Quantitative holistic assessment of environmental impacts of teleworking

在加拿大，住宅和商业建筑以及个人交通约占能源使用和温室气体（GHG）排放的40%。远程办公、远程办公和其他替代办公室工作安排被吹捧为具有减少个人交通和办公楼能源使用和空间的巨大潜力。然而，考虑到住宅和商业建筑以及旅客运输，这对广泛的社会能源使用和温室气体排放有何影响，特别是在加拿大的情况下，仍不清楚。 申请人研究计划的长期目标是开发技术，设计流程和运营策略，以产生具有积极环境，经济和社会影响的高性能（舒适，可用，低能耗，弹性）建筑。短期目标（目前的提案）是制定和应用科学方法（建模和模拟以及实地研究），以量化替代办公室工作战略对能源使用和温室气体排放的影响。空间范围将侧重于办公楼和住宅楼，但也考虑到客运和信息通信技术。 这项拟议中的研究涉及对100名办公室工作人员进行为期一年的大型综合性混合方法实地研究-其中一半人定期远程工作，另一半人以传统方式工作（通勤到家外的办公室）。其目标是：1）开发关于工作安排的能源和GHG排放影响的具体新知识，2）确定在元模型中应考虑的各种活动和采购决策的程度（下一步）。应制定和应用考虑到上述四个领域的综合元模型。该模型旨在量化个人的边际影响以及跨人群的更大趋势。本研究的主要数据来源是：1）实施了详细居住者模型的住宅和商业建筑模型和2）公开可用的数据库（例如，人口普查）。上述研究将由申请人领导，由9名高素质人员执行，包括3名博士，4名硕士和2名本科生。学员将获得丰富的调查和现场测量方法，详细的建筑模型，以及能源，传热，建筑控制等方面的基础知识-所有这些都受到行业和政府的高度追捧。 这一结果将有可能对加拿大约1000万可以远程办公的工人的企业和政府政策产生重大影响。预计研究将表明，替代办公室工作安排的环境影响不应仅限于建筑物层面，雇主可能会对环境产生重大影响-远远超出办公楼本身的界限。

In Canada, residential and commercial buildings and personal transportation are responsible for approximately 40% of energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Teleworking, telecommuting, and other alternative office working arrangements have been touted as having great potential to reduce personal transportation and office building energy use and space. However, it remains unclear how this impacts widespread societal energy use and GHG emissions - particularly in the Canadian context - considering residential and commercial buildings and passenger transportation. The long-term objective of the applicants' research program is to develop technologies, design processes, and operating strategies to yield high-performance (comfortable, usable, low-energy, resilient) buildings that have positive environmental, economic, and social impacts. The short-term objective (the current proposal) is to develop and apply scientific methods (modelling and simulation and field studies) to quantify the impact of alternative office working strategies on energy use and GHG emissions. The spatial scope will focus on office and residential buildings, but also consider passenger transportation and information and communication technologies (ICT). The proposed research involves a year-long large comprehensive mixed-methods field study of 100 office workers - half who regularly telework and half who work in a conventional sense (commuting to an office outside of their home). The objectives are to: 1) develop concrete new knowledge on the energy and GHG emission impacts of working arrangements and 2) determine the extent to which various activities and purchasing decisions should be considered in a meta-model (the next step). A comprehensive meta-model that considers the above four domains shall be developed and applied. The model aims at quantifying the marginal impact of individuals as well as larger trends spanning populations. The main data sources for this research are: 1) residential and commercial building models with detailed occupant models implemented and 2) publicly available databases (e.g., the Census). The above research will be led by the applicant and executed by nine highly qualified personnel, including three PhD, four master's, and two undergraduate students. Trainees will gain significant experience with survey and field measurement methods, detailed building model, and fundamentals in energy, heat transfer, building controls, etc. - all of which are highly sought after by industry and government. The results will have the potential to greatly impact corporate and government policy for the estimated 10-million workers in Canada who could telecommute. The research is expected to show that environmental impacts of alternative office working arrangements should not be limited to the building level and that employers may have the potential to significantly impact environmental impact - well beyond the boundaries of the office building itself.