scope for improvement in Malaysia. These issues are related to verification of application of construction code of practice, building risk and safety, building health, building energy and environmental and eco construction. From the findings, several recommendations have been suggested as measures for improvement the quality of low-cost affordable housing in the future.
Building performance is a widely held goal in the architecture, engineering and construction industries, driven by a shared pursuit of the triple bottom line. This research paper re-examined the term ‘performance’ and its characterization in post-occupancy evaluation (POE) literature using a semi-systematic review of 160 articles published since 2008. The review identified how performance parameters have been defined, what the dominant attributes of studies are and what metrics have been used to measure them. A thematic content analysis found that many new priorities had emerged in recent years, problematizing Preiser et al.’s 1988 construct of the concept. The main contribution of this paper is a new expanded definition of ‘performance’ in terms of three interrelated domains: building, people and organization, and the development of subcategories for more nuanced analysis. This definition builds on the building performance-people performance paradigm first established by the UK’s PROBE initiative and responds to several shifts in thinking the review results revealed, including a shift from deterministic thinking towards a more bidirectional understanding of the person-environment relationship. Results were further distilled into recommendations to be used by researchers, practitioners and policymakers to identify performance areas of interest and develop more adaptive, integrated approaches to POE work.
Indoor environmental quality (IEQ) monitoring is an important basis of smart buildings to ensure human comfort and control energy systems. IEQ monitoring conventionally relies on a limited number of stationary sensors deployed at selected locations, which has little capacity to capture fine spatial characteristics due to the cost of infrastructure and maintenance. This paper describes a robot-based mobile sensing system for high-resolution temperature monitoring by selecting air temperature as the targeted IEQ parameter. Experiments were conducted in a classroom to test the mobile sensing performance through comparisons with the dense stationary sensor network. Furthermore, two spatio-temporal processing methods were developed to reconstruct continuous thermal maps from short- and long-term monitoring. The results indicate that the robot velocity of 0.25–0.45 m/s is better than 0.60–0.80 m/s and 0.10–0.20 m/s, and that the proposed methods are suitable for generating accurate, high-resolution thermal maps.
Proper technology solution-sets can enable a regenerative indoor environment for building users and for the planet, thereby ensuring occupant wellbeing and health. Several aspects are considered for high indoor environmental quality, such as hygro-thermal comfort, visual comfort, indoor soundscape, indoor air quality and a pleasant ambiance. Regenerative indoor environmental quality must be achieved, through the minimization of environmental and social impacts linked to the solutions, while making opti- mal use of resources throughout the entire set of life cycles. Key technologies can promote a paradigmatic shift in building design from “less bad” to “more regener- ative”. However, proper technologies need a dedicated evaluation framework for aware selection within a comprehensive decision-making process. The activities of Working Group Four of the COST Action RESTORE were undertaken with the aim of defining the aspects that determine a regenerative indoor environment, so that all the technologies and their characteristics that provide this “regenerativeness” may be defined. Practitioners can approach aware design of indoor regenerative environments with examples of solution-sets within the building domain and case studies. Regenerative design is built on the awareness that humans and the built environment exist together within natural systems. As such, Regenerative Design is aimed at reversing the damage that has been done, restoring ecosystems, so that they will thrive and evolve. As regards the design of spaces, re- generative design places occupant wellbeing centre stage. Here, the salutogenic focus is on making wellbeing part of the regenerative paradigm, rather than the reductionist approach of sustainable design that targets the absence of ill health. The term salutogenesis, coined by Aaron Antonovsky, means ‘gen- eration of health’.
This paper will explore recent collaborative design research into Symbiotic Colony of Bacteria and Yeast (SCOBY), also known as Kombucha. This material is being utilised by both product and fashion designers working within the field of bio-design. Suzanne Lee's BioCouture SCOBY garments are well known examples of SCOBY used in an experimental fashion context. However, up until now upscaling of SCOBY and the challenges of working with it as an architectural medium, both structural and expressive, have not been investigated.
In this research, the architectural possibilities of this biodegradable leather-like material have been investigated - supported by three separate, yet related, projects: a team-teaching development grant that brought together chemistry and architecture/design, research undertaken by a student in a Deans Summer Research Scholarship programme, and other students in an Advanced Design Research unit. In this paper, the collaborative cross-disciplinary process will be outlined, including the challenges encountered and the SCOBY outcomes produced. The process of up-scaling the growing process will also be described. To facilitate this up-scaling of the growing process, large 'farms' were constructed - the largest 2.4m x 1.2m. This process extended the dialogue beyond the initial team to include the knowledge and expertise of a SCOBY artist.
The next stage of the research and investigation involved students exploring the bio-fabrication possibilities of the material. SCOBY presents unique challenges for fabrication. It has variable moisture content, lacks self-supporting structural integrity and is a living material. The 3D-printability of SCOBY was piloted; and subsequently, through further student research development, techniques of folding and creasing tested. This multi-dimensional project, with its various outputs and investigations, represents a collaborative, cross-disciplinary material investigation that seeks to operate at the porous edges of disciplines, technologies and design paradigms.
The application of post-occupancy evaluation (POE) has increased recently, owing to the methodology's ability to improve building performance. However, the procedures employed vary depending on the building's suitability and category. Therefore, this study aims to provide a comprehensive survey to explore the state-of-the-art POE research. Bibliometric analysis was used to retrieve 381 POE publications from the Scopus database between 1979 and 2020. VOSviewer software was applied for the visualization and scientific mapping of literature. The study helps researchers understand by offering comprehensive data about the most literate nation contributions, publications' significant sources, and devoted authors to POE publications. The findings revealed that the United States, the United Kingdom, and China had rendered the three most literature contributions; Building Research and Information were the top publication's significant source titles, and Hassanain, M.A. is incredibly devoted to POE publication. Research hotspots in the POE focus on building performance, architectural design, and sustainable development. The primary themes in POE concentrate on comfort, sustainability, performance, design and criteria. Future research should emphasize that POE is used on heritage buildings to ensure that these buildings perform well for sustainability. It will significantly value the people involved in the design, construction and also conservation practice.
