Hori: Although the specific effects (numerical values) won't be available until the demonstration is performed, a sufficient number of simulations have been conducted to conclude that the system will be effective. General data suggest that 20 million pollen grains enter indoor spaces every day, and ventilation is the cause of roughly 60% of these. Our current development goal is to reduce pollen due to ventilation as nearly as possible to zero.
Incidentally, the remaining 40% is brought inside by adhering to laundry and clothing. Air conditioners alone cannot solve this, and so we plan to talk with the residents of Toyota Woven City about their lifestyles, such as how they hang up their laundry and when they go out, to work out reasonable countermeasures.
Personalized Functional Spaces: Spaces That Combine Comfort and Functionality
――What is a personalized functional space?
Nakagawa: People experience various states of mind, such as relaxation, concentration, and restful sleep. Personalized functional spaces are personal spaces created to achieve those states by combining air and other elements.
First, let me say that air is the specialty of our company. Air elements, such as temperature and humidity, airflow, and cleanliness, are all incorporated to create air environments suitable for daily living. For example, in the past, we collaborated with another company at "point 0 marunouchi," a co-working space in Marunouchi, Tokyo, to develop airflow control technology that could reproduce the comfortable, natural wind of Karuizawa.
Likewise, in the Toyota Woven City demonstration, images, sounds, scents, and lighting unite with air elements to create the optimal space. For example, when wanting to relax, images and sounds evoking the highlands of Karuizawa and Oze are combined with the scent of lavender, which is famous for having a relaxing effect.
Obviously, individual differences are accounted for, but there are also some parameters that are common to all. Through the demonstration, we would like to build a system that properly understands what is commonly shared while allowing for adjustments to suit each individual.
――How do you plan to evaluate effectiveness?
Nakagawa: Because feelings of relaxation and concentration fluctuate widely from person to person, it's extremely difficult to evaluate from a single numerical value. This is why we plan to evaluate the experience from various aspects, which include conducting questionnaires and measuring the time needed to complete tasks both inside and outside the multisensory functional space.
In contrast, data has been collected in-house on the effect of air elements. Using this data, we would like to clarify the value of air by evaluating the significant differences between air by itself and air when combined with other elements.
Real-Life Feedback from Toyota Woven City
――Why are the demonstrations at Toyota Woven City significant?
Hori: The ability to obtain data over a long period of time in Toyota Woven City, an environment where people actually live, is a huge advantage. While hay fever is obviously seasonal, the severity of symptoms can also vary depending on other factors such as Asian Dust and PM2.5, making the ability to continuously monitor such conditions (collect data) extremely beneficial. In light of the difficulty of analyzing some areas because of the daunting amount of data, we hope to incorporate data into a mathematical model with the help of Woven by Toyota, Inc. (WbyT) and the participation of members from Daikin Information and Communications Technology College (DICT).
――What role do you expect the Toyota Woven City residents to play?
Wang: Because Toyota Woven City attracts residents with an Inventor's mentality, a variety of feedback and astute suggestions can be expected from these residents based on the premise that this is a demonstration project. By integrating their insights into product development, I think that we will be able to quickly build a dependable business.
Nakagawa: The Toyota Woven City environment is also extremely important in conducting trials on personalized functional spaces. There are many different desirable effects, such as relaxation, concentration, and good sleep, and the combination of elements that can achieve them varies depending on the target. By having not only engineers but also family members from all walks of life, we can expect honest feedback from a variety of perspectives.
――What is significant about a "digital twin" at Toyota Woven City?
Hori: Toyota Woven City is understood to be a place where demonstrations in the real world are closely linked to the digital world. Not only can you see phenomena occurring on-site with your own eyes, but you can also immediately see how those same phenomena are reflected in the data, which leads to a variety of benefits that include accelerating the kaizen cycle and improving the accuracy of simulations.
With cedar pollen, the two-month window during which it disperses is crucial. By speeding up the cycle from analysis to implementation and increasing the number of attempts during this time, development time can be reduced by years. Also, it appears that a digital Toyota Woven City already exists (※1), so when you merge this with information from the sensors that are being planned for installation in various locations, we expect to easily simulate with high accuracy how pollen enters.
Moving towards Social Implementation
――What potential do you see for collaborative creation?
Hori: Currently, we are not considering co-creation in the development of pollen-less spaces. However, to further promote the solutions that we are proposing to the world, I see co-creation with industries that are closely involved in human living environments, such as home builders (detached houses) and developers (apartments), as a necessary step in the future.
Nakagawa: When it comes to personalized functional spaces, I believe that collaboration with other companies will be necessary to create elements other than air, and I'm confident that we won't disappoint people with what we accomplish in the future.
――To that point, what are your thoughts on the future and the potential for expansion, including overseas?
Hori: To further contribute to our business, we are already moving forward towards pollen-less spaces and have developed a social implementation plan. In the future, we will not only target Japan, where hay fever is common, but we'll also be considering overseas expansion. When that happens, it may not only be pollen-less but some other feature as well with the "-less" suffix.
Air conditioning cultures vary in every country, and when it comes to air environments, it is necessary, now more than ever, to coordinate with the construction side and implement in a manner that is tailor-made to each region through both internal and external collaboration. As a control tower for technology development, we at TIC want to establish standards for pollen-less spaces that are easy to introduce to detached houses and apartments, both in Japan and overseas, and expand from selling standalone equipment to selling systems and proposing air environments.
Wang: Common countermeasures for hay fever include medicine, masks, and glasses, but through this demonstration, I hope to impress upon people that air conditioning systems are also important. Nevertheless, even if the demonstration gets good results, ventilation systems are only thought about when constructing a building, making it difficult to quickly provide them to many people.
First, we will implement pollen-less spaces targeting customers who are highly receptive to the effectiveness of air conditioning systems, and as we gain public recognition, I think that we will be able to leverage our success to develop new pollen-less spaces that many other customers can easily install in their homes.
Nakagawa: Our intention is for social implementation of personalized functional spaces by 2030. We hope to expand the value of not only buildings, such as homes and offices, but also to a variety of other types of spaces.
Toyota Woven City itself is a project that has attracted a great deal of attention from overseas, and we hope that our solutions, which are part of this project, will also attract attention.
