This special issue on Breakthrough of natural and hybrid ventilative cooling technologies: models and simulations, together with the connected issue Breakthrough of natural and hybrid ventilative cooling technologies: strategies, applications and case studies (vol. 16, issue 1), focuses on methods, tools and technologies for reaching the above-mentioned goal through the use of ventilative cooling, i.e. cooling by controlled natural ventilation (CNV). This strategy is one of the most cost-effective alternatives to air-conditioning systems.

This study analyses the climate-dependent passive ventilative cooling (PVC) potential in central and southern Europe. This analysis was carried out in two phases: (1) evaluation of PVC potential as a climate-dependent variable, in different locations representative of European climate zones for both wind-drive airflow (comfort ventilation) and temperature gradient (environmental and structural cooling); (2) verification of the above PVC potential through dynamic energy simulations on a reference-building model located in selected cities.

The present study aims at assessing the geo-climatic potential applicability of controlled natural ventilation (CNV) as a natural ventilative cooling (NVC) technique in the Mediterranean area. This assessment was carried following two approaches: (1) a climate-dependent evaluation of the NVC potential of different locations considering a “virtual space”; (2) a calculation of the NVC potential of different locations considering a “real” building through dynamic energy simulations.

Different simplified simulation models of a Passive Downdraught Evaporative Cooling tower (PDEC) were compared by using experimental data. Among these, a series of tests on a Passive Downdraught Evaporative Cooling tower (PDEC) were carried out at the SyTIn (Systems for Technology Innovation) Laboratory of the Department of Architecture and Design, Politecnico di Torino. In addition, other monitored databases were taken from literature and used as input data for the simplified models.

The paper aims to evaluate the geo-climatic applicability of two different passive cooling strategies: the passive evaporative cooling (PEC) and the natural ventilative cooling (NVC) in China. The two cooling techniques are analysed following a climate-related approach considering a ‘virtual Space’. NVC potential is assessed by analysing the typical meteorological year related to a set of 105 locations representing different typical Chinese climate conditions. A parametric approach is used in order to virtualise the geo-climatic potential of this cooling technique.

This paper presents a parametric study on the effect of different TMY (Typical Meteorological Year) datasets on the results of energy dynamic simulation. The analysis was carried out running the software Design Builder with EnergyPlus code on a sample residential building located in three Italian cities and using two different TMY data sets: EnergyPlus and CTI (Italian Thermo- Technical Committee).

We present a study of natural ventilation design during the early (conceptual) stage of a building's design, based on a field study in a naturally ventilated office in California where we collected data on occupants' window use, local weather conditions, indoor environmental conditions, and air change rates based on tracer-gas decay. We performed uncertainty and sensitivity analyses to determine which design parameters have most impact on the uncertainty associated with ventilation performance predictions.

Because of the customers’ need of best possible comfort condition and satisfaction, shopping centers are conditioned by means of basic HVAC systems, often without considering the potential of natural ventilation to reduce energy consumption related to cooling and ventilation. Within the European project CommONEnergy, EURAC researchers are dealing with ventilative cooling strategies as retrofit solutions for shopping centers.

Natural ventilation is widely applied to new building design as it is an effective passive measure to reach the Net Zero Energy target. However, the lack of modelling guidelines and integrated design procedures that include technology solutions using passive design strategies to exploit climate potential, frustrate building designers who prefer to rely on mechanical systems.

The aim of our study was to determine the effect of a cooling jet on performance and comfort in warm office environment. We compared cognitive performance, subjective workload, cognitive fatigue, thermal comfort, symptoms, perceived working conditions and perception of airflow in warm temperature (29.5 °C) in two conditions: with and without the jet. Twenty-nine students participated in the experiment in which a repeated measures design was employed. The jet improved the speed of response in a working memory task with increasing exposure time but did not affect other performance measures.