In recent years, sustainability practices in Africa have been promoted as the relatively most effective means of reducing adverse environmental impacts associated with buildings and occupants. Occupants' perception within buildings, whether green or non-green, is crucial for the understanding of building sustainability (energy performance) and comfort conditions. However, there has been a scanty research-based knowledge from empirical studies, particularly in Dar es Salaam. This study endeavoured to bridge that knowledge gap. The study evaluated the occupants' satisfaction rate of 2 certified green office buildings and 15 non-green office buildings and the extent to which they control indoor environmental performance. The study deployed a PoE questionnaire based on two types of scales, a bipolar and unipolar scale to measure the occupants' perception of the indoor environmental performance: temperature comfort, temperature sensation, noise, air movement, air freshness, air quality and satisfaction with the amount of natural light. A total of 532 occupants from the buildings set provided valid responses. The results show that overall occupants were quite satisfied in all buildings set. However, there are some differences regarding air movement, air quality, glare from artificial light, noise levels, and lighting control. Occupants of green buildings were more satisfied with lighting control; nonetheless, improved lighting control alone is insufficient to enhance occupants’ satisfaction in green buildings to a superior level than that of non-green buildings. This study can provide feedback to building owners, property managers, green building certification systems and can aid architects in designing climate-responsive buildings that encourage long-term occupant satisfaction.
Although hospitals are notorious for poor acoustics, the acoustic environment is usually evaluated in silos, without considering other indoor environmental quality (IEQ) factors. In the absence of qualitative evidence, it is important to first establish a holistic baseline perception of the hospital acoustic environment before commissioning costly measurement campaigns. A psychometric questionnaire based on the industry-standard IEQ survey and ISO 12913-2 soundscape standard was administered to examine the perceived indoor acoustic environment quality across major occupant groups (i.e. staff, patients, visitors) in an acute hospital in Singapore. Of the 16 IEQ factors examined, all occupant groups expressed the greatest dissatisfaction with noise levels and sound privacy. Notably, the staff were significantly more dissatisfied than the other groups in terms of sound privacy and overall IEQ. When assessing the overall quality (OQ) and appropriateness (OA) of the acoustic environment, OQ was similarly neutral across all groups, whereas the staff expressed significantly lower OA than both patients and visitors. The dissatisfaction in the acoustic environment could be attributed to the perceived dominance and annoyance of vocal and operational sounds across all occupant groups, as well as the environment set-up with most being housed in cohort rooms. Particularly, the staff were significantly more annoyed with vocal and operational sounds than patients and visitors. This study also yielded evidence that challenges the validity of the 5-item Weinstein noise sensitivity scale when used in an Asian context, as well as the applicability of the perceived affective quality circumplex model in ISO 12913-3 for indoor environments.
The objectives of this study are to investigate building professionals' experience, awareness, and interest in occupant health in buildings, and to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their opinions, as well as to compare the research on occupant health in buildings to professionals' opinions. To address these objectives, a mixed research methodology, including a thorough review of the literature (NL = 190) and an online survey (NS = 274), was utilized. In general, there is an increasing research interest in occupant health and a heightened interest in health-related projects, among professionals, following the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, among the nine different building attributes examined, indoor air quality was the most researched building attribute with a focus on occupant health and was also presumed to be the most important by the professionals. Professionals considered fatigue and musculoskeletal pain to be the most important physical well-being issues, and stress, anxiety, and depression to be the most important mental well-being issues that need to be the focus of design, construction, and operation of buildings to support and promote occupant health, while eye-related symptoms and loss of concentration were the most researched physical and mental well-being symptoms in the literature, respectively. Finally, professionals indicated that COVID-19 pandemic had significant effect on their perspectives regarding buildings’ impact on occupant health and they believed future building design, construction and operation will focus more on occupant health because of the pandemic experience.
This paper identifies the key planning stages of a post-occupancy evaluation (POE) in Higher Education Institutes (HEIs), utilising prominent guidance documentation and then develops a delineated data flow diagram representing the decision pathways (as a process map) practitioners are required to follow. Process mapping conducted also identifies inconsistencies in POE planning and implementation in practice, and develops new theory regarding the barriers to systematic and comparable POE implementation. An interpretivist and inductive research approach is utilised to develop new insights and theories on POE implementation using secondary data contained in published case study reports. The research delineates prominent POE guidance documentation using data flow diagrams to enable a cross comparative analysis to be made between case studies. A comparison of the delineated publicly available POE reports illustrate a distinct lack of consistency in the implementation of POE directly impeding the development of benchmarks and subsequent iterative improvement of future building design. Furthermore, the observed low levels of compliance (with data collection recommended in industrial guidance documentation) shows that the full utility and widely espoused sustainability benefits of POE are not being exploited in practice. Findings presented emphasise the requirement for a standardised approach to implementing POE in practice vis-à-vis simplifying the diverse array of strategies and approaches stipulated in prevailing guidance documentation. Such work is the first to adopt a process mapping approach to POEs conducted in practice.
Architects are increasingly integrating principles of biophilic design to foster experiences of nature in regularly occupied buildings such as schools. Although researchers often objectively measure building variables to document the presence of nature, few tools currently help architects assess subjective biophilic experiences during building walkthroughs in the preliminary design stages of renovation projects. This paper presents the results of a pilot study designed to assist the development of an architectural diagnostic tool that represents designers’ experiences of natural elements such as sunlight, wind and snow. The Biophilic Experience Representation Tool (BERT) was used during site visits in two Canadian primary schools in winter. These post-occupancy evaluations with BERT highlight its potential to discuss subjective dimensions of biophilic architecture. It further reveals the importance of seasonality when assessing and designing biophilic buildings in cold climates.
Purpose
In the rise of offices designed to support activity-based working (ABW), parts of industry have fully transitioned to open-plan environments and then later to unassigned seating, whereas other parts, such as tertiary education, are still in the process of moving away from individual offices. There are a few relevant studies to understand how occupants from industry sectors with different levels of adoption of ABW perceived environments designed to support this way of working. This paper aims to contribute to the knowledge gap by providing insight into workers’ satisfaction and dissatisfaction from open-plan offices designed to support ABW along with the key predictors of perceived productivity.
Design/methodology/approach
A data set of 2,090 post-occupancy evaluation surveys conducted in five sectors – tertiary education, finance, construction, property/asset management and design/engineering – was analyzed. ANOVA and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were conducted for the survey questionnaires. First, ANOVA tests were conducted for the whole sample with perceived productivity as the dependent variable. A seven-point Likert scale with five theoretical factors was generated with all survey questionnaires. CFA was performed to show the factor loadings. In addition, regression analyses were carried out for each of factor item taken as the independent variable, where perceived productivity was the dependent variable. Key sources of satisfaction and dissatisfaction per sector were analyzed and differences between occupants reporting a negative or positive impact on their productivity were also investigated. Finally, open-ended comments were analyzed to show the key sources of dissatisfaction based on open-ended comments.
