Hariharan Naganathan

Applications of Clustering and Isolation Forest Techniques in Real-Time Building Energy-Consumption Data: Application to LEED Certified Buildings

AbstractBuildings are the largest consumer of energy in the United States from various sectors that includes transportation, industry, commercial, and residential buildings. Leadership in Energy an...

Impact of sustainability on business performance and strategy for commercial building contractors

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand the corporate sustainability culture of contracting firms, particularly in the Midwest. Many of the local firms operate nationally. The local corporate culture influences their regional offices. Other than convenience, the firms are selected from Midwest since their headquarters are situated in Midwest region and comprises of more number of employees than their other regional offices. This helped the research to approach more contractors for better survey and interview responses. The paper documents the study on existing management and construction practices these contractors adopt on sustainability and examines how their sustainability efforts influence the firms’ performances. Design/methodology/approach This research utilized surveys and interviews as the primary means of data collection. The data were collected from survey and interviews with selected companies operating in the Midwest region of the USA. One of the companies also operates offices across the country. Data from the interviews and surveys were analyzed using statistical analysis system software application. χ2 analysis, particularly the frequency procedures using the Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel (CMH) method was the primary analysis method used to study the relationships between different factors. The CMH method compares the association between and within two groups and permits adjustments of the control variables. Findings The findings of this paper include the results from various Midwest commercial building contractors. The results on different aspects of sustainable practices and their success rates among the contractors are determined and discussed, and future scope of improvements are mentioned at the conclusion of this paper. Research limitations/implications In summary, sustainable business practices are beneficial to society and favorable for the construction business. Embracing sustainable business practices has a positive impact on firm strategic performance for commercial building contractors through employee satisfaction, project opportunities, and market advantage. Sustainable business practices extend into the lives of individuals involved which exceedingly impacts society. The construction industry has advanced sustainability efforts, but there is a long way to go on the journey to being better stewards of the environment and resources. Originality/value A rival theory became apparent during the investigation that a new building consolidating all local company employees could have an impact on firm strategic performance. Third, this paper is confounded by a great recession that made project opportunities and revenue considerations analysis problematic. Some information regarding these aspects were helpful; however, expanding this paper during a more stable and typical economic period could provide additional insight.

Sustainability Quantification System: A Quantitative Approach to Evaluate Transportation Sustainability in U.S.

Sustainable practices have become the cornerstone of the transportation sector, and widely adopted by many states’ transportation agencies. Sustainable practices have now become the edifice of the transportation sectors but the adoption of such practices is not fast enough to overcome the ever-increasing global demand for resources. There are numerous sustainable policies, rating systems, and most of them follow similar approaches and formats that outline the sustainability factors. This paper proposes a quantitative approach to measure and evaluate sustainable performance of the transportation sector. The paper makes an extensive analysis on carbon emissions when treated by total population and Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The evaluation focuses on the transparency of sustainability through measurement and quantification of sustainability rather than to develop standard compliance approaches. These measurement and quantification approaches would allow transportation agencies to measure and thus reduce their footprints. BACKGROUND The scope of sustainable transportation is emerging into reality as a part of broader scheme of transportation. It is emerging as an epitome of global sustainability growth and aims at integrating resource conservation through transportation. Transportation influences all aspects of the economy, environment and society and generates long-term impacts on humanity (Dearing, 2000). Sustainability in transportation addresses the basic needs of societies such as safety and in a manner consistent with the health of human and ecosystem through transportation infrastructure. Sustainable transportation indicators are critical to measure the sustainability of transportation policies and practices. Amekudzi (2005) presented the sustainable transportation frameworks through thorough literature search, and placed the indicators into three categories: linkages-based, impact based and influence oriented. Litman (2006) included indicators that are separated into economic, social and environmental categories. Gudmundsson (2000) developed an understanding on how transportation planning is adopted in the U.S. and Canada and identified the indicators used to benchmark sustainable transportation performances. Segnestam (1999) examined the