About Us

Thermal systems associated with buildings and other applications that exchange energy with the environment are responsible for a significant amount of worldwide energy consumption and energy expenditures. Our ability to improve energy efficiency, thermal comfort, environmental impact and even safety is limited by our ability to understand and optimally design thermal systems. In many cases, the tools to optimally design thermal systems are not currently available. (In some cases, even the tools to adequately design thermal systems are not available.) Accordingly, many thermal systems, particularly in buildings, operate in a less than optimal manner, partly due to the manner in which they exchange heat with the environment.

The Building and Environmental Thermal Systems Research Group of Oklahoma State University is made up of researchers with common interests in this area that have been working together since the early nineties. The special interests of the group include building heat transfer, HVAC systems modeling, building energy simulation, hydronic heating systems, geothermal heat pump systems and ground loop heat exchanger technology.

The Group is constituted of faculty, students and staff of the OSU College of Engineering Architecture and Technology (CEAT) with interest in building and environmental thermal systems. Individual faculty are members of the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) or Mechanical Engineering Technology (MET).