The course will give a fundamental understanding on how energy technology can be applied to reduce energy demand of buildings. Thermodynamics, heat transfer, thermal indoor climate, measurement technology, building simulation software and problem solving will be applied in surveys to find the possibilities to increase the energy performance of buildings.

The course is divided in two parts; one theoretical part that consist of a series of lectures and one practical part where the student will work with surveys of real energy systems in buildings. The course focuses on typical buildings in the Swedish building stock, but the knowledge attained in this course can be adapted to any building and energy system in the world.  

Upon successfully completing the course, the student should be able to:

1. Make a plan and perform an energy audit in buildings according to the degree of detail needed
2. Understand how to evaluate energy using systems in buildings in terms of energy efficiency
3. Be able to analyze and process historical energy data for buildings
4. Disaggregate and assign energy use between the different sub systems
5. Identify possibilities and tailor energy saving measures that will results in a reduced energy demand

This course will discuss how energy is used in buildings today and how energy technology can be used to increase energy performance of existing buildings. The course will focus on how the energy use may be reduced, keeping the same or improving indoor climate, by collecting and interpret information of the energy systems in buildings.  

In the course the students will address and consider the following aspects:

• Make a plan to audit  energy systems in buildings according to the degree of detail needed
• Perform the planned energy audit
• Understand how to evaluate heat demand of building heating systems
• Understand how to evaluate electric power of pumps, fans and other typical equipment
• Estimate the UA-Value of typical building elements
• Account for reference values of energy performance in different building types
• Estimate the energy use of typical air conditioning applications
• Calculate a buildings energy signature and normalize energy use
• Interpret measurements on heating systems and identify defects 
• Interpret measurements on electric systems and identify defects 
• Distribute the measured energy use between the different sub systems
• Understand how the different energy systems in a building interacts
• Understand how the control systems interact with the energy systems in buildings
• Identify typical errors in complex energy systems
• Identify measures that results in a reduced energy demand
• Evaluate measures and combination of measures from an technical perspective
• Evaluate measures and combination of measures from an economical perspective
• Evaluate measures and combination of measures from an social perspective

To course schedule

The course use Energy-Efficient Building Systems: Green Strategies for Operation and Maintenance by Lal Jayamaha as primary course literature.

Apart from the book, additional course material will be available as PDFs in CANVAS. Students can also find interesting information in Heating and Air-Conditioning of Buildings by Faber Kell´s.

Students at KTH with a permanent disability can get support during studies from Funka:

Funka - compensatory support for students with disabilities

A, B, C, D, E, FX, F

• PRO1 - Project, 1.0 credits, Grading scale: P, F
• PRO2 - Project, 2.0 credits, Grading scale: P, F
• TEN1 - Written exam, 3.0 credits, Grading scale: A, B, C, D, E, FX, F

Based on recommendation from KTH’s coordinator for disabilities, the examiner will decide how to adapt an examination for students with documented disability.

The examiner may apply another examination format when re-examining individual students.

In the exam, student can bring books that does not contain handwritten notes and other material approved by the course responcible.

To receive a final grade in the course the student shall complete and pass the two project assignments PRO1, PRO2 and receive a passing grade in the written exam. The final grade will be a combination of the grade in the written exam and the quality of the project assignments.

Grading Criteria

The different ILOs will be evaluated in the projects and the exam according with Table 1.

Table 1 ILOs and assessments

Project assignments PRO1 and PRO2 (3 credits)

The grading scale of the projects are Pass/Fail. 

In order to recieve a passing grade on PRO1 and PRO2 the student shall prove that the ILOs have been fullfiled. The evaluation ILOs will be performed according with the Evaluation table presented in Figure 1. 

The following Scale is used to grade the ILOs in the table:

Pass: The students have proposed solutions and presented results, which are clearly motivated, evaluated and discussed thoroughly and quantitatively.

Fail: The students have proposed solutions, which are not motivated, evaluated or discussed.

Control Checkpoints KS1 and KS2

By passing both project assignments plus KS1 and KS2 the student have fullfilled the requriements for a passing grade of the course (grade E), and passed part A of the exam. The grading scale of KS1 and KS2 are Pass/Fail. If a student wants to achieve a higer grade on the course, the student may do so by passing the exam (TEN1) with a higher grade.  

Exam TEN1 (3 credits)

The grading scale of the exam is A, B, C, D, E, F. The grading criteria for the examination (TEN1) are presented in Table 4. The exam is devided into two parts A and B, where a passing grade in part A is equvalent to grade E in the course. Part B of the exam provides the oportunity for the student to increase the grade of the course. If a student have passed KS1 and KS2 the student can skip part A and only take part B of the exam for the possiblity to get a higher grade of the course.

Table 4: Grading criteria for the examination

Final grade (6 credits)

The course gives 6 credits from three different course activities. The final grade of the course is a combination of  the projects (PRO1 and PRO2), control checkpoints (KS1 and KS2) and possibly the exam (TEN1).  The grade E is given if the projects and control checkpoints are awarded a Passing grade.

The students can get a higher grade by displaying a higher understanding of the course topics in part B of the exam (TEN1)

• All members of a group are responsible for the group's work.
• In any assessment, every student shall honestly disclose any help received and sources used.
• In an oral assessment, every student shall be able to present and answer questions about the entire assignment and solution.