Research and development require methods: research to prove or disprove hypotheses, and development to create solutions, products, and services. We continually adopt new methods based on existing expertise and on the current state of the art, aligned with the research or development questions at hand. As a result, our methods portfolio is highly dynamic. The overview below describes our current standard methods:

Energy Systems

• Building simulation for modeling and analyzing building envelopes and building services at a wide range of levels of detail
  • Building energy use
  • Impact of different materials
  • Comfort
  • Summer overheating
  • Energy Flexibility
• Monitoring and data science
  • Collection of measurement data, taking measurement errors and confounding variables into account
  • Analysis of measurement data, including pseudonymization when needed
  • Digital twins (simulation models) of buildings, technical installations, and their system components
  • Model validation with measurement data
  • Data science methods
• Automated generation of simulation models
  • Analysis of large datasets from simulation and measurement using artificial intelligence methods
  • Fault detection and analysis
  • Maintenance information
• Analysis of fluid flows using CFD simulation
• Prototype and test planning for physical and virtual prototypes (digital twins) for experimental investigations in the Twin²Sim experimental building with its façade test rig

Building Envelopes and Building Systems

• Systematic, criteria-based analyses and comparisons for (multifunctional) building and building-envelope systems
• Requirements-oriented, principle-based system development for (multifunctional) building and building-envelope systems
• Variant development and parametrization for (multifunctional) building and building-envelope systems
• Hygrothermal and thermal building-component simulation (2D, 3D in development)
• Mechanical FEM analyses of small building components (in development)
• Development and design of (multifunctional) building and building-envelope systems
• Analysis of functional and structural parameters for the systematic development of building components and construction details for parametric 2D and 3D digital models
• Building and building-envelope system development
• Prototype and test planning for physical and virtual prototypes (digital twins) for experimental investigations in the Twin²Sim experimental building with its façade test rig

Settlement Systems

• Applied Geographic Information Systems (GIS) processing and modeling
• 3D and 4D geospatial data infrastructures, data standardization, and data harmonization
• Development of spatial indicators
• Development of technology-based planning tools
• Cartographic visualization, 3D and 4D visualization (web cartography, dashboards), and web application development
• Interactive data visualization: dynamic data queries and charts