Innovative Projects Realized

Correction of Non-ideal Lighting Conditions for Face Recognition in Alcohol Ignition Interlock Devices

The alcohol interlock system manufactured by Alcohol Countermeasure Systems (ACS) is an in-vehicle breath alcohol testing instrument that prevents a vehicle engine from being started if the breath alcohol concentration of the driver is over a pre-set limit. With the current countermeasures, the alcohol interlock devices, with a high certainty, can confirm that the blown air is from a human, but fails to indicate whether he/she is the intended driver. A fundamental problem exists in the current alcohol interlocks devices is that they lack a “smart” monitoring system to know the identity of the person who is using the device. Implementing a facial recognition system within these devices is the key; however, experiments show that images of ‘poor quality’ such as driver’s pose variation, image blurring due to vehicle bumping and vibration, and illumination variations negatively and dramatically affected the performance of facial recognition. Therefore, the integration of illumination correction methods into ACS facial recognition system becomes the key to improving the performance of the alcohol interlock system to a satisfactory level. Specifically, the objectives of the proposed research are: a) to investigate facial recognition under non- ideal conditions such as non-uniform illumination, shadow artifacts and glare vision; b) to develop a new prototype interlock device with capabilities to accurately, automatically, and continuously authenticate the car driver; c) to transfer new knowledge acquired and new technology developed in the project to ACS, and other Canadian industry specialized in public safety, and intelligent systems; and d) to train highly qualified personnel for Canada’s R&D industry in the public safety sector and intelligent systems.

Designing for Urban Agriculture in a smart community

This project will develop appropriate strategies for a “Smart Community” of the future with respect to the integration of food growing and processing spaces into the community. This may range from rooftop greenhouses, residential growing sunspaces, community gardens, food producing building components, etc. As well this proposal will investigate how food production will interact with other essential systems and infrastructure in such a community. This study will be based on a review of ideas that have been suggested in many projects around the world for urban growing, and a distillation of these ideas into a series of approaches or patterns that can be used in a Smart Community undertaken by S2E. This will include information about the community’s potential food production capacity, design implications, and details of the synergies that occur with low energy and water saving design.

Dynamic Door-to- Transit Station “Shared” E-Taxi Serving Smart Community

While electric vehicles (EVs) are generally viewed as non-polluting and environmentally friendly, EV utilization brings other concerns such as: range anxiety, battery charging issues, cost of electricity, and network overload. Furthermore even though EVs are better for the environment in comparison with the traditional vehicles powered with internal combustion engine, they are still vehicles on the road contributing to road congestion. This study aims to address the above mentioned shortcomings of EVs by investing in a door-to transit station shared E-Taxi system. A successful project would mean having an acceptable plan for a taxi company to pick up and try out for the smart community which would result in:

• Not everyone in the smart community being required to have an electrical vehicle or vehicle in general
• Reduction in electricity usage
• Flexible door to terminal station transit system for the residence of the smart community
• Higher transit ridership
• Reduction in road congestion

Development of a Storm Water Re-Use System to Supply Non-Potable End-Uses in Multi-Use Community in London, Ontario

Urban stormwater re-use is gaining acceptance in Canadian jurisdictions as a means to offset anticipated increases in potable water demand from urbanization and climate change. S2e Technologies has partnered with Queen's University to determine if a net economic benefit can be achieved from potable water savings in large-scale stormwater re-use facilities in Canada. The new partnership between s2e Technologies and Queen’s will examine the economic feasibility of large-scale stormwater re-use in a Showcase Community in London, ON. The aim of the proposed project is to perform a feasibility research study that analyzes the economic efficiency, the potential savings in potable water, and the peak-runoff reduction potential of large-scale urban stormwater re-use. The research will generate fundamental knowledge about annual and seasonal variations in the water quality, supply, and demand for reclaimed stormwater as well as predictive correlations between regional hydrologic conditions, watershed characteristics, and the hydraulic performance of the re-use system that can be used for design purposes. The feasibility research is a first step in the development of large-scale stormwater re-use technology that will help Canada and Ontario compete in the global water market.

Employee Engagement Research

The internship project investigates the market feasibility of a new service/product offering and the existing organizational capacity to enable such a change to occur. Assist with the strategy and business plan development for what form this offering should take shape, either as an intrapreneurial initiative or a separate entity. The project will also adapt and advance lean startup methodologies (e.g. Lean Launch Pad) and design thinking for comparative scenario analysis and strategic planning.

Integration of Low Impact Development stormwater practices into the development of smart community

Development of stormwater management plans in Ontario has focused primarily on sizing of conveyance infrastructure and stormwater management ponds that mitigate the receiving water impacts of new developments. The focus has shifted in recent years towards the implementation of Low Impact Development (LID) that emphasizes the control of stormwater runoff at the source. Although several methods and tools have been developed to aid in planning and design of LID practices, there is a need for better integration of these tools into development and assessment of alternative site layouts to meet regulatory requirements for the protection of receiving waters. This research will focus on providing a closer linkage between the conceptual site design and stormwater performance assessment by linking site design tools with USEPA Stormwater Management Model (SWMM). The developed methodology will be tested on the Smart Community project, allowing a quick effectiveness assessment of a variety of LID practices into alternative site designs covering both their hydrologic performance and cost.

