SBIR Phase II:An IoT Smart Shower for Hotel Utility Savings

这个小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是通过节省2000亿加仑的水和1万亿千瓦时的能源，每年在美国节省超过500亿美元的建筑公用事业成本。减少对水和能源的总体需求可以减轻市政基础设施的压力。拟议的项目包括一个高度准确的方法，以产生有价值的公用事业最终用户的行为数据在炎热，潮湿的环境。 公共和私营组织可以使用这些数据来设计更好的政策和最佳做法。此外，占用检测技术可以用于困难的环境条件阻止使用传统传感器的其他应用。除了为用户带来经济和环境效益外，该业务还将创造工程，销售和客户支持工作。拟议中的项目将消除行为水浪费发生时，洗澡离开淋浴空置后，即使水热身。 项目目标包括开发：（1）一种可以在多个淋浴/浴缸布局中准确感知淋浴占用情况的设备;（2）一种低能耗电路和长电池寿命算法;以及（3）一种设计外壳的系统工程，该外壳能适应淋浴的炎热和潮湿环境。 项目任务包括传感器精度的信号分析、多个建筑物所有房间的现场试验测试、工业设计和加速老化测试。技术里程碑包括：（1）设计一种传感器，当在至少25个不同的酒店浴缸/淋浴间布局中进行测试时，该传感器在1%的误差范围内检测到人类存在，（2）在至少3家酒店的房间中完成至少1年的现场用户赞助的试点测试，及（3）证明节省淋浴用水及能源至少20%该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Phase II project is to save over $50 billion in building utility costs annually across the U.S. by saving 200 billion gallons of water and 1 trillion kWh of energy. Reducing the overall water and energy demand decreases the strain on municipal infrastructure. The proposed project consists of a highly accurate method to generate valuable utility end-user behavior data in hot, humid environments. Public and private organizations can use the data to design better policies and best practices. Moreover, the occupancy detection technology can be used for other applications where difficult ambient conditions prevent the use of conventional sensors. In addition to the economic and environmental benefits to the user, the business will create engineering, sales, and customer support jobs. The proposed project will eliminate behavioral water waste occurring when a bather leaves a shower unoccupied even after water warm-up. Project objectives include development of: (1) a device that can accurately sense shower occupancy across multiple shower/bathtub layouts; (2) a low energy circuit and algorithm for long battery life; and (3) systems engineering of a designed enclosure resilient to a shower's hot and humid environment. Project tasks include signal analysis for sensor accuracy, in-situ pilot testing across all rooms of multiple buildings, industrial design and accelerated aging tests. Technical milestones include: (1) Design a sensor that detects human presence within a 1% error margin when tested across at least 25 different hotel bathtub/shower layouts, (2) Complete live user-sponsored pilot tests in the rooms of at least 3 hotels for at least 1 year, and (3) Demonstrate that the amount of shower water and energy saved is at least 20% when compared to the baseline.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.