Behavioural modelling for building sustainability

Quality and performance of the built environment are enhanced throughout the whole life-cycle of buildings. Several parameters should be evaluated in design and measured in operational stages. However, performance gap could be observed. Indeed, designers can predict impacts of technical alternatives, but users’ behaviour influence consumptions too. Therefore, a workflow should be defined to correlate predicted performance in design stage with real measurement in operational one, by managing information coming from different sources, as building information models and building monitoring systems. Starting from the literature review, considering main inefficiencies of traditional building processes, the research aims to define methods and tools for designing and managing cognitive buildings, analysing how occupants could affect building sustainability, how their activities could be controlled and how building behaviour could be adapted to different conditions. The paper presents the first steps of this research, highlighting potentialities for several stakeholders, as users, designers and facility managers.