Résumé
The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the need for effective ventilation control in public buildings. This study develops and evaluates a smart ventilation control algorithm (SIREN) that dynamically adjusts zone and system-level HVAC operation to maintain an acceptable COVID-19 infection risk and HVAC energy efficiency. SIREN uses real-time building operation data and Trim & Respond control logic to determine zone primary and system outdoor airflow rates. An EnergyPlus and CONTAM co-simulation framework was developed to assess its performance across various control scenarios and US climate zones. Results show that SIREN can flexibly control infection risk within a customized threshold (e.g. 3%) for every zone, while traditional controls cannot. At the building level, SIREN's HVAC energy consumption is comparable to a fixed 70% outdoor airflow fraction scenario, while its infection risk is lower than the 100% outdoor airflow scenario, illustrating its potential for safe and energy-efficient HVAC operation during pandemics.
Résumé
COVID-19 is a severe global epidemic in human history. Even though there are particular medications and vaccines to curb the epidemic, tracing and isolating the infection source is the best option to slow the virus spread and reduce infection and death rates. There are three disadvantages to the existing contact tracing system: 1. User data is stored in a centralized database that could be stolen and tampered with, 2. User's confidential personal identity may be revealed to a third party or organization, 3. Existing contact tracing systems [1] [2] only focus on information sharing from one dimension, such as location-based tracing, which significantly limits the effectiveness of such systems. We propose a global COVID-19 information sharing and risk notification system that utilizes the Blockchain, Smart Contract, and Bluetooth. To protect user privacy, we design a novel Blockchain-based platform that can share consistent and non-tampered contact tracing information from multiple dimensions, such as location-based for indirect contact and Bluetooth-based for direct contact. Hierarchical smart contract architecture is also designed to achieve global agreements from users about how to process and utilize user data, thereby enhancing the data usage transparency. Furthermore, we propose a mechanism to protect user identity privacy from multiple aspects. More importantly, our system can notify the users about the exposure risk via smart contracts. We implement a prototype system to conduct extensive measurements to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of our system.