On the Influence of Users’ Actions on Thermal Performance of Buildings

The thermal exchanges between the buildings and its surroundings may be easily evaluated from balance equations. However, some parameters in the equations are prone to changesdue to decisions taken by the users at some time, and further decisions and even computations onthermal behaviour may be strongly affected by the users attitudes and actions. This can producewrong computation of energy consumption and savings, and then they have to be avoided. On theother hand, wrong actions of the users or misuses might produce uncomfortable conditions that aredifficult or expensive to handle.

Daymedia and mulcom

DayMedia and MulCom are multimedia teaching packages targeted at architects and building engineers, as well as students. While DayMedia is concerned with daylighting in architecture, MulCom covers human comfort and the energy performance of buildings. Most of the content is related to thermal comfort, although acoustics and visual comfort are covered as well. The development of the packages has part-funded by the European Commission and coordinated by the Low Energy Architecture Research Unit (LEARN) of the University of North London.

The serraglaze window - a revolution in daylighting

SERRAGLAZE is a breakthrough daylighting system designed to be incorporated into the primary glazing of normal sidelit rooms to save energy and enhance comfort.The paper describes the design, construction and optical properties of the plastic SERRAGLAZE panel, the key component of the system.

Assessment of energy saving in buildings by means of hybrid envelope systems

Active and passive solar strategies, together with measures of energy conservation and integration of new materials and technologies, can bring a meaningful energy saving in buildings. In particular, if combined with energy saving measures, the use of solar source can strongly reduce the demand of traditional energy sources. However, the use of such technologies is not sufficient if comfort demands of people who live or will live in the building are neglected and if the proposed technologies are not studied for their real suitability.

Ventilation efficiencies and thermal comfort results of a desk-edge mounted task ventilation system

In experimental chambers, the ventilation effectiveness and thermal comfort of a task ventilation system has been investigated. The method and results of the experiment are presented in this paper. The conclusion of that thermal comfort survey is that task ventilation systems maintain the occupants thermally comfortable while saving energy.

The performance and subjective responses of call-center operators with new and used supply air filters at two outdoor air supply rates

For that study an experiment was conducted during 2 months, in a call center : each week 26 operators returned questionnaires recording their environmental perceptions and sick building syndrome symptoms. In parallel, the recording of their average talk-time was monitored every 30 minutes.The results of that study confirm that increasing outdoor air supply rates and replacing used filters with new ones has a positive effect on health, comfort and productivity of workers.

A global approach of indoor environment in an air-conditioned office room

In this paper the authors in order to reach the objective of a global approach of comfort by a spatial statistical study of the various discomforts, apply a multi-criteria analysis based on ELECTRE II method adapted to the comfort of air-conditioned indoor environment.

Operable windows, personal control and occupant comfort

Past research (ASHRAE RP-884) demonstrated that occupants of naturally ventilated buildings are comfortable in a wider range of temperatures than occupants of buildings with centrally controlled HVAC systems. However, the exact influence of personal control in explaining these differences could only be hypothesized because of the limits of the existing field study data that formed the basis of that research. The objective of ASHRAE RP-1161 was to quantitatively investigate how

Evidence of inadequate ventilation in portable classrooms : results of a pilot study in Los Angeles County

This paper deals with a pilot study in portable classrooms where neither adequate ventilation nor associated conditioning of indoor air for occupant comfort were provided. Concentrations of pollutants should be mitigated with an appropriate ventilation and should lead to a reduction of symptoms of "sick building syndrome"

Air and well being - a way to more profitability

Until recently, the air quality did not play a major role in the planning of buildings. Air qualitywas simply understood to be synonymous with pollution-free and safe air. This approach,however, omitted consideration of how to achieve the well-being of the occupants. Asresearch has shown, elimination of pollutants is far from being sufficient and does notsignificantly reduce the dissatisfaction rate of building occupants. More recently, research hasaddressed the occupants perception of indoor air with the goal of increasing their satisfactionrate.

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