Findings
Workers from construction were the most satisfied, followed by finance and tertiary education. Occupants from all industry sectors consistently rated their workspaces highly on biophilic and interior design. Distraction and privacy received the lowest scores from all sectors. Open-ended comments showed mismatches between spatial and behavioral dimensions of ABW both for satisfaction and perceived productivity. Interior design was the strongest predictor for perceived productivity for all sectors. Findings dispel the notion that ABW implementation may not be suitable for certain industries, as long as the three key pillars of ABW are fully implemented, including design, behavior and technology.
Originality/value
This paper provides insight into workers’ satisfaction and dissatisfaction from open-plan offices designed to support ABW in different industry sectors along with the key predictors of perceived productivity.
This paper summarizes the recent post-occupancy evaluation (POE) method studies and latest literature reviews. According to the research trends, data visualization of an occupant's feedback is an important perspective and surveys through POE methods have provided a quick and cost-effective approach for gathering and analyzing an occupant's feedback. Therefore, the objective of this study is to establish a web-based building occupant survey system that incorporates new approaches based on a geographic information system (GIS) tool and open-source spatial information. This paper reports the following to provide the detailed system framework: (1) development requirements from literature reviews; (2) integration of collected data and 3D (three dimensional) spatial information; (3) system processes and user-friendly functions; and (4) pilot test and data visualization. The difference between the proposed platform and existing online survey systems is that in the former the survey responses are linked to the 3D spatial information of the buildings on a map. Thus, the results provide more intuitive insights for building managers and occupants to identify specific performance issues related to the building.
Poor work privacy represents a frequently reported issue in open office environments,
yet relatively little is known about its consequences. In addition, prior research has limitations
including weak operationalisations and measures of privacy. Therefore, this thesis developed
a new work privacy measure and examined the adverse effects of poor work privacy on
workers’ well-being. The roles of coping appraisal and contextual factors in this relationship
were explored to inform future preventative steps.
Study 1 (n = 30) qualitatively explored different scenarios of poor work privacy in an
open-plan office context for the development of a new measure of privacy fit. Three
dimensions of poor work privacy have been identified: acoustical and visual stimulation,
interruptions, and confidentiality.
Study 2 quantitatively tested (2.A n = 195) and confirmed (2.B n = 109) the factor
structure of the new privacy fit measure in two open-plan office worker samples. Four
dimensions were identified: conversation confidentiality, task confidentiality,
visual/acoustical stimulation, and interruptions. The measure concluded with 12 items, good
model fit, reliability, and construct validity.
Study 3 (n = 220) employed the newly developed measure and quantitatively examined
stress-related consequences of poor privacy fit in an open-plan office worker sample. Poor
privacy fit was associated with dissatisfaction, stress, and fatigue. Coping appraisal was found
to mediate these relationships.
Study 4 (n = 61) quantitatively demonstrated in a longitudinal study that a move to an
activity-based office influenced workers’ privacy fit, coping appraisal, and stress-related
outcomes (satisfaction, stress, and fatigue).
Study 5 (n = 22) qualitatively explored contextual factors in the activity-based office
that support or hinder privacy fit. Four factors were identified: the physical environment (e.g.
variety of settings) and the social environment (e.g. social norms), the job (e.g. role conflict),
and the self (e.g. self-awareness).
This thesis developed a new measure of work privacy and confirmed that privacy fit has
an impact on workers’ well-being. The thesis demonstrated the methodological benefit of
considering individuals’ appraisal, and the importance of contextual factors in privacy
regulation.
Purpose
From poor indoor environmental quality conditions to musculoskeletal discomfort, the interior design of workspaces has the potential to negatively affect human health. One of the key responses from industry has been the rise of health-related guidelines, certification and rating tools. Despite the rapid adoption of such tools by the Australian high-end corporate real estate, there is a scarcity of empirical evidence arising from such premises. This study aims to compare results from certified premises against other open-plan offices to understand differences arising from occupants’ satisfaction, perceived productivity and health.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 1,121 post-occupancy evaluation (POE) surveys conducted in 9 offices were analyzed. All these premises hold a certification from the Green Building Council of Australia and two achieved a WELL rating. The analysis is performed in three parts: comparing WELL-certified (2 cases) and non-WELL certified (7 cases) offices along with comparison with a benchmark of 9,794 POE surveys from the BOSSA database, comparing activity-based working (ABW) (5 cases) and traditional (4 cases) offices along with comparison with BOSSA database and qualitative study of the similar design features in all 9 offices accompanied with an in-depth analysis of the health-related issues that might have occurred because of poor ergonomic design. For the first two parts, several t -tests are performed.
Findings
Highest scores for overall satisfaction, workability, perceived productivity and health were reported on WELL-rated premises. Offices incorporating active design principles outperformed others on workability, satisfaction with work area, collaboration, unwanted interruptions, perceived productivity and health. ABW environments outperformed the traditional offices on spatial comfort, thermal comfort, noise and privacy, personal control, comfort of furnishing, adjustability of the work area and space to collaborate. People using sit–stand workstations reported spending significantly less time seated and female workers were more prone to reporting pain over the past 12 months. The best-performing offices implemented active and biophilic design, prioritized overall ergonomics and different spaces designed to support a variety of work-related activities.
Originality/value
This research conducts a comparison between certified premises against other offices in terms of occupants’ satisfaction, perceived productivity and health. A qualitative analysis is also conducted to investigate personal and physical environmental aspects. The way of working (ABW or traditional), implementation of active design features, self-reported musculoskeletal discomfort and physical activity were also investigated. The study has taken a holistic approach to investigate many health-related physical, environmental and emotional aspects in certified workspaces.
Post-occupancy evaluations (POE) have been often used to study user satisfaction with office environments. More recently, POEs have been recognized for documenting occupant well-being and responses to 26 indoor environmental quality (IEQ) factors that incorporate sustainable design guidelines such as thermal, lighting, and acoustic conditions. The Sustainable Post-Occupancy Evaluation Surveys (SPOES) have measured occupants’ (n = 2836) satisfaction with IEQ factors for 11 years. This paper presents findings from this 11-year-benchmark study. It suggests a lower satisfaction rating for adjustability than other IEQ factors. Based on further logistic regression analyses of the IEQ factors, occupants tended to be dissatisfied with their primary workspace when they were dissatisfied with acoustic conditions, furnishings, and privacy. The results imply that improving acoustic and privacy conditions, especially, would bring the most significant impact on the positive experience in built environments, whereas improving thermal conditions would impact relatively less significant on the positive experience. Acknowledging how differently each IEQ factor can affect building occupants’ satisfaction and perception is important for determining benchmarks that support occupants’ health and well-being in the workplace environment, where they spend much of their time.
