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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

At the Core: Fundamental Building Science Education Matters More Than Building Type

As building technologies become more advanced, the need for highly skilled and qualified workers has increased. Both residential and commercial building industries struggle to capture the full benefit of these new technologies because of the limited building science knowledge base of the professionals researching, designing, building, and selling these structures. To help address this need, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Residential Building Integration (RBI) program initiated the Guidelines for Building Science Education (GBSEs). These guidelines provide guidance on the fundamental building science knowledge base that is helpful for a wide range of building industry jobs. This effort provides a mechanism for training organizations to align core curriculum that can be applied to any building type. At the same time, DOE’s Commercial Building Integration (CBI) program has been spearheading a full suite of impactful initiatives including the Better Buildings Workforce Guidelines (BBWGs), which provide voluntary national guidelines from which select stakeholders can develop high-quality and nationally recognized training and certification programs. The BBWG framework helps to improve quality and scalability issues for five energy efficiency-related jobs: Building Energy Auditor, Building Commissioning Professional, Building Operations Professional, Building Operations Journey-Worker and Energy Manager. The residential and commercial building programs are both interested in helping to create better buildings through an improved workforce. The two program initiatives complement each other in many ways. The GBSEs pave the way for more specialized training and education offered by industry and academia, which lead to credentials that signify competency. The BBWGs cover credentialing for energy efficiency jobs—a critical area that DOE believed could benefit from incentives for credentialing bodies and building operators that would improve the energy efficiency of commercial buildings. This paper summarizes the steps DOE programs have taken to work together and the outcome of this symbiotic relationship.

Metzger, Cheryn E.↗
DOE OSTI2021

The Building Science Advisor: A Web-Based Tool to Assess the Durability of Building Envelope Components

The Department of Energy (DOE) and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have developed an innovative new design tool that will put building science expert advice in the hands of every building designer who cares to manage moisture risk in high-R envelope components. As modern buildings become increasingly more airtight, constructed with modern labor-saving materials, and equipped with air-conditioning, they have become less forgiving to moisture intrusion. The Building Science Advisor (BSA) provides building science knowledge and advice based on expert experience, field measurements, laboratory tests, and computer simulations.BSA users are prompted to enter relevant information about the building location, design, and material selection options like cladding, structural system, and insulation. Influential factors such as climate, building air tightness, material properties, and internal moisture loads are also considered to estimate and compare the moisture durability performance of several design options. If the BSA deems the assembly’s performance unsatisfactory, it will provide the reasons why, and suggest necessary changes to wall design to ensure more robust performance.Using the BSA tool enables building designers to confidently select assembly design characteristics that achieve their design goals with the least moisture durability risk. Links to design-specific guidance are also be provided to help users manage any remaining risk. This tool will further enable DOE’s Building Technologies Office (BTO) to meet its long-term energy goal of a 50% reduction in building energy consumption by reducing builder concern about using highly energy efficient wall systems.

Desjarlais, Andre Omer↗
DOE OSTI2022

Engaging a Diverse Workforce in the Building Sciences Through the JUMP Into STEM Program: Impact Study; Preprint

Ensuring inclusivity in building science professions requires engaging people from underrepresented demographics; unfortunately, many races, ethnicities, and genders continue to be underrepresented. The JUMP into STEM program works to rectify this, encouraging creative ideation and highlighting the unique perspectives of a diverse array of students. The top students are awarded internships that provide opportunities to work in building science research with close supervision from mentors in the field. In the research presented here, we investigate the impact of participation in JUMP into STEM on students' careers, including the impact on students from diverse backgrounds. Furthermore, we research students' awareness of career opportunities in building science, students' perception of their ability to meaningfully contribute to this field, and the career building opportunities that JUMP into STEM provides for students. Through participant interviews and data analysis, we measure program diversity, inclusion, and effectiveness at achieving goals. We find that among the hundreds of students who have participated in this program, more than 25 different majors and/or educational degree programs are represented and more than 45% of students attend minority serving institutions or historically black colleges and universities. The JUMP into STEM experience had a significant effect on career choices or career development for more than 80% of participants. Our results also indicate that the JUMP into STEM program is effective at promoting diversity in the building sciences and is successfully contributing to the larger effort within the building science industry to promote and ensure equity in technological progress and innovation.

