Boosting Research for a Smart and Carbon Neutral Built Environment with Digital Twins (SmartWins)

At an era when the design of the built environment is being digitised, and the evaluation of buildings is implemented with the use of Industry 4.0 tools, the assessment of the energy performance of buildings can be no exception. Practices such as transmission of information through IoT and digital twins, for the assessment and control of building units, design using Building Information Modelling (BIM), smart meters and digital logbooks are anticipated to be established for conducting the energy assessment of buildings in the near future. Also, additional layers of information related to the sustainability of the built environment have been recently developed, which can enhance the information provided to the building owners and users, regarding the environmental performance of a building. This study presents the overall objectives of the project “Boosting Research for a Smart and Carbon Neutral Built Environment with Digital Twins - SmartWins”, which is funded under the call HORIZON-WIDERA-2021-ACCESS-03 - Twinning. SmartWins project aims to build the capacities for the Kaunas University of Technology in Lithuania, through its “Sustainable Energy in the Built Environment” Research Group (SEBERG) within the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Architecture to conduct high-quality research on the topic of next generation digital twins, applied for allowing the transition to a smart, sustainable, resilient and carbon neutral built environment. The concept of the SmartWins project is to form a network between KTU and leading institutions in the field of energy and sustainability assessment of buildings with the use of Industry 4.0 practices related research and innovation management, for know-how transfer and development of a long-term research collaboration. KTU will twin with the Politecnico di Milano University (PoliMi, Italy), the Centre for Research and Technology, Hellas (CERTH, Greece), a spin-off of the Technical University of Berlin, Contecht GmbH (CON, Germany), and Innotrope (France), aiming to increase its excellence and international reputation in the field, to both cover fundamental research aspects, as well as to further develop its skills, practices and structures to conduct top-notch research.