While there is broad evidence of the impact of tangible factors (i.e. room temperature, indoor air quality) on work well-being and productivity, the objective measurement of intangible factors (i.e. ergonomics and privacy) is still an under-researched subject. A holistic approach to indoor environmental quality (IEQ) has been developed in this study by combining the research dimensions of IEQ factors (tangible vs. intangible), outcome (workplace satisfaction, health, productivity), method (subjective vs. objective assessment) and impact (direct vs. indirect effects), and it has been tested in a laboratory (n = 180). The main findings are that (i) workplace satisfaction, health and productivity are more strongly affected by intangible factors than by tangible ones, (ii) impaired privacy leads to sick building symptoms and less creativity, (iii) negative self-assessment impairs objective performance in the form of a self-fulfilling prophecy, while (iv) personality traits correlate differently with ergonomics and privacy. Hence, a holistic IEQ approach that also considers interrelations between the research dimensions is beneficial for creating supportive workplace designs.
Occupant satisfaction surveys are widely used in laboratory and field research studies of indoor environmental quality. Field studies pose several challenges because researchers usually have no control over the indoor environments experienced by building occupants, it is difficult to recruit and retain participants, and data collection methods can be cumbersome. With this in mind, we developed a survey platform that uses real-time feedback to send targeted occupant surveys (TOS) at specific indoor environmental conditions and stops sending survey requests when collected responses reach the maximum surveys required. We performed a pilot study of the TOS platform with occupants of a radiant heated and cooled building to target survey responses at 16 radiant slab surface (infrared) temperatures evenly distributed from 15 to 30 °C. We developed metrics and ideal datasets to compare the TOS platform against other occupant survey distribution methods. The results show that this novel method has a higher approximation to characteristics of an ideal dataset; 41% compared to 23%, 19%, and 12% of other datasets in previous field studies. Our TOS method minimizes the number of times occupants are surveyed and ensures a more complete and balanced dataset. This allows researchers to more efficiently and reliably collect subjective data for occupant satisfaction studies.
This paper explores the existing literature on indoor environmental quality (IEQ) evaluation models and proposes a new weighting and classification scheme. Studies that attempt to provide IEQ assessment of commercial buildings through a scoring system are reviewed and critiqued. Objective and subjective evaluation methods and correlations are discussed. The use of assessment categories (classes) in IEQ models is critiqued and an argument is proposed against their adoption. IEQ weighting schemes are summarized and compared against a newly developed scheme based on 52,980 occupant responses in office buildings. A binary assessment classification scheme is proposed in alignment with the ASHRAE/CIBSE/USGBC Performance Measurement Protocols for Commercial Buildings.
Purpose
– This study aims to examine the trends in space per office worker and the influence of a number of factors on the ability to reduce space per worker. These trends are important in that they impact future office demand along with property values.
Design/methodology/approach
– Using both survey and empirical data a simulation model is used to examine the impact on space per worker over the course of a typical lease. Factors considered include the length of lease, the worker growth rate of the firm, turnover and time to fill positions, the type of organizational management hierarchy, whether dedicated or non-dedicated space is utilized and firm policies toward working out of the traditional office.
Findings
– Space per worker will continue to decline over time, yet collaborative work environments and the effects of traditional management and cultural momentum suggest that downsizing will take time. Counter to the initial hypothesis, growing tenants do not over-consume space in the early years but rather tend to renegotiate leases when growth spurs the need for more space.
Research limitations/implications
– It appears that modest economic growth is sufficient to offset downsizing trends, but some markets will be more affected than others. Portfolios dominated by larger than average tenants or U.S. Federal Government tenants will be affected much sooner by downsizing efforts compared to smaller private sector tenants. The mix of occupant types and age also matters, and this study does not delve into significant occupant-type differences by market. This study also does not directly consider design influences on productivity other than those mentioned through surveys: natural light, air quality, temperature control, noise and the presence of collaborative space.
Practical implications
– Forecasters of office space demand must input an estimate of the growth in professional employment and then apply a space per worker assumption. This assumption in most markets will be declining, by as much as 30 per cent over several years. Washington DC is already being affected by downsizing, yet most markets with reasonably good economic growth will be able to offset most of this transition to more intensively used space.
Social implications
– Much of the existing stock needs to be rebuilt. Much of how the authors work and where is changing. This requires new perspectives on how productivity is measured and how remote workers are measured.
Originality/value
– This is the first paper to try and reconcile the views of commercial real estate owners and operators with those of corporate space planners, both of who have opposite sides of the same lease. It is also the first to point out the explicit reasons why downsizing efforts are sometimes not as effective as expected.
Background:
Based on improvements in indoor environmental quality claims are that 'green' buildings are healthier and promote greater productivity than conventional buildings. However, the empirical evidence over the last decade has been inconclusive, usually with flawed study designs.
Objective:
This study explored whether a 'green' building leads to a healthier, more productive work environment.
Methods:
A one-year, longitudinal comparison of two groups of employees of a large commercial bank; a group that moved into a GreenStar-accredited building and a group that stayed in a conventional building, was conducted. Measures of psychological wellbeing, physical wellbeing, productivity, and perceptions of the physical environment were taken before the move, six months later, and one year later.
Results:
Results indicate that the 'green' building group had significantly increased self-reported productivity and physical wellbeing. The perceptions of the physical work environment indicate that respondents in the 'green' building group experienced significant air quality improvements (specifically, reduced stale air, better ventilation, improved air movement, reduced humidity, and conditions that were not too drafty) but perceived the lighting conditions as dimmer.
Conclusion:
Despite positive findings 'green' building rating tools require amendment to focus on those qualities that actually lead to improved wellbeing and productivity.
The main findings from the Probe occupant surveys are assessed. The emphasis is on the consequences for strategic thinking on how best to design and manage buildings to improve conditions for occupants and users, taking examples from the Probe studies. Comfort, health and productivity of occupants are positively associated statistically; and all are easily undermined by chronic, low-level problems. Improvement may not necessarily require raising overall environmental standards - particularly if this requires more energy or reduces perceived control, which occupants think has been falling steadily in recent years. Noise-related problems are also growing with today's trend to more open, more diverse and often more reverberant environments. For the occupant, 'satisficing' may be better than optimizing; and big benefits can come from minimizing the main causes of discomfort, ill health and low productivity - for example by designing and managing to help individuals to choose how to overcome local problems when they occur. Perhaps the greatest enemy of occupant satisfaction is where a building and its systems have become too complicated for its managers - even if this has often occurred initially at their request. Its greatest friends are simplicity, intelligibility, managed feedback, respect for people's comments and rapid response.
