The Energy and Sustainability in Construction (ESC) Lab promotes energy efficiency and sustainability (EES) in the built environment through the development of sustainable design, innovative project delivery practices, and risk-based financial models for EES investments. Our work focuses on integrating advanced financial analysis, project development, and management strategies to enhance the delivery of energy-efficient buildings and sustainable infrastructure.
Through innovative solutions, the ESC Lab addresses complex challenges in current project development practices that slow the transition toward a more sustainable society. Our research spans a wide range of critical areas, including commercial energy retrofits, community solar projects, green datacenters, healthy commercial buildings, and electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure. By tackling these pressing issues, the ESC Lab is at the forefront of driving transformative changes in the built environment.
Financial and Management Questions that Lead to Sustainable Solutions
The ESC Lab targets to help project stakeholders evaluate the risks and rewards of energy efficiency and sustainability (EES) investments by addressing some of the industry’s most pressing financial and management challenges, including:
- What policies, financing mechanisms, and project delivery systems best support the advancement of EES?
- How can we categorize and accurately model the unique risks associated with EES investments?
- What analytical modeling methods can be applied to ensure the effective implementation of EES measures in projects?
- How can we optimize investment strategies to balance environmental benefits with financial returns?
- What best practices can enhance stakeholder engagement and collaboration to drive successful EES project outcomes?
Pursuing Innovative Solutions to Energy Efficiency and Sustainability
The ESC Lab has developed a series of analytical models and evaluation practices that facilitate the effective delivery of energy-efficient commercial buildings and sustainable infrastructure, including:
- Cost and power demand model for electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure
- Conceptual cost and carbon estimating model for mass timber structure
- Energy-Related Risk Management in Integrated Project Delivery
- Phased Investment for Energy Retrofit (PIER)
- Energy Retrofit Loan Analysis Model (ERLAM)
- An optimized portfolio analysis for community-based photovoltaic investment
ESC Research Funders and Selected Projects:
- UW Clean Energy Institute: “Equitable Public Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Expansion—From the Tribal Community Perspective”
- King County Metro–Sound Transit–Seattle City Light: “Electrified Mobility Hubs: A Blueprint for the Future of Transit Infrastructure”
- UW Global Innovation Fund: “Mitigating Effects of Future Pandemics with the Use of Risk-Responsive Building Codes: A Developing Country Framework”
- King County Metro: “Evaluation of a Public/Private Partnership (P3) Model for Bus Base Electrification”
- UW CBE INSPIRE Fund: “Investigating the Health Requirements and Risk-Responsiveness Criteria in Office Building Codes for Mitigating COVID-19 and Future Airborne Diseases”
- UW CBE INSPIRE Fund: “Investigating Energy Justice in Washington State in Terms of Photovoltaic (PV) Systems and Electric Vehicle (EV) Chargers”
- Google: “A Proposal to Grow a Greener Data Center with Google”
- UW Population Health: “Economic Impact of Office Workplace Transformation due to COVID-19: How Can Buildings and Surrounding Areas Recover?”
- UW Transportation: “UW Transportation Electrification and Solar Study”
- RERI–LBNL–DOE: “Effect of Energy Benchmarking and Disclosure on Office Building Marketability”
- Pankow–Skanska–Oregon DEQ: “Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for Low Carbon Construction Commercial Office Building MEP & Interiors Data”
- BE Innovation: “Impact of Energy Benchmarking and Disclosure on the Performance of Office Buildings”
Selected Journal Publications:
- Min, Y. and Lee, H.W. (2024). “Adoption Inequalities and Causal Relationship between Residential Electric Vehicle Chargers and Heat Pumps.” ASCE Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 04024025.
- Min, Y. and Lee, H.W. (2024). “Quantifying Clean Energy Justice: Impact of Solarize Programs on Rooftop Solar Disparities in the Pacific Northwest.” Sustainable Cities and Society, 105287.
- Shang, L., Dermisi, S., Choe, Y., Lee, H.W., and Min, Y. (2023). “Assessing the Office Building Marketability Before and After the Implementation of Energy Benchmarking and Disclosure Policies – Lessons Learned from Major US Cities.” Sustainability, 15(11), 8883.
- Min, Y. and Lee, H.W. (2023). “Characterization of Vulnerable Communities in Terms of the Benefits and Burdens of the Energy Transition in Pacific Northwest Cities.” Journal of Cleaner Production, 135949.
