Towards whole building moisture modelling of the impacts of short duration moisture release

Considerable progress has been made in the field of building simulation for combined heat, air and mass transfer processes occurring in the indoor environment, yet concerns persist over the reliability and suitability of moisture property data integrated into available tools and the approaches taken in modelling physical phenomena. Particular interest lies in predicting the impact of indoor moisture production schemes and sources observed in housing, linked to occupant activity. To this end, the work included in this paper includes studies to verify and develop the capabilities of the building simulation tool ESP-r in modelling indoor environmental conditions resulting from occupant-related moisture production. The activities include modelling a realistic scenario taken from IEA Annex 41, a laboratory based experiment focused on short-duration, high moisture loading pulses and the development of a moisture release model associated with the passive drying of clothes.