From 1995-1999, the Probe series of post-occupancy studies reported individually on the performance of 16 buildings. This paper introduces the buildings - seven office, five educational and four other - and reviews aspects of their technical performance in a number of areas: building envelope and window design, heating, hot water and ventilation systems, artificial lighting, controls and operations and ICT (the energy and occupant surveys are reported in papers 3 and 4 of this series). The buildings are above average in performance for the UK - some exceptionally so - but nevertheless certain types of problem were widespread. Many buildings had poor airtightness and problems with controls, which sometimes seriously reduced occupant satisfaction and energy efficiency (which is discussed in more detail in paper 3). Important lessons for designers, owners, tenants and operators of buildings are described, based on feedback from Probe. For both old and new techniques and technologies there are frequently chronic, minor problems; often revealing the need to make components, systems and particularly their means of control more understandable to those using and operating them; to avoid unnecessary complication; for design to be appropriate to the management resources likely to be available to run the buildings; and for all but the simplest and most standardized buildings to have a period of 'sea trials' following completion in which performance is evaluated, problems fixed, and information collected for the benefit of the organizations concerned and of the whole industry.
Historically, post-occupancy evaluation (POE) was developed to evaluate actual building performance, providing feedback for architects and building managers to potentially improve the quality and operation of the building. Whilst useful in gathering information based on user satisfaction, POE studies have typically lacked contextual information, continued feedback and physical measurements of the building’s indoor climate. They, therefore, sometimes over-exaggerate poor building performance. POEs conducted in two academic office buildings: a mixed-mode (MM) and a naturally ventilated (NV) building located within a university in Sydney, Australia, suggest high levels of occupant dissatisfaction, especially in the MM building. In order to test the validity of the POE results, parallel thermal comfort studies were conducted to investigate the differences in occupant satisfaction and comfort perceptions between these two questionnaires. Instrumental measurements of each building’s indoor environment reveal that occupants tended to over-exaggerate their POE comfort responses. Analysis of thermal satisfaction and acceptability in each building indicate that occupants of the NV building were more tolerant of their thermal environment despite experiencing significantly warmer temperatures than their MM counterparts. In discussing these results, along with participant comments and anecdotal evidence from each building, this article contends that POE does not accurately evaluate building performance, suggesting occupants can and do use POE as a vehicle for complaint about general workplace issues, unrelated to their building. In providing a critical review of current POE methods, this article aims to provide recommendations as to how they can be improved, encouraging a more holistic approach to building performance evaluation.
Open-plan office layout is commonly assumed to facilitate communication and interaction between co-workers, promoting workplace satisfaction and team-work effectiveness. On the other hand, open-plan layouts are widely acknowledged to be more disruptive due to uncontrollable noise and loss of privacy. Based on the occupant survey database from Center for the Built Environment (CBE), empirical analyses indicated that occupants assessed Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) issues in different ways depending on the spatial configuration (classified by the degree of enclosure) of their workspace. Enclosed private offices clearly outperformed open-plan layouts in most aspects of IEQ, particularly in acoustics, privacy and the proxemics issues. Benefits of enhanced ‘ease of interaction’ were smaller than the penalties of increased noise level and decreased privacy resulting from open-plan office configuration.
This study describes the development of a new model for rapid assessment of Indoor Environment Quality (IEQ) in air-conditioned office buildings in the UK using design, measured, calculated and surveyed input data. The novelty of this model is that it addresses the need to present indoor environment performance ratings alongside energy performance certification and help determine by how much energy efficiency imperatives sacrifice human comfort. The model is based on the IEQindex which was developed from literature. The IEQindex is an expression which was derived from four contributing factors namely Thermal Comfort, Indoor Air quality (IAQ), Acoustic Comfort and Lighting. The relative weightings of each of the contributing factors were derived by fitting a multiple regression model to questionnaire data obtained from 68 occupants of two selected case study buildings in the UK. During questionnaire administration, measurement of indoor environment variables such as air temperature, relative humidity, air velocity, illuminance, CO2 concentrations and A-weighted sound pressure level was carried out in order to validate occupant responses. An empirical expression more suited to the air-conditioned offices in the UK was developed and the end result was a computer based program called the Indoor Environment Quality Assessment Tool (IEQAT). The model was compared to the AHP developed by Chiang et al. and the models showed good agreement.
The building user's experience is explored as the basis for constructing a theory of the built environment. The first postulate of a user-centred theory is that the built environment exists to support the activities of users that it shelters. This theory, therefore, indicates ways in which we might learn more about this complex relationship; it also provides tools for measuring the degree to which the built environment in use is successful. Ways of approaching the users' experience of built space, and ways of measuring it to ensure that knowledge of the user-environment relationship grows, are described. Challenges to implementing such an exploration include defining users, agreeing on the meaning of experience, and organising if not delimiting what is included in the notion of built environment. The temporal dimension of space use is also a consideration. Drawing on extensive research on space-use in office buildings, a viable user-centred theory is developed in the context of one type of built environment. The user-centred theory enables links to be made between knowledge accumulated both at the micro scale of the users' experience and at the macro perspective of how the built environment is produced and delivered.
User satisfaction studies and measured performance studies reveal that there are significant gaps between the design intent and the performance of buildings and systems over time and occupancy shifts. Whether this gap is due to failures in the design, construction, management or use of buildings is often unclear, user satisfaction studies, augmented by as-built records and measured performance studies to fully understand the performance of buildings and building systems over time. The article introduces the General Services Administration's (GSA) National Environmental Assessment Toolkit (NEAT) field study tools and database and their contributions to advancing the goals of high-performance buildings that meet ongoing occupancy needs and management resources. The NEAT studies undertaken by Carnegie Mellon University's Center for Building Performance GSA have been used to illustrate the value of instrumented post-occupancy evaluation to: promote occupants as sensors and controllers; identify technologies and systems that work; prove that place impacts health and productivity; ensure investment where it matters; recognize the importance of behaviour on environmental gains; and to catalyse innovation.