- Min, Y., Lee, H.W., and Hurvitz, P.M. (2023). “Clean Energy Justice: Different Adoption Characteristics of Underserved Communities in Rooftop Solar and Electric Vehicle Chargers in Seattle.” Energy Research and Social Science, 96(1), 102931.
- Su, S., Li, X., Zhu, C., Lu, Y., and Lee, H.W. (2021). “Dynamic Life Cycle Assessment: A Review of Research for Temporal Variations in Life Cycle Assessment Studies.” Environmental Engineering Science, 38(11).
- Droguett, B. X. R., Huang, M., Lee, H.W., Simonen, K., and Ditto, J. (2020). “Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing and Tenant Improvements Over the Building Lifetime: Estimating Material Quantities and Embodied Carbon for Climate Change Mitigation.” Energy and Buildings, 226, 110324.
- Ho, C., Lee, H.W., and Gambatese, J. (2020). “Application of Prevention through Design (PtD) to Improve the Safety of Solar Installations on Small Buildings.” Safety Science, 125, 104633.
- Gomez Cunya, L.A., Fardhosseini, M.S., Lee, H.W., and Choi, K. (2020). “Analyzing Investments in Flood Protection Structures: A Real Options Approach.” International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 43(2), 101377.
- Shang, L., Lee H.W., Dermisi, S., and Choe, Y., (2020). “Impact of Energy Benchmarking and Disclosure Policy on Office Buildings.” Journal of Cleaner Production, 250, 119500.
- Shakouri, M., Lee, H.W., and Kim, Y.-W. (2017). “A Probabilistic Portfolio-based Model for Financial Valuation of Community Solar.” Applied Energy, 191(1), 709-726.
- Shakouri, M. and Lee, H.W. (2016). “Mean-Variance Portfolio Analysis Data for Optimizing Community-based Photovoltaic Investment.” Data in Brief, 6(1), 840-842.\
Current and Former Lab Members:
- Abdul-Razak Alidu
- Byungju Jeon
- Chitika Vasudeva
- Yohan Min
- Matt Wiggins
- Novi T.I. Bramono
- Yong-Hyuk Oh
- Chuou Zhang
- Jonghyeob Kim
- Wenqi Zhu
- Julie Knorr
- Zhila Mohammady
Stephanie’s work investigates the interaction between the natural and constructed environment, including embodied carbon, life cycle assessment (LCA), urban ecology, landscape performance and supply chains and toxicity of building materials. Combining a background in environmental science and architectural design, she builds bridges between research and practice, bringing data-driven analysis and topical research to complex design problems. This experience will be applied towards improving the EC3 tool as well as other carbon data initiatives at the Carbon Leadership Forum.
She most recently was a Principal at KieranTimberlake Architects where she was an environmental researcher in the firm’s interdisciplinary research group. She is also a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design and a Co-Editor-In-Chief of Scenario Journal.
Meghan uses her background in architecture, supply chain sustainability, and life cycle assessment to pursue broad, system-wide policies and initiatives that support the vision of carbon neutral, circular building material supply chains. Meghan has been an active contributor at the Carbon Leadership Forum, and played a crucial role as a contributing editor to the Practice Guide for the Life Cycle Assessment of Buildings. She also chairs the Building Focus Group in the CLF Online Community. As a staff member she’ll be responsible for leading policy research to support Buy Clean initiatives.
She was recently the Head of Global Energy and Sustainability at WeWork, where she also launched the supply chain sustainability program in 2018 to drive efforts to source sustainable materials across their global portfolio. Before joining WeWork, Meghan was an architect at Mithun, where she worked on a range of project types and developed office-wide sustainability guidelines as part of the firm’s sustainability team. She also led internal efforts to integrate whole building life cycle assessment and low carbon material selection into the design process, through R+D and implementation on active projects.
As principal and founder of KRIEGH ARCHITECTURE STUDIOS | Design + Research, Julie Kriegh brings her clients’ project goals to fruition while adhering to the values of sustainability, high-performance construction principles, exceptional craft and attention to detail. These principles apply to custom single-family, multi-family, and residential community developments, as well as religious, medical, educational, and municipal facilities. She offers collaborative, team-oriented architectural services that result in custom designs that are aligned with her clients’ project needs. As a passive house designer, Julie uses state of the art energy modeling software to design and consult on net-positive energy buildings.
Dr. Kriegh is currently working on several research initiatives at the University of Washington, Seattle. Collaborating with a team of university researchers and industry partners on sustainability issues, Dr. Kriegh is leading research on building and occupant performance using wireless sensing devices and tailored feedback on energy use in residential settings. As a Research Scientist, she belongs to a consortium between UW, UA, Microsoft and Google researching the future of sustainable Data Centers. In addition, Dr. Kriegh worked with the UW Carbon Leadership Forum investigating materials for the Carbon Storing Data Center of the future to advance Microsoft’s goal to be carbon neutral by 2030 and carbon negative by 2050.
