Evaluation of the Impact of Window Shading on the Anti-Insulation Phenomenon in Building Energy Use

MRS Advances ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (34-35) ◽  
pp. 2063-2073
Author(s):  
R. K. Rabasoma ◽  
D. D. Serame ◽  
O.T. Masoso
Keyword(s):  
Solar Radiation ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Common Knowledge ◽  
Building Design ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Climatic Regions ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The World ◽  
Building Design Decisions ◽  
The Impact

ABSTRACTBefore 2008, it was common knowledge around the world that insulation always saved air conditioning energy in buildings. In 2008 a phenomenon called anti-insulation was brought to light by Masoso & Grobler. They demonstrated that there are instances when insulation materials in a building directly increase building energy use. Researchers around the world then echoed the message. Recent work by some of the authors investigated the anti-insulation phenomenon in summer and winter for both hot climatic regions (Botswana) and cold climatic regions (Canada). Their study concluded that there is still a mystery of exaggerated sources of heat inside the building aggravating the anti-insulation phenomenon. They hypothesized that incident solar radiation through the windows could be one of the causes. This paper therefore focuses on eliminating direct solar radiation through windows by applying external shadings on a previously anti-insulation building. The energy saved is evaluated and the possible reversal of anti-insulation studied. The study is useful to energy policy makers and the building industry as it showcases the existence of a possible silent killer (anti-insulation) and demonstrates that investing large sums of money on insulation in buildings may not be the most economic thing to do in building design decisions.

scholarly journals Evaluation of Urban-Scale Building Energy-Use Models and Tools—Application for the City of Fribourg, Switzerland

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 1595
Author(s):  
Valeria Todeschi ◽  
Roberto Boghetti ◽  
Jérôme H. Kämpf ◽  
Guglielmina Mutani
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Residential Buildings ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Energy Performance ◽  
Space Heating ◽  
Engineering Model ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The City

Building energy-use models and tools can simulate and represent the distribution of energy consumption of buildings located in an urban area. The aim of these models is to simulate the energy performance of buildings at multiple temporal and spatial scales, taking into account both the building shape and the surrounding urban context. This paper investigates existing models by simulating the hourly space heating consumption of residential buildings in an urban environment. Existing bottom-up urban-energy models were applied to the city of Fribourg in order to evaluate the accuracy and flexibility of energy simulations. Two common energy-use models—a machine learning model and a GIS-based engineering model—were compared and evaluated against anonymized monitoring data. The study shows that the simulations were quite precise with an annual mean absolute percentage error of 12.8 and 19.3% for the machine learning and the GIS-based engineering model, respectively, on residential buildings built in different periods of construction. Moreover, a sensitivity analysis using the Morris method was carried out on the GIS-based engineering model in order to assess the impact of input variables on space heating consumption and to identify possible optimization opportunities of the existing model.

Cost Optimization of Net-Zero Energy House

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
George A. Mertz ◽  
Gregory S. Raffio ◽  
Kelly Kissock
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Cost Optimization ◽  
Building Design ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Zero Energy ◽  
Resource Limitations ◽  
Net Zero Energy ◽  
Net Zero ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The Cost

Environmental and resource limitations provide increased motivation for design of net-zero energy or net-zero CO2 buildings. The optimum building design will have the lowest lifecycle cost. This paper describes a method of performing and comparing lifecycle costs for standard, CO2-neutral and net-zero energy buildings. Costs of source energy are calculated based on the cost of photovoltaic systems, tradable renewable certificates, CO2 credits and conventional energy. Building energy simulation is used to determine building energy use. A case study is conducted on a proposed net-zero energy house. The paper identifies the least-cost net-zero energy house, the least-cost CO2 neutral house, and the overall least-cost house. The methodology can be generalized to different climates and buildings. The method and results may be of interest to builders, developers, city planners, or organizations managing multiple buildings.

scholarly journals The Impact of Trees on Building Energy Use

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulrike Passe ◽  
Jan Thompson ◽  
Baskar Ganapathysubramanian ◽  
Boshun Gao ◽  
Breanna Marmur ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The Impact

scholarly journals Outdoor Thermal Comfort and Building Energy Use Potential in Different Land-Use Areas in Tropical Cities: Case of Kuala Lumpur

Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 652
Author(s):  
Yasemin D. Aktas ◽  
Kai Wang ◽  
Yu Zhou ◽  
Murnira Othman ◽  
Jenny Stocker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Thermal Comfort ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Outdoor Thermal Comfort ◽  
Kuala Lumpur ◽  
Air Temperatures ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
Urban Heat ◽  
The Impact

High air temperature and high humidity, combined with low wind speeds, are common trends in the tropical urban climates, which collectively govern heat-induced health risks and outdoor thermal comfort under the given hygrothermal conditions. The impact of different urban land-uses on air temperatures is well-documented by many studies focusing on the urban heat island phenomenon; however, an integrated study of air temperature and humidity, i.e., the human-perceived temperatures, in different land-use areas is essential to understand the impact of hot and humid tropical urban climates on the thermal comfort of urban dwellers for an appraisal of potential health risks and the associated building energy use potential. In this study, we show through near-surface monitoring how these factors vary in distinct land-use areas of Kuala Lumpur city, characterized by different morphological features (high-rise vs. low-rise; compact vs. open), level of anthropogenic heating and evapotranspiration (built-up vs. green areas), and building materials (concrete buildings vs. traditional Malay homes in timber) based on the calculated heat index (HI), apparent temperature (TApp) and equivalent temperature (TE) values in wet and dry seasons. The results show that the felt-like temperatures are almost always higher than the air temperatures in all land-use areas, and this difference is highest in daytime temperatures in green areas during the dry season, by up to about 8 °C (HI)/5 °C (TApp). The TE values are also up to 9% higher in these areas than in built-up areas. We conclude that tackling urban heat island without compromising thermal comfort levels, hence encouraging energy use reduction in buildings to cope with outdoor conditions requires a careful management of humidity levels, as well as a careful selection of building morphology and materials.

