Ernst Jan de Place Hansen has a MSc (Civ.Eng.) and a PhD within building materials and building physics from DTU. Since 2000, he has been Senior Researcher at Dept. of the Built Environment (BUILD) (former Danish Building Research Institute (SBi)), Aalborg University, Campus Copenhagen. Before that, he has e.g. been Assistant Research Professor at DTU.

Ernst is an experienced project manager within projects for the National Agency with the responsibility for the Danish building regulations, at present Social- og Boligstyrelsen (SBST). Since 2007, he is editor at the SBi Guideline on building regulations and is responsible for ensuring that it is updated in relation to the present legislation. Further, Ernst manages projects related to the Greenlandic building regulations, as an important activity of BUILD being supplier of research-based consultancy for the Self Government of Greenland.

During 2015-2020, he was Project Manager at RIBuild, a 37 mio. DKK big project finanzed by EU (Horizon 2020) with 10 partners from seven European countries. It was about internal insulation of historic buildings. A major outcome was guidelines for building owners and consultants (www.ribuild.eu). During 2024-2027 he is involved in a follow-up EU-funded project FuturHist, with a broader approach to renovation of historic buildings (www.futurhist.eu)

Ernst has acted as project manager, held courses and publicized SBi-guidelines, reports and scientific papers within service life for materials and constructions, complete evaluation at renovation, internal insulation, insulation materials, moisture conditions in buildings, winter construction, building defects, roof apartments, and single-family houses.