Research Projects

Increasing energy efficiency in buildings is essential for an economically and ecologically sensible university life. In order to increase the energy efficiency of the Lichtwiese campus of the TU Darmstadt, it should be determined which buildings and building components are characterized by particularly high heat losses at which times. In addition to theoretical methods such as balancing or simulation calculations, practical methods such as infrared thermography can be used to record these heat losses. The thermal images generated in this process, known as thermograms, use different colors to indicate which surface temperatures are present on building components. Each temperature is assigned a color. High surface temperatures, usually shown in reddish colors, indicate greater heat loss than low surface temperatures, represented by blue colors. Within the scope of the project, these thermograms will not be created from the ground, i.e. with a thermal imaging camera and tripod, but from the air, i.e. with a thermal imaging camera and drone. A 3D model of the Lichtwiese campus will be generated from the large number of thermograms in combination with selected geodata. By continuously repeating the aerial survey or the thermographic images, the thermograms can be put into a temporal context. Based on this data, the 3D model is expanded to a 4D model, which makes it possible to show the evolution of heat losses depending on time. Thermal weak points can now be identified visually or mathematically, evaluated and remedied in a targeted manner.

This project is supervised by Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Architect Stefan Schäfer and Dr.-Ing. Robert Burgaß.