Many cities in the world are putting in place their own robust carbon reduction strategies in response to, or in advance of, leadership from central government. As the powerhouses of economic growth, cities use vast amounts of energy and consume resources from hinterlands that stretch across international borders. However, the population density of cities can also provide opportunities for significant efficiencies in terms of the provision of building services and the mobility of people and goods. In this programme of work, we propose to centre our activities on two cities: Xi'an, China and Portsmouth, UK which are notable both for their cultural heritage and for their population density (Portsmouth has the highest population density of any city in the UK). Both cities have published ambitious plans for reducing city-wide carbon emissions but also have large stocks of ageing buildings and infrastructure. This programme of work will: (a) develop an overall understanding of current buildings, mobility and energy services in both cities; (b) identify low disruption and scaled-up retrofit methodologies taking into account the particular characteristics of the two cities; (c) carry out modelling of city-wide retrofit and systems integration, at both the neighbourhood and district scales including building refurbishment, district energy and micro generation geared to improve buildings for their users. In all our modelling and building performance evaluation, we will take into account anticipated climate change projections and the adaptation required to maintain or exceed current levels of thermal comfort. (d) Address adaptive urban logistics to meet mobility needs within the two cities while pursuing carbon reduction targets through a series of targeted workshops with practitioners in the field from both countries. (e) Through a combination of modelling and monitoring, we will identify smart solutions harnessed to inform users and reduce consumption. Crucially, the modelling will be validated by real energy consumption datasets, gathered from both secondary sources (provided by our partners and from others) and primary, from a combination of sensor deployments and surveys. The latter will take the form of monitoring of a sample of multi occupancy buildings for a range of relevant parameters including temperature, power consumption, humidity and carbon dioxide. The building performance data provided by the sensor deployment will be supported by user survey data exploring perceptions of thermal comfort, overall wellbeing (satisfaction with life, health, employment and so on) and attitudes to energy saving and the cost of energy. This will link the purely techno-economic assessment of energy saving interventions to their potential social impacts. The outcomes of this programme will take the form of validated tools and guidance distilled from the project results in order to support city planners in their decision making processes concerning building asset refurbishments and the likely impact on wellbeing resulting from such improvements. A central aspect of the programme will be to foster collaboration and knowledge transfer between both researchers and practitioners in China and the UK. There are areas, for example district heating, of which there is far more experience of in China than the UK, very relevant to densely populated UK cities like Portsmouth. In other areas such as energy efficiency standards for new buildings and building energy assessment techniques, there is potential for knowledge transfer from the UK to China. In the final year of the project a joint UK-China workshop will be held to bring together researchers and practitioners in the fields of planning, energy, building services and local government, in order to disseminate the results of the programme, to test out and receive feedback on the support tools and to foster further collaboration.

Even if opening a window has a limited impact on the environmental conditions in an office, it is often a desirable feature as users are typically more tolerant as they feel they have been able to take action to improve their space. The ability of a user to interact with a façade does not, however, come without risk to the energy performance of a building. In a domestic setting, a householder is directly responsible for the energy bills and would therefore not consciously leave a window open overnight in the winter. In an office environment however, there is no financial driver for the user to operate the façade in the same energy efficient manner. Whilst there may be a strong driver to open a window in an office (stuffiness, high temperature), the driver to close the window (energy awareness) may be very weak unless there is an additional driver such as external noise, rain or a security risk. This poses a real challenge to the facilities manager, 'happy productive users' prefer control of the façade, which is what well designed non-domestic building environments should provide, but providing this control introduces significant energy performance risk. This study proposes to develop and test a low cost, non-invasive technique to assess the impact of poor facade control on energy performance and enable facilities managers to address this issue. We are looking to use external cameras to diagnose the status of a facade in terms of window opening, blind and internal lighting usage and to engage the Facilities Manager, security staff and building users to change the facade state. This approach can help address issues of (1) winter heating losses, (2) summer overheating and (3) poor internal lighting operation. Whilst security guards may provide an effective solution to the problem of energy waste, successful users' behavioural change in managing windows and blinds is very important in non-domestic buildings where there are no guards or where guards cannot intervene due to their narrow remit. All interventions will be developed through a user-centred design approach. Workshops will be conducted at the start of the project, to make sure that the interventions fit both with the technical constraints and with the organisational culture of the buildings where they will be deployed. In particular we will focus on (1) the trade-offs between preserving privacy and sharing information and (2) on the balance between group-level and individual feedback. As far as point (1) is concerned, a privacy-preserving intervention would allow us to send email messages to individuals who left their windows open, in the hope that this will not be done in the future. In contrast, broadcasting to everyone on a given floor in which windows are currently open and need closing would allow users to take action here and now. This second approach may be considered more constructive (rather than reprimand), it would require everyone to know which windows were left open, and by inference who might have left them so. Regarding point (2), our aim is to test whether the effect of individual feedback (e.g. individual emails saying "you left your window open last weekend") can be reinforced by framing it in the context of the general performance of people occupying the same building (e.g. through a public display or an email that is sent to everyone). Designing interfaces and systems which provide and maintain user engagement is the other key theme of this study. Decay in user engagement is a challenge for any behaviour change intervention and often not fully addressed in studies. Here we anticipate strong and sustained engagement with the facilities manager and security staff who are the primary path to energy savings in the building. Engagement with users of buildings such as offices is far more challenging where developed interfaces have to add value to the individual to ensure their sustained use beyond the initial 'novelty / honeymoon' period.