building energy science↗
DOE OSTI2022

The Future of Building Science Education with the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon: Preprint

Experience the future of Building Science Education with the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon, from community-focused designs to real-life innovative zero energy buildings constructed by students. In this paper, we will introduce the Solar Decathlon programs and a reimagined Building Science Education curriculum that is transforming education to inspire future building design professionals and bring sustainable, equitable design and construction strategies to the real world. The Solar Decathlon is a collegiate-level building design competition that challenges students in 10 Contests, from embodied environmental impact to affordability and resilience. We will cover the structure of the competition and its two Challenges - the Build Challenge and the Design Challenge - as well as additional programs that impact all aspects of the buildings industry. These programs include the Solar Decathlon Building Science Education course, a free online video series that provides students and working professionals with building science fundamentals; the Design Partners Program, which connects innovative student design teams and local building owners seeking low-risk, low-cost opportunities to incorporate sustainable design alternatives into their building portfolio; and Solar Decathlon Pro, a program piloted in 2021 that brings Solar Decathlon resources to design professionals. The Solar Decathlon's effective approach to bringing real-world solutions to building science empowers future professionals to do impactful work.

buildings↗
DOE OSTI2025

Updating the Building Science Advisor (BSA): A Tool to Assist in the Design of Durable Building Envelopes

Predicting the moisture durability of building envelope components remains challenging due to multiple influencing factors, including material selection, assembly positioning, local climate conditions, air tightness, interior environment, and construction quality. Building codes increasingly emphasize energy efficiency through enhanced insulation and tighter envelopes but offer limited guidance on moisture durability considerations. Consequently, builders face uncertainty, particularly as new materials and assemblies enter the market.The Building Science Advisor (BSA) is a free, web-based expert system developed to address these challenges by providing actionable insights into the moisture durability and energy efficiency of both new and retrofit wall designs. Recently updated, we are now providing version 3.0 of the tool. BSA features significant user interface improvements, enhancing navigation and user interaction through a refreshed, intuitive design. Additionally, the tool incorporates a newly developed database containing pre-simulated wall assembly cases, significantly reducing response times and improving the accuracy of moisture durability assessments. Furthermore, the updated BSA includes moisture content as a performance criterion, providing users with a more comprehensive understanding of moisture-related durability risks. These enhancements enable rapid, reliable assessments tailored to specific climate zones and local building practices. BSA continues to offer targeted guidance on wall retrofit scenarios and delivers access to an expanded library of location-specific building science resources.This paper describes these key updates, highlighting the enhanced features, expanded capabilities, and overall improvements to user experience and educational content. The paper includes a demonstration that illustrates how the revised BSA effectively supports practitioners in designing durable, energy-efficient building envelope assemblies.

Salonvaara, Mikael [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000318991554)↗
DOE OSTI2023

Building Science Education for Solar Decathlon: Emissions and the Built Environment [Slides]

The Solar Decathlon Building Science Education series is designed to educate students and working professionals on building science principles that are paramount to the successful design of high-performance, energy-efficient buildings. Instructional content is presented in modules, covering specific topics. Altogether, this series aims to educate viewers on: 1) where/how energy is used in buildings; 2) how to define zero energy buildings; 3) how to apply the fundamentals of thermodynamics to building envelope design; 4) how to explain the science of how/why buildings use energy; 5) how to apply this knowledge to design comfortable energy efficient buildings. Students and working professionals can use this educational information at no cost to complement academic curriculum and continuing education activities. This is Module 7 which focuses on embodied environmental carbon.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2017

