Smart Buildings & Cities PDEng program

The Smart Buildings & Cities PDEng program wants to contribute to the transition towards smart, intelligent and sustainable cities where quality of life is high. This transition requires new solutions which can only be created through multiscale and transdisciplinary (design) approaches. The transition is a relevant theme for society (as reflected by the Horizon 2020 Societal Challenges formulated by the European Commission), building industry and university (consider the TU/e's Strategic Areas: Energy, Health and Smart Mobility and the TU/e's Smart Cities Program).



This requires technical designers who are able to work in a multidisciplinary environment and know how to communicate with different disciplines and stakeholders. This PDEng program educates trainees to become those technical designers! Please note that this program is about technological design, i.e., the process of solving problems by means of a technological design, this in contrast to (PhD) research, which is the process of understanding problems.

After the two year program our trainees become technical designers with a broad technological understanding of energy related disciplines in the built environment (mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, building physics and services and ICT), who excel in their own discipline and who are able to work in multidisciplinary design teams, contribute to design issues outside their own core disciplines, integrate different technologies into new products and concepts, and who understand the commercial aspects of these innovative products and concepts.



Job description

The Department of the Built Environment of the Eindhoven University of Technology offers you a trainee position to follow a two-year post-master technological designer program, which leads to the degree of 'Professional Doctorate in Engineering' (PDEng). The SEB&C program consists of two main parts:

1. Workshops. You will follow technical workshops in which you acquire knowledge concerning important concepts of disciplines other than your own (master) specialism. You will follow these workshops with other SEB&C trainees (all with different master specialisms). The workshops increase your ability to effectively and efficiently communicate with these other disciplines in multidisciplinary design teams. Furthermore, you will follow workshops on design methods, entrepreneurship and professional skills.

2. Design projects. You will work on a design project with a group of SEB&C trainees and you will work an individual in-company assignment (see description below). The latter is a design project in collaboration with a company and the university. You work within the company structure (facilities, office desk, computer and other required equipment are provided by the company). It is your main responsibility to manage and execute the project. You are supported by an advisor from the company and an advisor from the university. A business plan for implementation or marketing of the project or product is part of the final deliverables.



A significant part of the first year of the program is dedicated to the workshops, while the second year is mostly dedicated to the in-company assignment. Nonetheless you will start working on the in-company assignment from the start of the program. The in-company assignment related to this traineeship is described below.



To meet the targets set by the Dutch government in order to fulfil the Paris Climate agreement (2015) goals, countries are aiming at achieving a carbon neural building stock by 2050. The current European market for the sustainable renovation of the housing stock is too small, leading to high costs and little innovation. This project aims to contribute to the acceleration of the large-scale sustainable renovation of the housing stock. However, in addition to mere scale, this demand for renovations should be standardized in order to create the conditions for industrialisation and innovation, to ultimately lead to cost reduction. Therefore the clients' requirements need to be elicited in a structured format such that the building industry can offer standardized solutions that allow for large scale, high speed construction processes. The standardized building solutions entails industrialized products and processes for renovation. As part of the overarching project, a housing classification system will be developed, which defines clusters of housing types and their optimal renovation strategies to be adopted in the collective procurement of renovations. As part of this project, a platform for tendering clusters of houses for renovation will be developed.



This project is specifically targeting the development of a prototype system for the large-scale tendering of clusters of housing renovations. Given the renovation solution for a certain type of housing, these can be clustered based on certain spatial or technical characteristics. In addition, different types of tendering mechanisms are conceivable (including the auction mechanism). A prototype of the tendering system according to housing clusters will be developed in this project. To this end, workshops with contractors will explore what information is needed to tender renovation clusters in a way that gives contractors the opportunity to align their production processes and achieve economies of scale. In addition, based on successful projects involving large-scale tenders (for example, offshore wind farm auctions), the question of how the tendering system should be set up and adapted to the construction sector is explored. The result will be recorded in a system design.

Who can apply?

We are looking for

• an excellent and highly motivated candidate with an MSc degree in Architectural Engineering, Building Science, Building, Civil, Mechanical or Environmental Engineering, or equivalent.

• Knowledge and experience in Web-based geographical platforms, GIS and software development are essential.

• an interest in software engineering and applications for smart cities.

• an academic attitude in order to develop new systems and perform applied research with an integral view on what is needed for the future built environment.

• an excellent command of the English language, both in speaking and writing.

 

What do we provide?

We offer a fulltime traineeship of two years. The traineeship is a formal employment at the Eindhoven University of Technology according to the Collective Labour Agreement Dutch Universities (CAO-NU). Trainees receive a financial compensation according to this standard. Bruto salary: € 1913



Trainees are provided with their own work place in the building of the Department of the Built Environment. The university provides all general modern facilities belonging to first class universities; mediation in housing, excellent sports facilities, language courses, modern digital library facilities etc. For more information please visit http://www.tue.nl/en/.