Julie received a PhD from the University of Washington in 2018, where her research focused on high-performance buildings, building user behavior and environmental psychology.
Teresa Moroseos is a Research Engineer at the Integrated Design Lab (IDL) in the University of Washington’s (UW) College of Built Environments and a Teaching Associate in the Department of Architecture. She is a licensed architect in the State of Washington. Her research includes studying the impact of extreme weather events on building energy use and thermal comfort, and optimizing energy use, daylighting, indoor air quality, and the operational lifecycle impacts of buildings. In her role at the UW IDL, she works as a consultant on design projects throughout the United States and provides technical expertise to improve daylighting and energy performance for retrofits and new construction. Teresa regularly teaches at the University of Washington in topics of climate analysis, energy principals for buildings, passive solar design, and daylight simulations.
The Integrated Design Lab (IDL) is operated by the Department of Architecture in the College of Built Environments at the University of Washington. IDL’s mission is to discover solutions that overcome the most difficult building performance barriers, and to meet the building industry’s goals of moving towards radically higher performing buildings and healthy urban environments. The IDL advances their mission through interconnected research, technical assistance, and professional educational and tour programs.
The Integrated Design Lab carries out research to advance knowledge and policies that support the healthiest and highest performing buildings and cities. It measures and analyzes modeled and actual building performance data so as to influence the building industry’s understanding of how to radically improve the design and operation performance of buildings. The performance research includes energy efficiency, daylighting, electric lighting, occupant energy use behavior, human health and productivity in buildings, and advanced building management systems.
The Integrated Design Lab connects its discoveries and the transformative knowledge of others to the building industry and public through education. These offerings include classes, workshops, focus-group meetings, leadership forums, and exhibits of breakthrough technologies intended to transform the market for the highest performing buildings by reaching out and educating current and future leaders on meeting 21st century building performance challenges with the knowledge and policies that favor renewable and regenerative buildings, neighborhoods and cities.
The IDL is a self-sustaining organization that includes interdisciplinary faculty, staff, students, professional collaborators, and partner organizations.
Green Futures Lab is dedicated to supporting interdisciplinary research and design that advances our understanding of, visions for, and design of a vital and ecologically sustainable public realm. The Lab’s goal is to develop green infrastructure solutions within a local and global context.
The Green Futures Lab explores and promotes planning and design for active transportation, including cycling and pedestrian environments; conducts research and design projects that aim to improve the ability of public spaces to build community and provide recreation and revitalization; works to improve the health of our water bodies and sustain our water resources through green infrastructure innovations, ecosystem restoration, and open space protection; innovates strategies for creating quality habitat, particularly within urban environments where it is most limited; and explores low-carbon urban design solutions to mitigate climate change.
Working with the University of Washington, local communities, and international partners, the lab provides planning, design, and education for healthy, equitably accessible, and regenerative urban and ecological systems.
The University of Washington’s Center for Integrated Design (UW CID) is a Research Center operated by the Department of Architecture in the College of Built Environments at the University of Washington. Its research organization, the Integrated Design Lab (IDL), is a self-sustaining lab that includes interdisciplinary faculty, staff, students, professional collaborators, and partner organizations.
Our mission is to discover solutions that overcome the most difficult building performance barriers, and to meet the building industry’s goals of moving towards radically higher performing buildings and healthy urban environments. We advance our mission through interconnected research, technical assistance, and education and outreach.
Kate Simonen joins the NORI podcast to share the ins and outs of life cycle assessments, or LCAs. Kate Simonen is a carbon accounting expert and professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Washington. As a licensed architect and structural engineer, she has an extensive background in high-performance building systems, seismic design and retrofitting, and net-zero energy construction. Kate’s research is focused on environmental life cycle assessment and innovative construction materials and methods. She is also the founding…
Monica Huang is a research engineer for the Carbon Leadership Forum at the University of Washington with expertise in environmental life cycle assessment (LCA). Recent research topics include the environmental impact of housing, optimizing tall wood structures, and developing data on the environmental impact of earthquake damage. She was also the lead author for a guide on the use of LCA in design and construction practice. Past research experience includes diverse topics such as astronomy, electronic waste, and sea level rise. As a graduate student, she developed the Port of Seattle’s first study on the impacts of sea level rise on seaport structures.