After the 2024 ASHRAE Annual Conference on June 22-26, 2024, Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities (CGBC) researchers returned with multiple accolades, including a Best Paper Award.

Elence Xinzhu Chen, instructor in Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and postdoctoral research fellow at the Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities, was recognized with the 2024 Willis H. Carrier Award. This award, established in memory of Dr. Willis H. Carrier to inspire young engineers, is in recognition of the best published paper presented at a Society Conference during 2023 by a member thirty-two years of age or younger.

Additionally, the CGBC publication, “Ensembled Deep Learning-Based Model Predictive Control for Automatic Window Operations in Winter” also received the ASHRAE Best Paper Award. The paper is co-authored by

Elence Xinzhu Chen,  Xu Han, Assistant Professor at the University of Kansas;  Ali Malkawi, Founding Director of the CGBC; and Na Li,  Professor of Electrical Engineering and Applied Mathematics in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) at Harvard University was recognized as the top paper presented at a Society Conference during 2023. The research paper explores a deep-learning-based model predictive control (MPC) that significantly improves indoor air quality without compromising occupants’ thermal comfort and heating energy consumption. Specifically, the paper discusses data-driven artificial intelligence (AI) based window control that was tested on HouseZero using its unique network.

Learn more about the CGBC team, and read the selected publication.