Are buildings designed for lower environmental impacts better from the occupants' point of view? Based on methodology developed in the UK by Building Use Studies and used for the Probe series of post- occupancy studies, the paper explores sources of occupant dissatisfaction, and whether or not green buildings are perceived as better by their users. Occupant surveys from 177 UK buildings are used for statistical comparisons between conventional and green buildings. Findings point to improvements in some areas, such as image and how needs are met, but green buildings are in danger of repeating past mistakes, especially if they are too difficult to manage. Users tend to tolerate deficiencies rather more than they do with more conventional buildings. There are also methodological problems. Findings based on more general, ` summary' questions tend give a more optimistic picture for green buildings than those which dig deeper. It is thus vital to back up statistical descriptions with detailed accounts of context so that rounded conclusions are obtained.
The Probe project, which started in 1995, has been a unique joint venture between the UK government (Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions), a publisher and a research team. It has undertaken post-occupancy surveys of well-regarded new commercial and public buildings, typically 2-3 years after completion. The purpose was to provide feedback on generic and specific information on factors for success in the design, construction, operation and use of buildings, together with areas of difficulty and disappointment. This paper outlines the project and describes the survey methods used, and prospects for further development. It considers the opportunities for more widespread deployment of post-occupancy surveys as routine quality assurance measures for the building industry and its clients. Papers 2 to 4 in this series discuss the findings on technical performance, energy performance and occupant satisfaction. Paper 5 draws some general conclusions and considers their implications.
Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) is a platform for the systematic study of buildings once occupied, so that lessons may be learned that will improve their current conditions and guide the design of future buildings. Various aspects of the occupied buildings’ functioning and performance can be assessed in a POE, both chemo-physical (indoor environment quality (IEQ), indoor air quality (IAQ) and thermal performance) as well as more subjective and interactional (space use, user satisfaction, etc.). POE draws on an extensive quantitative and qualitative toolkit: measurements and monitoring, on the one hand, and methods such as walk-throughs, observations and user satisfaction questionnaires on the other. POE may seem a necessary, indeed, axiomatic phase of the design and construction process, and exactly the kind of integrated assessment essential for the design of more sustainable buildings. Yet POE researchers have often been regarded with suspicion and even hostility, since their work may cause friction between different stakeholders. This chapter reviews material published in recent years in an attempt to trace the emergence of POE, describe its conceptual and methodological backdrop, its interaction with other issues related to sustainable design, and its increasing ‘canonization’ as a method. We argue that POE offers the potential to integrate a range of fragmented aspects of the construction process and of the relations of buildings to their environment and users. We propose that the acceptance of POE as a mandatory step in the design and commissioning of buildings, whose results are habitually fed backward and forward to other stages of the design and construction processes, is an important and probably inevitable step toward making buildings more sustainable.
Losses or gains of up to 15% of turnover in a typical office organization might be attributable to the design, management and use of the indoor environment. There is growing evidence to show that associations between perceived productivity and clusters of factors such as comfort, health and satisfaction of staff. Some of the management, design and use characteristics which contribute towards better energy efficiency also help productivity, thereby helping to close the loop on a potential ‘virtuous’ circle. Unfortunately, the vast majority of occupied buildings do not have these self-reinforcing qualities and many are unmanageably complex. This paper examines which factors within the control of building designers and managers best contribute to human productivity - the ‘killer’ variables of the title.
Unlabelled:
Building occupants are a rich source of information about indoor environmental quality and its effect on comfort and productivity. The Center for the Built Environment has developed a Web-based survey and accompanying online reporting tools to quickly and inexpensively gather, process and present this information. The core questions assess occupant satisfaction with the following IEQ areas: office layout, office furnishings, thermal comfort, indoor air quality, lighting, acoustics, and building cleanliness and maintenance. The survey can be used to assess the performance of a building, identify areas needing improvement, and provide useful feedback to designers and operators about specific aspects of building design features and operating strategies. The survey has been extensively tested and refined and has been conducted in more than 70 buildings, creating a rapidly growing database of standardized survey data that is used for benchmarking. We present three case studies that demonstrate different applications of the survey: a pre/post analysis of occupants moving to a new building, a survey used in conjunction with physical measurements to determine how environmental factors affect occupants' perceived comfort and productivity levels, and a benchmarking example of using the survey to establish how new buildings are meeting a client's design objectives.
Practical implications:
In addition to its use in benchmarking a building's performance against other buildings, the CBE survey can be used as a diagnostic tool to identify specific problems and their sources. Whenever a respondent indicates dissatisfaction with an aspect of building performance, a branching page follows with more detailed questions about the nature of the problem. This systematically collected information provides a good resource for solving indoor environmental problems in the building. By repeating the survey after a problem has been corrected it is also possible to assess the effectiveness of the solution.
Building occupants are a valuable source of information for indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and its effects on health, comfort, satisfaction, self-reported performances, and building performance. There are no standardized methods to survey occupants. A brief literature review has been conducted to collect and describe features of IEQ questionnaires. Ten surveys have been identified and analyzed in terms of type of evaluation, objectives, investigated topics, number of applications, integration with physical measurements, questionnaire structure, types of questions and answers, length of time to complete, languages, and distribution and gathering strategies.
This paper introduces the concept of total building performance and the diagnostic tools for measuring and assessing this performance. It emphasizes the need: (1) to fully address the fundamental building performance mandates of thermal comfort, acoustic comfort, air quality, lighting comfort, spatial comfort, and building integrity; (2) to define their physiological, psychological, sociological, and economic limits of acceptability; and (3) to clarify their relationships with each other. Integrated within the building delivery process, these performance mandates and the associated diagnostic measurement and assessment tools suggest new quality assurance procedures for providing suitable and reliable conditions for occupancy comfort in new as well as in existing buildings.
Motivated by a desire to discover how buildings operate in practice and inspired by the pioneering PROBE Studies (post-occupancy review of buildings and their engineering) the author has spent the last decade investigating both the design and the users' perceptions of (mainly) sustainable buildings. This has involved visiting some 60 commercial or institutional buildings worldwide, interviewing the designers, and in most cases personally conducting a questionnaire survey of the users covering operational, thermal, lighting, noise, control and satisfaction issues.
This paper highlights some of the key findings from these investigations, including the design features of the sustainable buildings, how their performance compared with that of more conventional buildings, whether refurbishments achieved better or worse perception scores than new designs, and the characteristics of the users' comments.
The paper concludes by outlining potential approaches to benchmarking user perception scores and advocating for their inclusion in building sustainability rating tools.
