4.4.1 ‘E CS RESEARCH LOGICS ’ BEHIND USING STANDARDS

ECS researchers told that is not mandatory to use standards in order to represent users or comfort. But the researchers appear very reluctant to deviate from standardization and make use of other sources to include users and their comfort needs in ECS research. Six types of motivations are identified to apply standards in ECS research. These are presented below in random order.

A first type of motivation mentioned by ECS researchers is that standards are within close reach. Real users are hardly involved in research practice, and ECS researchers view usability tests as complicated and expensive. Standards are an easy alternative to consult for information about users. They merely have to take the information about users of the shelf. In the ECS domain standards are easily available and a practical solution to bring users into ECS research.

The second kind of motivation that ECS researchers gave was that they approach standards as a professional reference. They mean with ‘professional’ that standards are official, objective and have a scientific base. This ‘professional’ feature enables researchers that they can refer explicitly to standards in their work. This is important to gain recognition for their research in the broader world. Standards as a basis for ECS work give their research an authoritative status.

52 A third sort of reasoning is that standards are widely accepted. The content of standards is the result of earlier discussions that are closed now. The solutions are based on collective agreement and provided as common information:

“Waarom zou je nog discussie voeren, waarom zelf alles nog een keer doormeten en gemiddeldes berekenen?[...] Je hebt gewoon sommige dingen, die onder de norm vallen, daarover bestaat geen discussie meer, die discussie is al geweest”(E.Wissink).

For example, one researcher explained that a contested area is human need for fresh air. Fresh air can be understood in different ways. However, in standards is ‘fresh air’ specified in terms of temperature, air circulation and humidity. In ECS research serve standards as a common accepted reference point for users and their comfort needs.

A fourth kind of motivation is that ECS researchers use standards as an instruction manual for complicated user and comfort issues. Standards prescribe how indoor climate systems should function regarding users and comfort.

Je moet gewoon harde gegevens hebben, harde waardes [...] die heb je nodig voor metingen.” (E.Wissink)

Standards provide guidance for making accurate predictions and guarantee the effectiveness of systems. Standards can be defined as rules and codes that commit the ECS researcher to particular technological research on comfort.

A fifth type of reasoning is that standards help to coordinate between actors in the ‘built environment’. For example standards are authoritative in the regulation of indoor climate systems for the research institute, industry, and contractors. Standards organize guidance for assessment and labelling of competing systems:

“In feite, als iemand een heel slim apparaat op de markt brengt, maar die is niet volgens de norm getest, dan kunnen ze daar in de nieuwbouw niets mee. Want daar horen geen EPC punten25 bij.[...] Ook al is het apparaat beter, als het niet volgens de norm is getest, dan zijn daar geen bewijzen voor.” (E.Wissink)

Without any official energy performance evaluation, it is impossible to grant an energy label to a device. Devices without a label will not qualify to be built into houses. The corporation within the ‘built environment’ depends according to the ECS researchers on standards.

A sixth kind of motivation identified is that standards ensure interoperability between various technologies. The indoor climate systems are not meant as stand-alone technologies at home. In a house, they require to function with other systems and networks like the electricity grid. The match with other technologies is accomplished through standards.

These six types of reasoning together form a coherent underlying logic to use standards in the ECS research domain for users and comfort. This ‘ECS research logic’ justifies for ECS researchers why standards are the main way to represent users and comfort in the current technical research.

4.4.2

‘S

’

‘

’

‘

LOGICS

’

The ‘ECS research logic’ that underlies standardization go hand in hand with a taken for granted attitude towards the applications of standards for users and comfort. They rationalize that standards

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EPC stands for ‘Energie Prestatie Coefficient’. ‘EPC credits’ give an indication for the energy performance of i.e. a climatic system, or in other words, its expected energy consumption.

53 provide the theoretical assumptions for users and comfort that they need for technical research. Using standards appears to be obvious to ECS researchers:

“Een norm pakken we zo uit de kast. Informatie over gebruikers is zo beschikbaar. “(R.Brand)

The researchers consider standards in terms of its input and output without critical reflection of its internal working:

“of de norm nu goed of slecht is, of wel of niet aansluit bij werkelijk gebruik, ja… dat is dan zo. [...]”Er zijn mensen die echt met norm ontwikkeling bezig zijn. Die stellen bepaalde normen voor, [...] daar ga ik niet over, ik vertrouw erop dat die mensen hun werk goed hebben gedaan” (E.Wissink).