An Integrated Technology Architect for Real Time Care Process Management

Patients are facing excessive wait times at hospitals, especially within Emergency Departments. Long wait times expose patients to unnecessary risks, and are very costly to hospitals. In addition, a number of governmental and medical guidelines impose limits on patient wait times. This has prompted hospitals to explore technologies that can enhance patients flow and reduce wait times. This research aims to address patients wait time issues by deploying a Care Process Management system (CPM) that models and monitor clinical pathways as a process model. The proposed approach provides real time dashboards where hospital administrators can view current patient states and can predict when a patient wait time will exceed a specified limit. This enables the administrator to take corrective action in a timely manner to address the cause of the delay. When completed, such a system will improve patient safety, reduce wait times, enhance patient satisfaction, and maximize resource utilization. 

Improving precision analysis of power line modeling and integrating data processing chains for automating 3D building rooftop modeling

The project consists of two independent segments. The first part, to be managed by PhD student Yoonseok Jwa, aims to develop and evaluate new photogrammetric computer vision algorithms for detecting and identifying POAs and insulator types attached to power lines (PL). The expected benefit to the partner can be summarized as: (a) Efficiency- automatic detection and identification of POAs and insulator types help redirect resources to other operations and reduce the time needed for modeling, (b) Accuracy- more accurate clearance quantity which threaten PL systems, (c) Productivity- enhancing the updating process of a geospatial database in challenging environments and detecting potential encroachment dangers to the power lines. The second part, to be managed by PhD student Heungsik Kim, aims to design and develop a new automatic workflow for 3D building rooftop modeling by integrating state-of-the-art algorithms with current data processing chain. The expected benefit to the partner can be summarized as: (a) Efficiency- significant reduction in both time and cost required for reconstructing the 3D building models from the raw LiDAR data, (b) Accuracy-the proposed technique ensures that accurate 3D building models can be constructed automatically and free from human-induced errors, (c) Productivity- the new technique is expected to reduce the processing time to construct a 3D building model thereby allowing resources to be more focused on quality assurance and other operations.

Capacity Planning and Optimization of WiMAX for Smart Grid

There are many international efforts to modernizing the current aging power grid towards an efficient grid known as “smart grid” (SG). To implement SG, many sensors are attached to different points of the power grid infrastructure. These sensors collect data and can be used for controlling, protecting, and monitoring the status of the grid by receiving comands from the utility control center. Hence, communication is a keypoint in realizing smart grid. With the recent advances in wireless technologies, there is a preference to use new standards for the communication in SG.

One of the smart grid companies in Ontario is aiming at modernizing their power grid and our task is to design a wireless infrastructure given the number of end-user devices and the system specifications. The architecture will be modeled by applying the real network data. We optimize the system performance in terms of delay, relaibility and capacity using a network simulator before the implementation.

Provision and Exploitation of Biosolids in Quebec

The project consists of a study on the disposal and upgrading of dried and dehydrated sludges from  the treatment of municipal and industrial wastewater. The study would be limited to the province of Quebec. As a specialist in the treatment of wastewater, Degremont supplies high performance technologies for the dehydration and drying of wastewater treatment sludges. The most appropriate system for handling the sludge needs to be optimized. The project consists of a review of the regulation for biosolids disposal, define the authorized levels of toxic metals, pathogens, etc, define the certification process (BNQ), evaluate the different ways of elimination and upgrading the sludge, evaluate the costs of the various options and evaluated the different storage options adapted for Quebec. The different technologies will need to be evaluated based on ecological, social and economic aspects.

Innovation to Commercialization Optimization Research Project: What knowledge based tools can help WADE Canada accelerate the suitable deployment of DE technologies?

This research project will address the following question: What knowledge-based tools can help WADE Canada accelerate the suitable deployment of decentralized energy (DE) technologies? The proposed research will contribute to WADE Canada’s mission by:

• Assessing the performance capabilities of DE technology providers,
• Developing a tool to assess the needs of end users (those that have the potential to adopt DE technologies),
• Providing recommendations as to how social license considerations can be incorporated into analytical tools,
• Analyzing DE technologies and projects using Homer Energy Model and RETScreen, and
• Developing a Knowledge Management (KM) framework for WADE Canada.

The components of the proposed research address needs that have been identified by WADE Canada. The outcomes of this research and the development of knowledge-based tools will help build the organization’s capacity, increasing its ability to foster growth of the DE industry.

Understanding of intra-annual wood formation and phenological development of black spruce and balsam fir over the spatial gradient in the boreal forest of Quebec

Climate warming may have resulted in altered initiation and termination dates of the primary growth (e.g. phenological development) and the secondary growth (e.g. stem xylem growth) of trees in the boreal forest, consequently impacting wood quality, forest growth and productivity, and carbon sequestration. This project will analyze the intra-annual wood formation and phenological data collected for black spruce and balsam fir over an altitudinal gradient in the Parc National des Monts-Valins from 2010-2013, and the proxy data of wood formation (onset, duration and termination) reconstructed for black spruce from 1950-2010 over a latitudinal gradient between 48-51ºN in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area, Quebec to address the current knowledge gaps in phenology and wood formation for the two species with climate warming. The results may contribute to better assessment on the potential growth responses of trees and forests to future climate warming over time, and better modelling and predicting of wood formation and quality, phenology as well as forest growth and productivity in the Quebec’s boreal forest under climate warming.