Planning Grant: Engineering Research Center for Green and Climate Resilient Built Environments (Green CRiB)

The vision of the proposed ERC for Green and Climate Resilient Built Environments (Green CRiBs) is to enhance the climate-resilience of our society by improving indoor temperature stability as a means of dramatically increasing passive survivability, environmental justice, and providing a pathway to accelerate energy system decarbonization. The Green CRiBs ERC planning grant activities will focus on identifying cutting-edge, sustainable, engineering-based innovations in transparent envelope materials and enabling smart manufacturing technologies that will transform how natural and artificial light, heat and energy are managed in the built environment. Window and transparent envelope technologies leveraging innovations in super-insulating materials and novel light management paradigms will enable dramatic reduction of the overall need for active cooling/heating in buildings and agricultural greenhouses, while maximizing access to safe temperatures for both human living and economic activity, including food production. Green CRiBs is envisioned as an essential strategy for addressing climate change and environmental equity through energy savings and grid protection, while catalyzing innovation in the $0.42 trillion glass/window industry and multiple sectors it serves, and training the next generation of diverse, convergence- and innovation-minded engineers to solve complex societal problems.

In this ERC, we aim to dramatically improve indoor temperature stabilization against outdoor temperature variations, which will lead to residual load reductions essential for grid decarbonization using an entirely new approach predicated on dynamical management of heat, light and energy at the level of the built environment. A diverse ERC team in terms of expertise, gender, race, geographic location, and career stage will be formed to establish an integrated research, innovation, learning, and mentoring environment with broad participation to produce a highly diverse group of convergent thinkers and problem solvers that reflect the increasing diversity of our society. System-level implications on safety, climate resilience, environmental equity and justice, reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and grid decarbonization will be sought and enabled through enabling technologies, fundamental research, smart manufacturing innovations and stakeholder engagement. Intellectual merit outcomes of this planning grant are to: i) establish linkages between how multi-functional and dynamic transparent envelope technologies and innovations therein will impact climate resilience, energy equity, and grid decarbonization, ii) identify system-level and technology-level testbeds (residential and commercial buildings, greenhouse agriculture, etc.) that will maximize system-level benefits and societal impacts, iii) chart a path towards developing enabling technologies that advance thermal and light management properties well beyond the current state-of-the-art to become responsive to system-level needs, iv) identify critical pathways for advancement of aerogel thermal insulating windows, macroelectronic devices in fundamental areas of reversible electrodeposition, light energy modulation required for optimal plant growth and human comfort, on-glass energy harvesting and storage, and v) improve sustainable, low-cost and large scale manufacturing of advanced technologies on glass and other envelopes. System-level evaluations in primary testbeds in conjunction with stakeholders will be identified to guide research with an eye on minimizing cost and maximizing acceptance, adoption and societal impact. The Green CRiBs planning activities will also seek to identify the broadest possible stakeholder community and foster convergence of diverse disciplines related to systems, technologies and fundamental knowledge.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.