This implies that ‘the standardized user’ and ‘normalized definitions of comfort’ that are embedded in standards come as durable wholes to the ECS researchers. The interviewed ECS researchers do not seem to feel responsible for the content and assumptions that are built into standards. In addition to this, some of the actors the ECS research group are involved with the development of standards. The interviewed ECS researchers trust that their colleagues do their work properly and that standard in general are good26. The above implies that the obvious application of standards lead to a situation in which users represented as abstract notions that are taken for granted in design logics of ECS research process.

4.5

C

This chapter was considered with user representation, comfort construction, design logics of the ECS research process in the ECS domain. The main conclusion is that ‘shaping a comfortable indoor climate’ is inscribed in design logics of ECS research process as a technical achievement of indoor climate systems and that users, comfort and energy are considered as functions of technology.

How are users represented in ‘Energy & Comfort Systems’ research on indoor climate systems?

This chapter explored user representation methods, articulation and roles of representations in design logics of ECS research process. Three representations were identified that ECS researchers use to anticipate future users: standardized, smart and incompetent users. The standardized user is inscribed on purpose, the smart user is inscribed unconsciously and the incompetent users is out scribed in ECS research process.

How is “comfort” regarding indoor climate constructed in ‘Energy & Comfort System’- research on indoor climate systems?

This chapter explored how ECS researchers define and understand categories of ‘comfort’ and ‘indoor climate’. Three interpretations of comfort were identified; however one construction of comfort, namely normalized definitions of thermal comfort, are explicitly inscribed in design logics of ECS research process.

Which design logics lay behind “user representation” and “comfort construction” regarding to the indoor climate in ‘Energy & Comfort System’-research on indoor climate systems? In the final sections became clear that the researchers reason that standards are the best possible solution to the seemingly self-evident divide between technology and behavior in their engineering research approach on indoor climate systems.

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54 Using standards into research process has great advantages, and ECS researchers are unwilling to shelve standards. Granting that standards are voluntary, the ‘ECS research logics’ seem to make their use seem ‘true’.

The ‘ECS research logics’ justify not only standardization as the ‘truth’, but also justify indirectly some consequences of standardization. Standardization allows technical investigation of indoor climate systems as a stand-alone object, detached from users and environment on neutral grounds in laboratory. Standardization ensures that all researchers do the same, which makes that the investigation becomes independent of the person performing the work. Furthermore, standards represent ‘the standardized user’ and ‘normalized definitions of comfort’. These are incorporated as detailed instructions and procedures and make that researchers can focus on doing things right, instead of doing the right things. The findings showed that the researchers do not question critically standardization, nor embedded content in standards or supposed benefits for using standards in the light of the potential users of the indoor climate systems under investigation.

The application of standard has reached a taken-for-granted status in the ECS research domain. The use of standards has as consequence that ‘the user’ and ‘comfort’ are treated as blackboxed entities in the ECS research domain. Thus, the ‘ECS research logic’ has an enormous influence on the users, their behavior and comfort needs that are embedded in the ECS research domain.

All these aspects are combined into a coherent research strategy with an underlying ‘ECS research logics’ on which the research team agrees. This logic determines the final arrangement of specific user representation and construction of comfort that guide the researchers in certain ways so that they can do functional research.

When one opens op the coherent research plan, it’s taken for granted status becomes less obvious, because it shows the action of ECS researchers that is required to make it appear logically ‘true’. Explaining i.e. the use and content of standards into ‘ECS research logic’ has certain benefits. It makes clear that standardization is not an objective property of the ECS research practice, but only one of more possible ways to arrange research. Moreover in my interpretation of Jelsma, ‘ECS research logics’ is a-deterministic in that it depends on the logics of the ECS research group members. If the research group would change, i.e. with TNO experts from behavioral science department or user involvement in research, the research logic and thus incorporated standardized values may change too. Another benefit is that the mapped design logics of ‘ECS research process can be compared for inconsistencies with the logics of related projects, like the energy consumption research of behavioral sciences. Do these logics i.e. define similar users and comfort preferences? An important advantage of ‘ECS research logic’ for this thesis is that it can be checked for the quantity and quality of the user logic that it incorporates. Jelsma hypothesizes that “the less user logic a research logics includes, the less functional – e.g. in saving energy the resulting design will be” (2005, p. 102). The user logics will be explored in the upcoming chapters. Jelsma suggests a contextual approach, because that departs from the minds of developers, in this case researchers.

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SHAPING A COMFORTABLE INDOOR CLIMATE AT HOME: MEANING,