scholarly journals Evaluating the use of straw bales in achieving passive house certification (PHIUS+ 2015) in western Canada

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ashley Lubyk
Keyword(s):  
Carbon Footprint ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Climate Impact ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Embodied Energy ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Passive House ◽  
House Design ◽  
Straw Bale ◽  
Wall System

Achieving Passive House certification requires super insulation which can significantly raise the embodied energy and carbon footprint of a project, effectively front-end loading the climate impact, especially where petrochemical foam-based products are used. This research sought to evaluate the use of straw bales - a low embodied energy, carbon sequestering agricultural by-product - to achieve PHIUS+2015 certification. A straw bale wall system was adapted to a single-family detached reference house designed to meet the Passive House standard. The wall system was evaluated for applicability across three Western Canadian cities using WUFI Passive energy simulation software to evaluate compliance; thermal bridging and hygrothermal performance were also evaluated. It was found that the proposed straw bale wall assembly satisfied the PHIUS+ 2015 requirements in all three locations - Saskatoon, Calgary, and Kelowna - with only minor changes required to the reference house design. The annual heating demand and peak heating load, the two targets most sensitive to design changes, were, respectively, 4% and 8.6% below the target in Saskatoon, 63.1% and 21.3% below in Calgary, and 63.1% and 32.6% below in Kelowna. The research also revealed that maintaining a high degree of air tightness is essential for satisfying the requirements. Overall, this research demonstrates that straw bales can be a beneficial component in creating high performance enclosures without exacting a large embodied carbon footprint.

scholarly journals Evaluating the use of straw bales in achieving passive house certification (PHIUS+ 2015) in western Canada

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ashley Lubyk
Keyword(s):  
Carbon Footprint ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Climate Impact ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Embodied Energy ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Passive House ◽  
House Design ◽  
Straw Bale ◽  
Wall System

Achieving Passive House certification requires super insulation which can significantly raise the embodied energy and carbon footprint of a project, effectively front-end loading the climate impact, especially where petrochemical foam-based products are used. This research sought to evaluate the use of straw bales - a low embodied energy, carbon sequestering agricultural by-product - to achieve PHIUS+2015 certification. A straw bale wall system was adapted to a single-family detached reference house designed to meet the Passive House standard. The wall system was evaluated for applicability across three Western Canadian cities using WUFI Passive energy simulation software to evaluate compliance; thermal bridging and hygrothermal performance were also evaluated. It was found that the proposed straw bale wall assembly satisfied the PHIUS+ 2015 requirements in all three locations - Saskatoon, Calgary, and Kelowna - with only minor changes required to the reference house design. The annual heating demand and peak heating load, the two targets most sensitive to design changes, were, respectively, 4% and 8.6% below the target in Saskatoon, 63.1% and 21.3% below in Calgary, and 63.1% and 32.6% below in Kelowna. The research also revealed that maintaining a high degree of air tightness is essential for satisfying the requirements. Overall, this research demonstrates that straw bales can be a beneficial component in creating high performance enclosures without exacting a large embodied carbon footprint.

scholarly journals Residential buildings with heat pumps peak power reduction with high performance insulation

2020 ◽  
Vol 172 ◽  
pp. 12008
Author(s):  
Henri Sarevet ◽  
Jevgeni Fadejev ◽  
Martin Thalfeldt ◽  
Jarek Kurnitski
Keyword(s):  
Electric Power ◽  
Peak Power ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Residential Buildings ◽  
Energy Performance ◽  
Heat Pumps ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Ground Source Heat Pumps ◽  
Electricity Use

Revised EPBD directive has set ambitious targets for nearly zero energy buildings. In residential buildings, energy performance can be improved mainly by applying better insulation of building fabric and by efficient energy sources, i.e. heat pumps. Electricity use and peak powers will increase when heat pumps, both air to water and ground source heat pumps, are used for heat source in new residential buildings compared to heating solutions that do not use electricity. The purpose of this study was to determine how much the high performance thermal insulation can compensate the increase of electricity use and peak power caused by extensive application of heat pumps in Finland residential buildings. The present study used five residential buildings that describe residential newbuild market. Finnish regulation defines minimum insulation level and high performance insulation level which were applied to single family houses, terraced house and apartment buildings to simulate electric power values all year round. Hourly electrical power values were simulated with dynamic simulation software IDA ICE. Results show that electricity use and peak powers are rising significantly when heat pumps are used, but better insulation level significantly decreases or even fully compensates the amount of additional electric power. The results can be used for the assesment of implications of extensive use of heat pumps to power grid.

