English

The term of “Active House” recently developed, addressing houses that target a balanced optimization of indoor environmental quality, energy performance and environmental performance. According to the idea of not only being energy efficient and eco-friendly, Active Houses equally focus on indoor environmental qualities, in particular daylight and air. With their tendency towards intensive sun penetration, natural ventilative systems and generally intensive connections to the exterior, Active Houses challenge the balance of technical and individual indoor climate control.

The article presents the results of our research, which was realized under a cooperation project between the University of Pécs, Hungary and the University of Osijek, Croatia. The aim was to gather 50 Pa ACH, air tightness and spontaneous ACH information of residential houses by the Croatian and Hungarian border. The budget of the project allowed approximately 50 tests for each university; these summarized results are presented together with correlations found between the results.  

A project at the Energie- und Umweltzentrum (e.u.[z].) Springe looked into strategies how insulation and sealing components can be installed in existing constructions to improve the best airtightness.

This study investigates the influence of outlet location on conventional, turbulent-mixing operating-room (OR) ventilation performance. This was done by numerical simulation using computational fluid dynamics. Multiple configurations of OR outlets, both at floor and ceiling level, were examined, and the results were compared. OR ventilation-system performance in each case was examined by conducting a tracer-recovery test. Two common anesthetic gases, halothane (C2HBrClF3) and desflurane (C3H2F6O), were used to perform the test.

The paper investigates the possibility for using a traditional ventilation system with ceiling mounted diffusers to provide heating under winter time conditions in relatively cold climates – in buildings with low transmition losses such as “passive houses”. The analysis is done through a number of CFD simulations of a simplified office. It is shown that even small over-temperatures reduce the Air Change Efficiency substantially. On the other hand even very small internal heat sources increase the efficiency.

Detached residential wooden houses are a common type of housing in Japan. Decay of wooden components within the walls is easily caused by condensation or defective flushing. To solve this problem, a double-skin system with a room-side air gap was developed. In this system, during winter, the airflow in the ventilated wall circulates freely around the whole house. Therefore, during daytime, the airflow moves solar heat to base, and releases heat to the house at night which can increase indoor temperature.

To ensure adequate indoor air quality, ventilation is necessary in new constructions as well as in modernized existing buildings. In order to minimize energy losses, ventilation systems with integrated heat recovery should be used. Particularly in building refurbishment, ventilation systems need to be designed as compact as possible, to allow a subsequent integration in the existing building stock. Ventilation systems in which one component is responsible for ventilation and simultaneously for heat recovery are well suited for this application area.

This research investigates the significance of the moisture buffering and latent heat capacities in exposed cross-laminated timber (CLT) walls with the respect to indoor climate and energy consumption. Hygroscopic materials have the ability to accumulate and release moisture due to change in the surrounding humidity. The moisture buffer capacity is regarded as this ability to moderate, or buffer, the indoor humidity variations. Latent heat refers to the heat of sorption due to the phase change from vapour to bound water in the material and the other way around.

Building integrated renewable energy sources e.g. photovoltaic system is one of the promised solution for improving energy efficiency in building. However such kind of the system is restrained by irregular power supplied and necessity to convert current from direct to altering form. Therefore, very often the electrical energy generated by photovoltaic system cannot be effectively utilised to supply building devices, e.g. components of HVAC or lighting system.

The paper presents optimization model of the chilled water based data center cooling system. The optimization procedure includes system technological and mathematical model, limiting conditions and optimization criterion, which in this case is annual power consumption minimum. The cooling system model is defined by constant parameters and decision variables and consists of aircooled chiller, independent external freecooling heat exchanger (drycooler), computer room air handling unit (CRAH) and constant flow chilled water system with circulation pump.