thermal comfort

Productivity of workers is greatly affected by their comfort in the workplace. Research has shown that thermal comfort is one of the most influential parameters on worker productivity, and that the running costs of a Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) system could be up to ten times lower compared to productivity losses that would be incurred in a free-runing building.

It is evident from the existing research that poor thermal comfort can adversely affect the health and productivity of the occupants. The analysis of thermal comfort is even more significant in the health care environments where the occupants are potentially more vulnerable due to poor individual health (patients) and/or extended exposure to such conditions (staff). This study focuses on the evaluation of thermal comfort in hospitals’ recovery rooms considering both health care staff and patients.

Climate control of cabin aircraft is traditionally conditioned as a single unit by the environmental control system. Cabin temperature is controlled by the crew while passengers of the aircrafts have the control on the gaspers providing fresh air from the above head area. The small nozzles are difficult to reach and adjust to meet the passenger’s needs in terms of flow and direction. A more dedicated control over the near environment of each passenger can be beneficial in many situations.

Indoor environment quality has been researched extensively, with many countries adopting regulations to ensure that building occupants enjoy healthy working environments. In many small island developing states (SIDS), such as Mauritius, the population benefits from perfect weather conditions, but building design considerations often under-estimate the effects of outdoor weather conditions, heat and pollutant emission, illumination and noise, which worsen indoor environment.

Recently, understanding thermal comfort management enabled the scientific community to broaden its research towards smart device set-ups, in order to further reduce energy consumption and thermal comfort satisfaction. Thus, the need to minimize user interaction and implement prediction functions has arisen. In this work, the development of a smart thermostat is presented. The procedure is divided into three basic stages: calibration, development of energy saving and thermal comfort routines, and comparison with a conventional thermostat’s operation.

Maintaining thermal comfort in buildings has become a big challenge in developing countries. Cool roof or high reflective/emissive roof reduces absorbed building solar energy, roof surface temperature to reduce energy consumption and maintain thermal comfort. However, the impact on buildings thermal performance located in hot-dry climate and dusty conditions is not well-known.

This study aims to use the WELL Building Standard (v2), an internationally recognised rating system for health & wellbeing in buildings, to perform a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the effect of wellbeing measures on an office building’s energy use in three different climates. The qualitative analysis was based on literature review and engineering rules of thumb to assess the potential energy impact of WELL’s 120 features.

The materials that compose the built environment have a key role in the resulting energy demand since their thermal properties affect the heat transfer processes. The use of cool materials aims at increasing the albedo of the urban surfaces and decreasing the heat absorbed by them. Cool materials can decrease roof temperatures, reduce energy needs for cooling and improve indoor comfort for spaces that are not air conditioned.

Due to age-related physiological changes, older people are more vulnerable than young people to heat or cold conditions. Predicting older people's thermal sensations is essential for controlling the built environment and avoiding extreme heat/cold injuries. Previous studies mainly focused on predicting the thermal sensation of young people, and the data-driven methods are often not constrained by physiological responses. This study proposes a new integrated model to combine the two-node physiological model and the data-driven method random forest classifier.

Infiltration of unconditioned air through access openings and entrance doors with high recurrence can cause detrimental impacts to the energy performance, air quality and thermal comfort of buildings. Air curtains are of strategic importance to attenuate these negative impacts. In addition, air curtains are relevant in specialized HVAC applications for which the impediment of infiltration is also essential (e.g., reduction of smoke propagation in fire events, decrease of contamination hazard in clean rooms, preservation of refrigeration properties in cold rooms).