Marianne Touchie

Biography

Marianne Touchie joined the University of Toronto as an Assistant Professor in July 2016 and is cross-appointed in the Departments of Civil Engineering and Mechanical & Industrial Engineering. She completed her BASc (2009) and PhD (2014) in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Toronto. Upon completion of her PhD, Dr. Touchie became the Building Research Manager at the Toronto Atmospheric Fund and was also a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto. Dr. Touchie’s research focuses on improving the energy performance and indoor environmental quality of existing buildings to make them more comfortable, healthy and sustainable through comprehensive retrofits. This work includes monitoring and characterizing building energy performance and environmental parameters such as temperature, mean radiant temperature, relative humidity, air velocity and leakage, lighting levels and contaminant concentrations to determine the influence of potential retrofit approaches, both active and passive. Much of her research has been in the multi-unit residential sector and particularly social housing buildings. Dr. Touchie is also the Academic Director and Chair of the Building Science Specialist of Ontario (BSSO) Committee for the Ontario Building Envelope Council (OBEC) and the Vice-Chair for the ASHRAE Technical Committee 2.1 Physiology and Human Environment. Marianne Touchie joined the University of Toronto as an Assistant Professor in July 2016 and is cross-appointed in the Departments of Civil Engineering and Mechanical & Industrial Engineering. She completed her BASc (2009) and PhD (2014) in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Toronto. Upon completion of her PhD, Dr. Touchie became the Building Research Manager at the Toronto Atmospheric Fund and was also a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto. Dr. Touchie’s research focuses on improving the energy performance and indoor environmental quality of existing buildings to make them more comfortable, healthy and sustainable through comprehensive retrofits. This work includes monitoring and characterizing building energy performance and environmental parameters such as temperature, mean radiant temperature, relative humidity, air velocity and leakage, lighting levels and contaminant concentrations to determine the influence of potential retrofit approaches, both active and passive. Much of her research has been in the multi-unit residential sector and particularly social housing buildings. Dr. Touchie is also the Academic Director and Chair of the Building Science Specialist of Ontario (BSSO) Committee for the Ontario Building Envelope Council (OBEC) and the Vice-Chair for the ASHRAE Technical Committee 2.1 Physiology and Human Environment.

Research Interest

Building science; building energy use; indoor environmental quality; thermal comfort; energy modeling; building environmental monitoring; building retrofits; occupant behavior; heat pump technology; low-energy buildings.