Epidemiological evidence suggests that mould infestation in buildings can have serious health implications for the occupants. On the basis of an analysis of published data, growth limit curves for six generic mould categories have been generated in terms of the minimum combination of temperature and relative humidity required to sustain growth on indoor building surfaces. These limits have been incorporated within the ESP-r system for use in conjunction within combined heat and moisture flow simulations.
Life-cycle design of air conditioning systems requires that plant should be capable of maintaining zone comfort conditions within specified limits, while minimising capital and operating costs. Lack of suitable design tools often prevents these objectives being met in conventional design practice. ZEBRA is a software package designed to simulate the performance of air conditioning plant across the whole range of operation. The structure of the package, which uses object-oriented methodologies, is described, as is its relationship to existing plant modelling codes.
Many building simulation computer programs, originally developed on mainframe computers for research purposes, can now run on the powerful workstation and personal computers that are available to most architectural and engineering firms. Major efforts have been underway during the last decade to compile these programs on personal computers and make them available to a wider range of building professionals. However, even with the addition of user-friendly front- and back-ends, their use is still limited to a small number of specialized consultants.
This paper describes the use of daylight coefficients in a computer tool which is based in Monte Carlo backward ray tracing merthod and was developed under the frame of DAYLIGHT- Europe EC Project. Following the daylight coefficients approach the intereflection calculation is carried out once for each zone and it doesn’t have to be repeated if the sky luminance distribution changes.
In this paper, a new method of direct run - time coupling between building energy simulation and global illuminance simulation is outlined and discussed. Direct coupling at the time step level between ESP-r and RADIANCE provides building energy simulation with access to an internal illuminance calculation engine, thus enabling modelling of the complex interactions between artificial lighting control and the rest of the building energy domain in a fully integrated way.
A controller for heating systems is normally equipped with many facilities to make it flexible and the heating system more cost-efficient. This results in a number of input parameters to be given by the user. It is not obvious how to choose appropriate values for these parameters unless the user has a large experience in this field. The aim of this paper is to reduce the number of parameters, with thermal comfort and energy consumption intact. This paper will show the benefits with a feedback from the room temperature.
A simulation software focused on HVAC energy consumption in large supermarkets, called Clim Top, has been recently developed in France. The first originality of this tool is to have a friendly interface, especially designed for supermarkets, which makes it really available for various users involved in energy savings in supermarkets (architects, maintenance managers, technical store managers, energy consulting engineers, ...), as well in terms of HVAC design as in terms of energy audit.
A case study is used to introduce a two-step thermal demand calculation for buildings in order to take thermal bridges into consideration. In the first step the outer envelope of a typical apartment is 3- dimensionally modelled and a 3D thermal- coupling coefficient is calculated. In the second step the thermal demands of the whole building is calculated using three variations of the outer envelope design. Each variation is calculated in ID and 3D.
The lighting simulation programme Radiance is used to predict daylight factors and the illuminance distribution in a room which is 12m x 12m x 3.6m high, with grey tinted solar control glazing. These predictions are compared with measurements taken simultaneously in the real room and in a physical model placed outside. Radiance is also used to predict the lighting conditions under a CIE overcast sky distribution.
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