IoT Building Cloud Deployment in the OU33 Smart Building Living Lab
The IoT Building Cloud platform is deployed in the OU33 building at the University of Southern Denmark as part of an experimental installation supporting the Digital Twin and Agentic AI Infrastructure Lab. The installation serves as a real-world environment where the lab’s software stack for digital twins, IoT infrastructures, and intelligent data platforms can be tested and evaluated under realistic operating conditions.
The OU33 building is part of the SDU Smart Campus Living Lab, which transforms operational campus buildings into full-scale experimental environments for research on intelligent and energy-efficient building technologies. Together with the newer OU44 building, OU33 provides a complementary test environment that combines legacy building infrastructure with modern digital technologies, enabling researchers to study both retrofitting scenarios and next-generation smart building solutions.
The IoT Building Cloud platform
The IoT Building Cloud is a software platform developed at the SDU Center for Energy Informatics to enable scalable deployment of Internet-of-Things sensor infrastructures in buildings. The platform combines wireless sensors, cloud computing, and data analytics to monitor building operation and analyse energy consumption and indoor environmental conditions.
The system integrates multiple components, including:
- wireless IoT sensors and smart thermostats
- edge and cloud-based data processing
- automated configuration tools for sensor deployment
- web-based dashboards for monitoring building performance
- mobile applications for installation and real-time data access
These components together create a digital data infrastructure that supports continuous monitoring and analysis of building operation. The platform allows facility managers and researchers to access detailed information about energy consumption, indoor climate conditions, and environmental parameters through cloud-based dashboards and data services.
Automated deployment of IoT sensor networks
One of the key innovations of the IoT Building Cloud platform is its automated approach to deploying IoT sensor networks. The system uses a QR-code-based configuration framework that simplifies the installation of sensors and smart thermostats by eliminating the need for manual device programming during installation.
This approach makes it possible to deploy large numbers of sensors across buildings in a scalable and cost-effective way. By reducing installation complexity, the platform enables rapid deployment of sensor infrastructures that can support large-scale monitoring and digital twin applications.
Experimental infrastructure for digital twin research
In the OU33 Smart Building Living Lab, the IoT Building Cloud installation provides a continuous stream of real-time operational data from the building environment. This data forms the foundation for developing digital representations of building systems and for studying how digital twin technologies can be implemented in real operational environments.
Within the Digital Twin and Agentic AI Infrastructure Lab, the IoT Building Cloud installation serves as a practical testbed where researchers can investigate:
- integration of IoT sensor networks with digital twin platforms
- cloud-based data infrastructures for cyber-physical systems
- data pipelines for monitoring and analysing building operation
- interaction between operational systems and digital simulation environments
- evaluation of intelligent software architectures for digital twins
Because the installation operates within a real building that is used daily by occupants, it provides valuable insights into how digital technologies behave in realistic operational settings.
From IoT infrastructure to intelligent digital systems
The IoT Building Cloud installation in OU33 represents an important step towards the development of intelligent digital infrastructures for the built environment and energy systems more broadly. By connecting sensors, cloud services, data platforms, and analytics tools, the platform creates the digital foundation required for advanced applications such as digital twins and AI-supported operational optimisation.
For the Digital Twin and Agentic AI Infrastructure Lab, the installation serves as a concrete case study demonstrating how experimental software infrastructures can be deployed in real environments to support research on next-generation digital energy systems.