An integrated building concept is a prerequisiteto come to an energy efficient building with agood and healthy IAQ indoor comfort. A designprocess that defines the targets and boundaryconditions in the very first stage of the design and guarantees them until the building is finished and used is needed. The hard questionis however: how to make the right choice of thecombination of individual measures frombuilding components and building sewiceselements.

A wide experimental campaign on transparent advancedintegrated fa~ades with a mechanically, naturally andhybrid ventilated air gap has been carried out both at theDepartment of Energetics at Politecnico di Torino and atLaboratorio Nacional de Engenharia Civil (LNEC) inLisbon.

Building performance can be expressed bydifferent indicators as primary energy use,environmental load andlor the indoorenvironmental quality and a building performancesimulation can provide the decision maker with aquantitative measure of the extent to which anintegrated design solution satisfies the designrequirements and objectives.In the design of sustainable Buildings it isbeneficial to identify the most important designparameters in order to develop more efficientlyalternative design solutions or reach optimizeddesign solutions.A sensitivity analysis makes it possible to identifythe mo

International building legislation is setting stronger and stronger requirements for the energy performance of buildings. The most recent example is the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive in the European Union. The improved energy performance of buildings can't be achieved by additional insulation or more effective building systems only. A major influence factor on the energy quality is the ventilation technology and also the airtightness of the building.

This study explores the plausible mechanismlinking outdoor air supply rates and workperformance through the perceptual responsesand a target salivary biomarker. An extendedobjective is this study is to perform comparativestudy between the healthy and the asthmaticgroups of subjects. A total of 160 young adultsparticipated as voluntary subjects in two phases.The study was conducted in the FieldEnvironmental Chamber which simulates anoffice setting. Subjects rated the air quality at18.0L/s/p to be most acceptable, followed by9.0L/s/p and the least acceptable at 4.5L/s/p(P

Social, financial, energy and technical data from about 1 1 10 households have been collected during 2004 in the major Athens area. The sample has been divided in seven inconie groups and a detailed analysis has been performed. Iniportant conclusions have been drawn regarding the quality of households, the operational conditions and the energy spent per income group. Low income people are more likely to be living in old buildings with poor envelope conditions. The cost per person and unit area is much higher for the low income group for both heating and electricity.

The construction of high-rise buildings beganseveral decades ago in North America, and nowhigh-rise buildings are common in East Asiaand the Middle East. A high rise buildingusually entails various problems in areas suchas energy consumption, IAQ, and stack effect,due to the great height of the building, most ofwhich are related to the airflow and pressure inand around the building. In particular, the stackeffect, which is driven by buoyancy forcesthrough the vertical shaft of the core, is themost critical in severe winter climates.

Building airtightness is an important parameter that canbe measured according to the International Standard IS09972 "Therm~~l performance of buildings -Determination of air permeability of buildings - Fanpressurization method".Since 2006, there is a second edition of the standardthat cancels and replaces the first edition (IS0 9972:1996).A modified version of IS0 9972: 1996 has been publishedby the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) asEuropean standard (EN 13829:2000).The standard provides good guidance for themeasurement of building airtightness but some aspectsshould be clarifie

The Energy Performance of Buildings Directivementions that each member states' energyperformance (EP) calculation methodology mayinclude envelope airtightness. In fact, manymember states have included envelopeairtightness in their EP calculation method.Many countries have also specific requirementsfor ductwork airtightness. However, they seemto be unequally successful in achieving a markettransformation. This paper describes themechanisms that have been used in somecountries, with a special focus on success storieswhich could inspire other member states.

Recently, dampness in buildings has beenindicated to be associated with occupants' healthdamages such as allergies. In particular mold inindoor air is considered to be a significant riskfactor of health. The indoor concentration ofmolds becomes higher with mold growth on thesurfaces of wall, floor, ceiling and so on.However, mold growth in the concealed spaces:inner wall spaces, beam spaces and crawlspaces, can not be ignored as one of theemission sources.