Guidelines for Building Science Education

This report summarizes the steps DOE has taken to develop guidance for building science education and outlines a path forward towards creating real change for an workforce in need.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Building Science Advisor (BSA): A Tool to Assist in the Design and Education of Durable Envelopes

The moisture durability of a building envelope component can be difficult to predict. It depends on the materials used, the location in the assembly, the macro- and microclimate of the building, the air tightness of the interior environment and construction quality. Modern building codes require more insulation and tighter construction but provide little guidance about how to ensure these energy-efficient assemblies are designed and built to retain moisture durability. Furthermore, as new products are introduced to the market, builders are increasingly uncertain about the long-term durability of their building envelope designs. As building envelopes get tighter and better insulated, moisture management is key to a durable and high-performing wall assembly.

Desjarlais, Andre↗
NASA NTRS2002

Making Sense of Rocket Science - Building NASA's Knowledge Management Program

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has launched a range of KM activities-from deploying intelligent "know-bots" across millions of electronic sources to ensuring tacit knowledge is transferred across generations. The strategy and implementation focuses on managing NASA's wealth of explicit knowledge, enabling remote collaboration for international teams, and enhancing capture of the key knowledge of the workforce. An in-depth view of the work being done at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) shows the integration of academic studies and practical applications to architect, develop, and deploy KM systems in the areas of document management, electronic archives, information lifecycles, authoring environments, enterprise information portals, search engines, experts directories, collaborative tools, and in-process decision capture. These systems, together, comprise JPL's architecture to capture, organize, store, and distribute key learnings for the U.S. exploration of space.

knowledge management organizational learning NASA ↗
DOE OSTI2025

Exploring Professor Motivations and Implementations of a Real-World Problem-Solving Project: A Case Study in Preparing Students for the Emerging Building Science Industry: Preprint

Engineering education literature offers a variety of theoretical and conceptual frameworks for project-based learning. This study explores the implementation of real-world problem-solving projects in engineering education. The research team analyzed the motivations and methods behind professors' adoption of such projects through exploratory qualitative interviews with seven professor participants who integrated a nation-wide student competition into their courses. We analyzed the resulting data using a constructivist grounded theory approach to identify key themes of professor practices. Findings reveal that the real-world aspect of the projects and alignment with values and research interests were primary motivators for implementation. While implementation methods varied significantly based on context (i.e., university setting, course type), we found that these projects could be effectively integrated into various classroom settings. The findings support the recommendation for non-academic institutions to develop and manage competitions that can be integrated into classrooms and which offer a point of engagement that is available to professors from a wide range of disciplines.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2026

Robotics for HVAC applications: A critical review and future perspectives

Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI), enhanced computational capabilities, and innovations in sensors and hardware have driven the increasing development and application of robots in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. We selected and reviewed 101 studies published between 2005 and 2025, sourced from IEEE Xplore, Scopus, Web of Science, and the ACM Digital Library. To analyze these works, we developed a five-dimensional analytical framework (morphology, sensing, navigation, task execution, and system integration), inspired by the Springer Handbook of Robotics and tailored specifically for robotic applications in HVAC. Based on the reviewed studies, six distinct tasks spanning the entire HVAC lifecycle have been identified. Among the six tasks, inspection and maintenance dominate (59 %), followed by indoor monitoring and auditing (21 %), whereas leakage detection, comfort support, and installation/retrofit remain less explored. To address the identified gaps, this review proposes future research directions including investigating robot-aware HVAC design principles, developing multimodal HVAC sensing and data fusion techniques, enhancing robot training and hardware capabilities, and expanding robotic applications beyond Maintenance and Operations (M&O). The findings from this review inform future robotics research for HVAC applications and ultimately enhance system affordability, energy efficiency, resilience or reliability, and occupant environmental comfort. Moreover, it seeks to inspire researchers to explore the intersections of robotics, computer science, building science, and HVAC engineering fostering advancements in this multidisciplinary field.

AI↗