A Global Building Occupant Behavior Database.

This paper introduces a database of 34 field-measured building occupant behavior datasets collected from 15 countries and 39 institutions across 10 climatic zones covering various building types in both commercial and residential sectors. This is a comprehensive global database about building occupant behavior. The database includes occupancy patterns (i.e., presence and people count) and occupant behaviors (i.e., interactions with devices, equipment, and technical systems in buildings). Brick schema models were developed to represent sensor and room metadata information. The database is publicly available, and a website was created for the public to access, query, and download specific datasets or the whole database interactively. The database can help to advance the knowledge and understanding of realistic occupancy patterns and human-building interactions with building systems (e.g., light switching, set-point changes on thermostats, fans on/off, etc.) and envelopes (e.g., window opening/closing). With these more realistic inputs of occupants' schedules and their interactions with buildings and systems, building designers, energy modelers, and consultants can improve the accuracy of building energy simulation and building load forecasting.

Perceived indoor air quality in naturally ventilated primary schools in the UK: Impact of environmental variables and thermal sensation.

Indoor air quality (IAQ) in classrooms has a significant impact on children's academic performance, health, and well-being; therefore, understanding children's perception of IAQ is vital. This study investigates how children's perception of IAQ is affected by environmental variables and thermal sensation. In total, 29 naturally ventilated classrooms in eight UK primary schools were selected and 805 children were surveyed during non-heating and heating seasons. Results show that air sensation votes (ASVs) are more correlated to CO2 levels than to operative temperatures (Top ) during non-heating seasons and more correlated to Top than CO2 levels during heating seasons. The impact of Top on ASVs decreases with an increase in CO2 levels, and the effect of CO2 levels on ASVs decreases with increase in Top . The most favorable ASVs are given when children feel "cool" and have "as it is" preference. By keeping CO2  < 1000 ppm and Top within children's thermal comfort band, ASVs are improved by 43%. The study recommends that standards should consider the impact of both temperature and CO2 levels on perceived IAQ. Perception of IAQ also affects children's overall comfort and tiredness levels; however, this influence is more significant on tiredness level than that on overall comfort level.