Dear colleagues and friends in the Boston area:

The Building Technology Program at MIT and IBPSA Boston are pleased to announce a presentation by Professor Malcolm Cook (Loughborough University) on January 31st at noon EST in the Long Lounge (building 7 room 431) at MIT (http://whereis.mit.edu/). Everyone is welcome.

Christoph

Low Energy Buildings: CFD Techniques for Natural Ventilation and Thermal Comfort Prediction
Malcolm's presentation will cover both his research and consultancy activities. This will cover the work he has undertaken during his time spent working with architects on low energy building design, with a particular focus on natural ventilation and passive cooling strategies, and the role computer simulation can play in this design process. Malcolm will talk about the simulation techniques employed, as well as the innovative passive design principles that have led to some of the UK's most energy efficient buildings. In addition to UK building projects, the talk but will include work Malcolm completed as part of the design of the LEED Gold award winning Harm A. Weber Academic Center at Judson University, in Elgin, near Chicago. This building, which comprises office and library space, employs a hybrid ventilation and cooling strategy which exploits the maximum benefit from natural ventilation before reverting to air-conditioning during the harsh winter and peak summer months. Malcolm will also talk about recent research projects, including his work on Large Eddy Simulation (LES) of unsteady flows in naturally ventilated buildings and the development of a new simulation system which couples CFD with a model of human physiology and thermal comfort.

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About the speaker:

Malcolm Cook is Professor of Building Performance Analysis at Loughborough University. He is based in the Building Energy Research Group in the School of Civil and Building Engineering and leads their work in the area of ventilation modeling and low energy building design. He obtained his first degree from Manchester University (UK) in Mathematics and completed his PhD in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modelling of buoyancy-driven natural ventilation at De Montfort University (Leicester, UK). He has worked on research projects funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the Department of Health and the European Union. He has completed many consultancy projects for a wide range of clients worldwide which have included design and simulation work for health care buildings, schools and modern library buildings. His work is published in over 70 refereed conference and journal papers and has contributed to awards for innovative building design, including the RIBA presidents gold medal for practice-based architecture (2007), the CIBSE environmental initiative of the year award (2006) and a LEED Gold rated Academic Center for Judson College, IL (2008). Malcolm is a member of the CIBSE Natural Ventilation group, vice-chairman of the CIBSE Building Simulation group and chairman of the England affiliate of the International Building Performance Simulation Association.

Christoph Reinhart