This paper provides a review of the improvements in the evaluation of building performance and introduces a new method for post-occupancy evaluation (POE) to complete the missing link in the building design process. Existing studies were reviewed to understand the possible reasons for the missing link of “building performance feedback”. The intention of this paper is to set out a new vision for how future post-occupancy evaluation can close the building performance feedback loop to better inform building design. The spatial mapping method adopted extends the use of building information modeling (BIM), which has shown great potential for the future of the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry, and uses geographical information systems (GIS), which is a powerful tool for analyzing and visualizing relationships between geographical units and their data.
This study explores how to establish a communication platform for different stakeholders in order to engage them in the collaborative effort of continuous building performance improvement by using the results of POE embedded into BIM. In this paper, the experiences of a POE study of a LEED® Platinum building and a historical building on a university campus are reported as examples to illustrate the proposed new method.
Climate change and the urgency of decarbonising the built environment are driving technological innovation in the way we deliver thermal comfort to occupants. These changes, in turn, seem to be setting the directions for contemporary thermal comfort research. This paper presents a literature review of major changes, developments and trends in the field of thermal comfort research over the last twenty years. One of the main paradigm shift was the fundamental conceptual reorientation that has taken place in thermal comfort thinking over the last 20 years; a shift away from the physically-based determinism of Fanger's comfort model towards the mainstream and acceptance of the adaptive comfort model. Another noticeable shift has been from the undesirable towards the desirable qualities of air movement. Additionally, sophisticated models covering the physics and physiology of the human body were developed, driven by the continuous challenge to model thermal comfort at the same anatomical resolution, and to combine these localized signals into a coherent, global thermal perception. Finally, the demand for ever increasing building energy efficiency is pushing technological innovation in the way we deliver comfortable indoor environments. These trends, in turn continue setting the directions for contemporary thermal comfort research for the next decades. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
The preservation of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) is key to the well-being and productivity of office occupants. In Taiwan, the green building certification system established IEQ criteria to evaluate the performance of buildings in acoustics, lighting, ventilation and decoration but not the performance in delivering thermal comfort. This study investigated and compared the green and conventional office buildings in middle Taiwan on various aspects of IEQ during a period of active air-conditioning use. Among the monitored environmental variables, the levels of noise, illumination, and carbon dioxide in both types of buildings were in compliance with international or Taiwan's regulatory standards, but not that of volatile organic compounds. The degrees of overall IEQ satisfaction as well as the proportion of occupants voting for satisfaction in the green buildings were both greater than their counterparts in the conventional buildings. Of the specific areas of IEQ evaluated, including the acoustics, lighting, perception of thermal comfort of the occupants toward the thermal environment, and indoor air quality, a statistically significant difference was found between the mean score of satisfaction in the green buildings and that in the conventional buildings. The occupants sharing a concern on energy conservation were more amenable to slightly deficient IEQ. The system of green building certification in Taiwan was able to facilitate proper IEQ performance of the buildings, although a re-visit of the current criteria to incorporate thermal comfort-related criteria may be adequate.
One of the primary objectives of the 2002/91/EC European Directive [1], recently replaced by the 2010/31/EU European Directive [2], is referred to the need of drawing up a methodology leading to buildings energy certification, which allows evaluation of both energy consumptions and polluting impacts and takes into account both comfort conditions of indoor environments and outdoor climate.Indeed, the connection between comfort quality of indoor environments and energy performance of building is firmly remarked by the Directive, pointing out that the achievement of high levels of comfort quality involves an increase of energy demand.In this context, the need of connecting building energy performances to the comfort quality of living spaces has focused the researchers' attention on the development of procedures aimed at classifying indoor environments under the point of view of comfort conditions.In this paper, in order to try to suggest a simple approach to the indoor environmental quality classification, a proposed methodology will be presented. It could be applicable to either single environments or whole building and is based on the calculation of two indoor quality indexes: the Environment Quality Index, EQI, and the Building Quality Index, BQI. Starting from the values of the EQI and BQI indexes, the proposed methodology allows the classification of the indoor comfort level, referring it to a seven values scale.
Indoor environment quality is simultaneously determined by thermal, acoustic, and luminous environments and air quality. This paper reports the findings of field studies conducted in public buildings in Beijing and Shanghai in 2008 and 2009. The studies included measurements of indoor environmental parameters such as air temperature, mean radiant temperature, relative humidity, air velocity, CO2 concentration, illumination intensity, and A-weighted sound pressure levels, as well as investigations of the occupants’ satisfaction with these indoor environments. A predictive model for evaluating overall satisfaction with the indoor environment was developed based on the analysis of the relationship between occupants’ satisfaction and the different environmental parameters. This model can provide a valuable reference for building designers as they compare different schemes by helping them choose designs favored by most people.
Indoor environmental quality (IEQ) of air-conditioned offices could be benchmarked by the occupants' acceptability. This study proposes a five-star IEQ benchmarking system based on an expression of the occupants' overall IEQ acceptance on thermal comfort, indoor air quality and aural and visual comfort. By using an earlier proposed IEQ index, the occupants' adaptive response of clothing adjustment for the perceived thermal environment was reported in order to determine the overall IEQ acceptance. The benchmarking parameter of a star rating system and the IEQ index were applied to express relative IEQ performance of air-conditioned offices in Hong Kong. The IEQ performance of some recommended environmentally sustainable policies for ``Excellent'' and ``Good'' offices was evaluated and compared with the existing offices. The probable IEQ in some Hong Kong offices were determined by Monte Carlo simulations from reports of surveyed studies. Among the existing office stock, results have shown that in offices which are renovated to the ``Excellent'' and ``Good'' IEQ criteria recommended by some policies, the IEQ acceptances for 5-star IEQ benchmarked offices are namely 0.95, 0.94, and 0.92, while for 3-star IEQ benchmarked offices, they are 0.89, 0.89, and 0.67 accordingly. The proposed star rating system would serve as a quantitative measure of IEQ for air-conditioned office environment in Hong Kong and given selected model parameters, it would be a useful reference for similar environments where the evaluation of an occupant is expected.
