Prateek joined NREL in January 2022 and works in the Residential Buildings Research Group in the Building Technologies and Science Center. Prateek’s areas of expertise include building ventilation, air infiltration, indoor air quality, blower door testing, asbestos monitoring, air quality and meteorological monitoring, building energy modeling, data analytics, multizonal airflow network modeling, heating ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC), and refrigeration systems characterization.

Prior to joining NREL, Prateek worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as a postdoctoral research associate, where he led several research efforts including a large-scale field study to investigate the impacts of home energy retrofits on potential asbestos contamination of houses containing vermiculite insulation, simulation of airborne SARS-CoV-2 aerosol dispersion within indoor environments, and development of multizonal airflow network model of an existing research building. For his Ph.D. dissertation work at University of Colorado Boulder, he led the engineering-related data collection and analysis for a large-scale U.S. Environmental Protection Agency-funded research correlating home weatherization, indoor air quality, and respiratory health in residential buildings.

Prateek is originally from Kathmandu, Nepal, and enjoys hiking, biking, cooking, playing musical instruments, and DIY IoT and robotics projects as his hobbies. 

Residential building energy systems

Mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and HVAC&R system energy optimization and decarbonization

Multizonal airflow network and building energy modeling

Renewable energy generation and systems integration

Sustainable and environmentally benign building materials

Air quality monitoring instrumentation and air filtration

Smart building systems