Low-Resolution Overhead Thermal Tripwire for Occupancy Estimation

Smart buildings use occupancy sensing for various tasks ranging from energy-efficient HVAC and lighting to space-utilization analysis and emergency response. We propose a people counting system which uses a low-resolution thermal sensor. Unlike previous thermal sensor based people counting systems, we use an overhead tripwire configuration at entryways to detect and track transient entries or exits. We develop two people counting algorithms for this system con-figuration. To evaluate our algorithms, we have collectedand labeled a low-resolution thermal video dataset with the proposed system configuration. The dataset, largest of its kind, will be published alongside the paper, should it be accepted. We also propose new evaluation metrics that are more suitable for systems that are subject to drift and jitter.