Stefano Schiavon
· Professor of Architecture and Civil & Environmental Engineering; Associate Dean for Research and Design; Associate Director of CEDRUniversity of California, Berkeley · Architecture
Active 1986–2024
About
Stefano Schiavon, PhD, is a professor of architecture and civil and environmental engineering at UC Berkeley. He serves as the associate dean for research and design at the College of Environmental Design and is the associate director of research at the Center for the Built Environment. His research focuses on reducing energy consumption in buildings while enhancing occupant health, well-being, and performance. Schiavon has expertise in sustainable architecture, air conditioning, occupant satisfaction, laboratory measurements, post-occupancy evaluation, and building performance simulation. He earned a PhD in energy engineering and an MS in mechanical engineering from the University of Padova, Italy, with honors. His work has been recognized with awards such as the REHVA Young Scientist Award and the ASHRAE Ralph Nevins Physiology and Human Environment Award, and has been featured in prominent media outlets.
Research topics
- Computer Science
- Engineering
- Architectural engineering
- Psychology
- Meteorology
- Applied psychology
- Geography
- Sociology
- Cognitive psychology
- Political Science
- Environmental science
- Simulation
- Process management
- Knowledge management
- Business
- Human–computer interaction
- Data science
- Civil engineering
- World Wide Web
- Database
Selected publications
A Global Building Occupant Behavior Database
Scientific Data · 2022 · 86 citations
- Computer Science
- Database
- Computer Science
This paper introduces a database of 34 field-measured building occupant behavior datasets collected from 15 countries and 39 institutions across 10 climatic zones covering various building types in both commercial and residential sectors. This is a comprehensive global database about building occupant behavior. The database includes occupancy patterns (i.e., presence and people count) and occupant behaviors (i.e., interactions with devices, equipment, and technical systems in buildings). Brick schema models were developed to represent sensor and room metadata information. The database is publicly available, and a website was created for the public to access, query, and download specific datasets or the whole database interactively. The database can help to advance the knowledge and understanding of realistic occupancy patterns and human-building interactions with building systems (e.g., light switching, set-point changes on thermostats, fans on/off, etc.) and envelopes (e.g., window opening/closing). With these more realistic inputs of occupants' schedules and their interactions with buildings and systems, building designers, energy modelers, and consultants can improve the accuracy of building energy simulation and building load forecasting.
Overcooling of offices reveals gender inequity in thermal comfort
Scientific Reports · 2021 · 69 citations
- Business
- Environmental science
- Engineering
Growth in energy use for indoor cooling tripled between 1990 and 2016 to outpace any other end use in buildings. Part of this energy demand is wasted on excessive cooling of offices, a practice known as overcooling. Overcooling has been attributed to poorly designed or managed air-conditioning systems with thermostats that are often set below recommended comfort temperatures. Prior research has reported lower thermal comfort for women in office buildings, but there is insufficient evidence to explain the reasons for this disparity. We use two large and independent datasets from US buildings to show that office temperatures are less comfortable for women largely due to overcooling. Survey responses show that uncomfortable temperatures are more likely to be cold than hot regardless of season. Crowdsourced data suggests that overcooling is a common problem in warm weather in offices across the US. The associated impacts of this pervasive overcooling on well-being and performance are borne predominantly by women. The problem is likely to increase in the future due to growing demand for cooling in increasingly extreme climates. There is a need to rethink the approach to air-conditioning office buildings in light of this gender inequity caused by overcooling.
CBE Thermal Comfort Tool: Online tool for thermal comfort calculations and visualizations
SoftwareX · 2020 · 409 citations
- Computer Science
- Computer Science
- Architectural engineering
The Center for the Built Environment (CBE) Thermal Comfort Tool is a free online tool for thermal comfort calculations and visualizations that complies with the ASHRAE 55–2017, ISO 7730:2005 and EN 16798–1:2019 Standards. It incorporates the major thermal comfort models, including the Predicted Mean Vote (PMV), Standard Effective Temperature (SET), adaptive models, local discomfort models, SolarCal, and dynamic predictive clothing insulation. Our tool also provides dynamic and interactive visualizations of thermal comfort zones. The CBE Thermal Comfort Tool has several practical applications and each year is used by more than 49,000 users worldwide, including engineers, architects, researchers, educators, facility managers and policymakers.
