Projects per year
Personal profile
Research interests
Sukumar Natarajan is the Director of the EPSRC Centre for Decarbonisation of the Built Environment (dCarb) . He is also Deputy Director of the Centre for Energy and the Design of Environments (EDEn) with research interests that include: building energy modeling, energy behavior, smart meter interface design, impacts of climate change on buildings, occupant thermal comfort.
Sukumar graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Architecture from Sushant School of Art and Architecture in India following which he read for his M.Phil. in Environmental Design at the Martin Centre in Cambridge. After a short period working for the Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi, Sukumar returned to academia to work on the Tyndall Centre funded "40% House" project at the University of Manchester where he obtained his Ph.D. on "Modelling energy use and carbon emissions from the UK domestic sector". Since then he has been involved in a number of projects on energy use in buildings and thermal comfort including the COPSE project (EPSRC, EP/F038135/1) as principal investigator looking at the thermal comfort implications of a warming climate.
Current projects include ENLITEN (EPSRC, EP/K002724/1) which will develop a low-cost intelligent home energy advisor to provide actionable prompts to households that they can use to save money and energy. This is a multi-disciplinary project with Computer Science, Psychology, Electrical Engineering, and the ECI at Oxford.
Research
Sukumar’s research focuses on how to design buildings that use as little energy as possible during their lifetime. A key question of interest is how big a role the occupant of a building plays in the creation and maintenance of a building’s low energy profile and how this could be optimised. This touches on issues of thermal comfort, occupant energy feedback, and innovative building physics. He also has a strong interest in modelling large scale building energy flows at community, regional and national scales. Much of his work is of an inter-disciplinary nature and he has been instrumental in bringing together techniques from computer science and psychology to these mainly engineering problems.
Willing to supervise doctoral students
Interested in supervising students studying:
- Smart metering and occupant feedback
- Occupant behaviour in buildings and how this affects energy use
- Large scale (urban to national) bottom-up modelling of energy flows
- Energy efficiency and use in buildings
- Thermal comfort, overcooling and underheating
Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals
In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):
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Network
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Newton Fund - Zero Peak Building Energy Design for India
Natarajan, S., Coley, D., Davenport, J., McCullen, N. & Walker, I.
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
1/11/17 → 31/10/22
Project: Research council
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Knowledge Exchange - Bath and IGES Institute (Dr Francesca Cecinati)
The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation
1/12/18 → 30/09/19
Project: UK charity
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VSIMULATORS: Human Factors Simulation for Motion and Serviceability in the Built Environment
Darby, A., Coley, D., Du, J., Natarajan, S. & Walker, I.
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
1/05/17 → 30/06/21
Project: Research council
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Healthy Housing for the Displaced
Coley, D., Adeyeye, K., Ball, R., Calabria-Holley, J., Copping, A., Hart, J., Natarajan, S. & Orr, J.
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
1/05/17 → 31/07/21
Project: Research council
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Preparing the South African Built Environment for Climate Change Resilience (SABER)
Natarajan, S., Coley, D., Heath, A., Kershaw, T. & Maskell, D.
1/03/17 → 31/01/21
Project: UK charity
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The comfort and energy impact of overcooled buildings in warm climates
Alnuaimi, A., Natarajan, S. & Kershaw, T., 1 Apr 2022, In: Energy and Buildings. 260, 111938.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Thermal comfort in naturally ventilated dwellings in the central Mexican plateau
Zepeda-Gil, C. & Natarajan, S., 1 Mar 2022, In: Building and Environment. 211, 108713.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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البرد شدید الازعاج في المناخات شدیدة الحرارة: دراسة عن التبرید المفرط في المباني المكتبیة في قطر
Alnuaimi, A. & Natarajan, S., 28 Feb 2022, In: The Journal of Engineering Research . 18, 2, p. 101-113 13 p.Translated title of the contribution :EXTREME COLD DISCOMFORT IN EXTREME HOT CLIMATES, A STUDY OF BUILDING OVERCOOLING IN OFFICE BUILDINGS IN QATAR Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open Access -
Improving thermal comfort in refugee shelters in desert environments
Moran, F., Fosas, D., Coley, D., Natarajan, S., Orr, J. & Ahmad, O. B., 30 Apr 2021, In: Energy for Sustainable Development. 61, p. 28-45 18 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open Access1 Citation (SciVal) -
Moving to a green building: Indoor environment quality, thermal comfort and health
Elnaklah, R., Walker, I. & Natarajan, S., 15 Mar 2021, In: Building and Environment. 191, 107592.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open AccessFile2 Citations (SciVal)8 Downloads (Pure)
Datasets
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Dataset for "Mitigation versus adaptation: Does insulating buildings increase overheating risk?"
Fosas de Pando, D. (Creator), Fosas, D. (Researcher), Fosas, D. (Data Collector), Coley, D. (Creator), Coley, D. (Project Leader), Natarajan, S. (Creator), Natarajan, S. (Work Package Leader), Herrera, M. (Creator), Herrera, M. (Researcher), Fosas de Pando, M. (Creator), Fosas de Pando, M. (Researcher), Ramallo Gonzalez, A. (Creator) & Ramallo-González, A. (Related Person), University of Bath, 26 Jul 2018
DOI: 10.15125/BATH-00390
Dataset
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Dataset for "Thermal comfort standards in the Middle East: Current and future challenges"
Elnaklah, R. (Creator), Alnuaimi, A. (Creator), Alotaibi, B. (Creator), Topriska, E. (Creator) & Natarajan, S. (Supervisor), University of Bath, 4 May 2021
DOI: 10.15125/BATH-00967
Dataset
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Dataset for "The importance of thermal modelling and prototyping in transitional shelter design"
Fosas, D. (Creator), Moran, F. (Creator), Natarajan, S. (Creator), Orr, J. (Creator) & Coley, D. (Creator), University of Bath, 22 Nov 2019
DOI: 10.15125/BATH-00668
Dataset
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ENLITEN - A dataset and its associated analysis code for the paper entitled "Designing sensor sets for capturing energy events in buildings"
Lee, J. (Creator), Thomas, E. (Creator), Lovett, T. (Creator), Padget, J. (Creator), Natarajan, S. (Creator) & Coley, D. (Creator), University of Bath, 26 Jul 2016
DOI: 10.15125/BATH-00241
Dataset
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Dataset for "Improving Thermal Comfort in Refugee Shelters in Desert Environments"
Moran, F. (Creator), Fosas de Pando, D. (Creator), Coley, D. (Creator), Natarajan, S. (Creator) & Orr, J. (Creator), University of Bath, 20 Jan 2021
DOI: 10.15125/BATH-00768
Dataset