scholarly journals Impact Assessment in the Process of Propagating Climate Change Uncertainties into Building Energy Use

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 367
Author(s):  
Hamed Yassaghi ◽  
Simi Hoque
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Regression Model ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Uncertainty Propagation ◽  
Principal Component Regression ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Weather Variables ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The Impact

Buildings are subject to significant stresses due to climate change and design strategies for climate resilient buildings are rife with uncertainties which could make interpreting energy use distributions difficult and questionable. This study intends to enhance a robust and credible estimate of the uncertainties and interpretations of building energy performance under climate change. A four-step climate uncertainty propagation approach which propagates downscaled future weather file uncertainties into building energy use is examined. The four-step approach integrates dynamic building simulation, fitting a distribution to average annual weather variables, regression model (between average annual weather variables and energy use) and random sampling. The impact of fitting different distributions to the weather variable (such as Normal, Beta, Weibull, etc.) and regression models (Multiple Linear and Principal Component Regression) of the uncertainty propagation method on cooling and heating energy use distribution for a sample reference office building is evaluated. Results show selecting a full principal component regression model following a best-fit distribution for each principal component of the weather variables can reduce the variation of the output energy distribution compared to simulated data. The results offer a way of understanding compound building energy use distributions and parsing the uncertain nature of climate projections.

scholarly journals The impact of local variations in a temperate maritime climate on building energy use

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ralph Evins ◽  
Ross Alexandra ◽  
Ed Wiebe ◽  
Michael Wood ◽  
Matthew Eames
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Maritime Climate ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
The Impact

scholarly journals Influence of User-Related Parameters on Calculated Energy Use in Low-Energy School Buildings

Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 2985 ◽  
Author(s):  
Branko Simanic ◽  
Birgitta Nordquist ◽  
Hans Bagge ◽  
Dennis Johansson
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Ventilation System ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Energy Performance ◽  
Hot Water ◽  
Low Energy ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
Low Energy Buildings ◽  
Demand Controlled Ventilation ◽  
The Impact

Literature and experience show that there are large discrepancies between the calculated and measured building energy usages, where user-related parameters are significant factors with regard to energy use in low-energy buildings. Furthermore, the difficulties encountered when quantifying these parameters compound these discrepancies. The main aim of this study was to provide feedback that would help the building industry and research communities to predict more accurately the impact of the user-related parameters on energy performance. The results of the study would, subsequently, contribute to minimizing the discrepancies between calculated and measured energy use. This article analyses simulated building energy use based on randomly chosen combinations of measured user-related parameters in three recently built low-energy schools in Sweden. The results show that energy performance can span from 30 to 160 kWh/(m² y) simply by varying the combination of previously measured user-related parameters in building energy simulations. The study shows that the set points for indoor air temperatures during the heating season and the energy required to run a demand-controlled ventilation system have an extensive influence, while tenant electricity use has a slightly lower influence on building energy use. Variations in occupancy rates and energy for hot water usage have the smallest influences on building energy use.

The impact of mandatory energy audits on building energy use

Nature Energy ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 309-316
Author(s):  
Constantine E. Kontokosta ◽  
Danielle Spiegel-Feld ◽  
Sokratis Papadopoulos
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Building Energy Use ◽  
Energy Audits ◽  
The Impact

scholarly journals Investigating the Impact of Actual and Modeled Occupant Behavior Information Input to Building Performance Simulation

Buildings ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 32
Author(s):  
Mengda Jia ◽  
Ravi Srinivasan ◽  
Robert J. Ries ◽  
Gnana Bharathy ◽  
Nathan Weyer
Keyword(s):  
Energy Use ◽  
Building Design ◽  
System Optimization ◽  
Building Energy ◽  
Building Performance ◽  
Occupant Behavior ◽  
Commercial Building ◽  
Multiple Perspectives ◽  
Human In The Loop ◽  
The Impact

Occupant behaviors are one of the most dominant factors that influence building energy use. Understanding the influences from building occupants can promote the development of energy–efficient buildings. This paper quantifies the impact of different occupant behavior information on building energy model (BEM) from multiple perspectives. For this purpose, an occupant behavior model that uses agent–based modeling (ABM) approach is implemented via co-simulation with a BEM of an existing commercial building. Then, actual occupant behavior data in correspondence to ABM output, including operations on window, door, and blinds in selected thermal zones of the building are recorded using survey logs. A simulation experiment is conducted by creating three BEMs with constant, actual, and modeled occupant behavioral inputs. The analysis of the simulation results among these scenarios helps us gain an in–depth understanding of how occupant behaviors influence building performance. This study aims to facilitate robust building design and operation with human–in–the–loop system optimization.

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