Ten questions concerning well-being in the built environment
Building and Environment · 2020 · 276 citations
- Computer Science
- Architectural engineering
- Political Science
Well-being in the built environment is a topic that features frequently in building standards and certification schemes, in scholarly articles and in the general press. However, despite this surge in attention, there are still many questions on how to effectively design, measure, and nurture well-being in the built environment. Bringing together experts from academia and the building industry, this paper aims to demonstrate that the promotion of well-being requires a departure from conventional agendas. The ten questions and answers have been arranged to offer a range of perspectives on the principles and strategies that can better sustain the consideration of well-being in the design and operation of the built environment. Placing a specific focus on some of the key physical factors (e.g., light, temperature, sound, and air quality) of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) that strongly influence occupant perception of built spaces, attention is also given to the value of multi-sensory variability, to how to monitor and communicate well-being outcomes in support of organizational and operational strategies, and to future research needs and their translation into building practice and standards. Seen as a whole, a new framework emerges, accentuating the integration of diverse new competencies required to support the design and operation of built environments that respond to the multifaceted physical, physiological, and psychological needs of their occupants.
Energy and Buildings · 2020 · 123 citations
- Computer Science
- Psychology
- Data science
People's subjective response to any thermal environment is commonly investigated by using rating scales describing the degree of thermal sensation, comfort, and acceptability. Subsequent analyses of results collected in this way rely on the assumption that specific distances between verbal anchors placed on the scale exist and that relationships between verbal anchors from different dimensions that are assessed (e.g. thermal sensation and comfort) do not change. Another inherent assumption is that such scales are independent of the context in which they are used (climate zone, season, etc.). Despite their use worldwide, there is indication that contextual differences influence the way the scales are perceived and therefore question the reliability of the scales’ interpretation. To address this issue, a large international collaborative questionnaire study was conducted in 26 countries, using 21 different languages, which led to a dataset of 8225 questionnaires. Results, analysed by means of robust statistical techniques, revealed that only a subset of the responses are in accordance with the mentioned assumptions. Significant differences appeared between groups of participants in their perception of the scales, both in relation to distances of the anchors and relationships between scales. It was also found that respondents’ interpretations of scales changed with contextual factors, such as climate, season, and language. These findings highlight the need to carefully consider context-dependent factors in interpreting and reporting results from thermal comfort studies or post-occupancy evaluations, as well as to revisit the use of rating scales and the analysis methods used in thermal comfort studies to improve their reliability.
The impact of a view from a window on thermal comfort, emotion, and cognitive performance
Building and Environment · 2020 · 310 citations
- Computer Science
- Psychology
- Architectural engineering
Frequent coauthors
- 63 shared
Fred Bauman
- 29 shared
Federico Tartarini
University of Sydney
- 28 shared
Toby Cheung
- 24 shared
Paul Raftery
- 23 shared
Tom Webster
- 21 shared
Jiayu Li
Zhejiang Chinese Medical University
- 21 shared
Kwang Ho Lee
- 21 shared
Edward Arens
University of California, Berkeley
Education
- 2009
PhD in Energy Engineering, Applied Physics
Universita degli Studi di Padova
- 2005
MS in Mechanical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering
Universita degli Studi di Padova
Awards & honors
- Building and Environment Best Paper Award, 2024
- Three Building and Environment Best Paper Award, 2018
- Faculty Award for Excellence in Postdoctoral Mentoring, 2017
- Ralph G. Nevins Physiology and Human Environment Award, 2013
- REHVA Young Scientist Award, 2010
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