Existing buildings present the best opportunity for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in developed economies, given that only 2–3% of the building stock is newly built each year. Insights from a post-occupancy evaluation of a large-scale refurbishment project of a head office building in Sydney, Australia, are presented to inform future refurbishment strategies. The study evaluates occupant satisfaction and energy performance, and elicits influencing factors arising from the design process and interventions, ongoing building management, and operational performance. Occupants returned a high level of satisfaction across the range of environmental variables for overall comfort, temperature, lighting, and air quality as well as perceived productivity and health. These outcomes highlight the importance of improving indoor environmental quality for occupants particularly through increased fresh air, daylight, glare control, access to views, and noise management. The positive results reinforce the value of an integrated and user-responsive approach that was adopted for building design, development, and management. The reduction in operational energy (in this project, coupled with carbon reduction) as a consequence of refurbishment and positive user feedback demonstrates the potential to future-proof existing buildings in the context of climate change.
Les bâtiments existants offrent la meilleure possibilité de réduction des émissions de gaz à effet de serre dans les économies développées, étant donné que les constructions neuves ne représentent chaque année que 2 à 3% du parc bâti. Les enseignements retirés d'une évaluation après occupation d'une opération de rénovation à grande échelle réalisée dans l'immeuble d'un siège social de Sydney, en Australie, sont présentés afin d'infléchir les futures stratégies en matière de rénovation. L'étude évalue la satisfaction des occupants et les performances énergétiques, et met au jour les facteurs d'influence qui découlent du processus de conception et des interventions réalisées, de la gestion en cours du bâtiment et des performances de fonctionnement. Les occupants ont exprimé un degré de satisfaction élevé sur l'ensemble des variables environnementales concernant le confort global, la température, l'éclairage et la qualité de l'air, aussi bien que la productivité et la santé telles qu'ils les ont perçues. Ces résultats mettent en évidence le fait qu'il est important d'améliorer la qualité environnementale intérieure pour les occupants, tout particulièrement en apportant davantage d'air frais et de lumière du jour, un plus grand contrôle de l'éblouissement, un accès accru à des panoramas et une gestion renforcée du bruit. Ces résultats positifs renforcent l'utilité d'une approche intégrée et sensible aux besoins des utilisateurs, telle qu'elle a été adoptée pour concevoir, aménager et gérer ce bâtiment. La réduction de l'énergie de fonctionnement (dans cette opération, conjointement avec la réduction du carbone) en conséquence de la rénovation et du feedback positif des utilisateurs démontre le potentiel de cette approche pour permettre aux bâtiments existants de bien affronter l'avenir dans le contexte du changement climatique.
Mots clés: adaptation, changement climatique, confort, énergie, qualité environnementale intérieure, conception intégrée, occupants, évaluation après occupation, rénovation
A questionnaire survey in Danish homes investigated the factors that influence occupants’ comfort. The questionnaire contained questions on inhabitants’ behaviour, their knowledge as regards building systems designed for controlling the indoor environment and the ways in which they achieve comfort. A total of 2499 questionnaires were sent to inhabitants of the most common types of housing in Denmark; 645 persons replied (response rate of 26%). The results show that the main indoor environmental parameters (visual, acoustic and thermal conditions, and air quality) are considered by occupants to be the most important parameters determining comfort. Manual control of the indoor environment was indicated by the respondents as highly preferred, and only in the case of temperature did they accept both manual and automatic control. The respondents indicated that they were confident about how the systems for controlling indoor environmental quality in their homes should be used. 54% of them reported to have had at least one problem related to the indoor environment at home. A majority of those respondents did not try to search for information on how to solve the problem. This may suggest that there is a need for increasing people’s awareness regarding the consequences of a poor indoor environment on their health and for improving people’s knowledge on how to ensure a good indoor climate.
Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) is a diagnostic tool and system
which allows facility managers to identify and evaluate critical aspects
of building performance systematically. This system has been applied to
identify problem areas in existing buildings, to test new building
prototypes and to develop design guidance and criteria for future
facilities. Outlines the numerous benefits of POE, including better
space utilization, as well as cost and time savings. Describes a
conceptual framework and evaluation data-gathering techniques. Presents
examples of the outcomes of a case study POE on a medical facility.
Highlights the primary effect of a POE database development project on
FM software and summarizes the outcomes of an IFMA Pilot Survey on
Academic Facility Performance Feedback.
The article provides a practical overview of three kinds of building performance feedback loops: benchmarking, systems audits and monthly performance monitoring. The feedback loops are being explored through Canada Green Building Council’s pilot projects, the first three of which
were conducted in 2008 for the commercial sector, the government and utility company administrative sector, and the K-12 school sector. The article argues that such feedback loops, grounded in actual building performance data, are essential to expanding intelligence, so that performance can
be continually improved. The pilots have shown that there is considerable potential to reduce the energy use of buildings, thereby reducing greenhouse gas emissions, as well as providing economic benefits to society. On a larger scale, aggregating performance results for many buildings allows
performance standards and best practices to be established, which can be incorporated into public policy and policies of individual companies.
Maintaining an acceptable indoor environmental quality (IEQ) for air-conditioned office buildings consumes a considerable amount of thermal energy. This study correlates thermal energy consumption with the overall occupant acceptance of IEQ in some air-conditioned offices. An empirical expression of an IEQ index associated with thermal comfort, indoor air quality, aural and visual comfort is used to benchmark the offices. Employing input parameters obtained from the building stocks of Hong Kong, the office portfolios regarding the thermal energy consumption and the IEQ index are determined by Monte Carlo simulations. In particular, an energy-to-acceptance ratio and an energy-to-IEQ improvement ratio are proposed to measure the performance of energy consumption for the IEQ in the air-conditioned offices. The ratios give the thermal energy consumption corresponding to a desirable percentage of IEQ acceptances and to an IEQ upgrade, respectively. The results showed a non-linear increasing trend of annual thermal energy consumption for IEQ improvement at the offices of higher IEQ benchmarks. The thermal energy consumption for visual comfort and indoor air quality would also be significant in these offices. This study provides useful information that incorporates the IEQ in air-conditioned offices into the development of performance evaluation measures for thermal energy consumption.
The indoor environmental quality (IEQ) in offices is examined from the prospect of an occupant's acceptance in four aspects: thermal comfort, indoor air quality, noise level and illumination level. Based on the evaluations made by 293 occupants of the IEQ of offices in Hong Kong, empirical expressions have been proposed to approximate an overall IEQ acceptance of an office environment at certain operative temperature (To), carbon dioxide concentration (CO2), equivalent noise level (Leq) and illumination level (lux). The overall IEQ acceptance is calculated from a multivariate logistic regression model. A range of acceptance in typical office environmental conditions and its dependence on the four parameters stated above are determined for design conditions. The proposed overall IEQ acceptance can be used as a quantitative assessment criterion for an office environment and similar environment where an occupant's evaluation is expected.