In Situ Evaluation of Vanguard Technologies for High Performance Residential Buildings

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
David J. Sailor ◽  
Santiago Rodriguez ◽  
Jeff Lauck
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Quality ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Residential Buildings ◽  
Indoor Environmental Quality ◽  
Water Heater ◽  
Passive House ◽  
Heat Pump Water Heater ◽  
High Performance Buildings ◽  
House Design

High performance buildings demand innovative and often untested strategies for improving thermal performance and reducing energy consumption while maintaining indoor environmental quality. The Passive House design standard is increasingly being implemented in residential and small commercial construction. This standard results in buildings with airtight envelopes, high levels of insulation, very high performance windows, and energy efficient appliances. The intent of this paper is to evaluate the performance of several cutting-edge high performance building technologies as implemented in a Passive House duplex constructed in Portland, Oregon, USA. We provide an overview of the performance of the entire structure from multiple viewpoints, but focus largely on the performance of the heat recovery ventilator and heat pump water heater. Interactions of these systems with occupant behavior and indoor environmental quality are also discussed.

scholarly journals Numerical Evaluation of a HVAC System Based on a High-Performance Heat Transfer Fluid

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (11) ◽  
pp. 3298
Author(s):  
Gianpiero Colangelo ◽  
Brenda Raho ◽  
Marco Milanese ◽  
Arturo de Risi
Keyword(s):  
Heat Transfer ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Cooling System ◽  
Electrical Energy ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Heat Transfer Fluid ◽  
Hvac System ◽  
Dynamic Simulations ◽  
Heating And Cooling ◽  
The University

Nanofluids have great potential to improve the heat transfer properties of liquids, as demonstrated by recent studies. This paper presents a novel idea of utilizing nanofluid. It analyzes the performance of a HVAC (Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning) system using a high-performance heat transfer fluid (water-glycol nanofluid with nanoparticles of Al2O3), in the university campus of Lecce, Italy. The work describes the dynamic model of the building and its heating and cooling system, realized through the simulation software TRNSYS 17. The use of heat transfer fluid inseminated by nanoparticles in a real HVAC system is an innovative application that is difficult to find in the scientific literature so far. This work focuses on comparing the efficiency of the system working with a traditional water-glycol mixture with the same system that uses Al2O3-nanofluid. The results obtained by means of the dynamic simulations have confirmed what theoretically assumed, indicating the working conditions of the HVAC system that lead to lower operating costs and higher COP and EER, guaranteeing the optimal conditions of thermo-hygrometric comfort inside the building. Finally, the results showed that the use of a nanofluid based on water-glycol mixture and alumina increases the efficiency about 10% and at the same time reduces the electrical energy consumption of the HVAC system.

Based on Numerical Simulation of High-Performance Parallel Machine Muffler Experimental Calibration

2013 ◽  
Vol 718-720 ◽  
pp. 1645-1650
Author(s):  
Gen Yin Cheng ◽  
Sheng Chen Yu ◽  
Zhi Yong Wei ◽  
Shao Jie Chen ◽  
You Cheng
Keyword(s):  
Numerical Simulation ◽  
Finite Element ◽  
Boundary Element ◽  
Message Passing ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Message Passing Interface ◽  
Parallel Machine ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Experimental Calibration ◽  
The Cost

Commonly used commercial simulation software SYSNOISE and ANSYS is run on a single machine (can not directly run on parallel machine) when use the finite element and boundary element to simulate muffler effect, and it will take more than ten days, sometimes even twenty days to work out an exact solution as the large amount of numerical simulation. Use a high performance parallel machine which was built by 32 commercial computers and transform the finite element and boundary element simulation software into a program that can running under the MPI (message passing interface) parallel environment in order to reduce the cost of numerical simulation. The relevant data worked out from the simulation experiment demonstrate that the result effect of the numerical simulation is well. And the computing speed of the high performance parallel machine is 25 ~ 30 times a microcomputer.

scholarly journals Investigation of the life cycle carbon impact of passive house building envelopes in Canada

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick W. Andres
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Building Envelope ◽  
Carbon Intensity ◽  
Low Carbon ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Passive House ◽  
Standard Life ◽  
System Configurations ◽  
House Building ◽  
House Standard

Whole building energy and life cycle impact modeling was conducted for a single-family detached reference building designed to meet the Passive House Standard. Life cycle operating global warming potential (GWP) and building envelope embodied GWP were assessed for two mechanical system configurations and three Canadian cities. Variations in regional electricity carbon intensity were found to significantly impact both operating and embodied GWP. Embodied GWP was found to be significant relative to operating GWP in locations with access to low carbon electricity. Additionally, use of natural gas mechanical systems in Edmonton resulted in 360% greater operating emissions than in Montreal, while electric heat pump mechanicals yielded 6,600% higher emissions. Finally, the Passive House Standard method for quantifying operating GWP was found to overestimate emissions by up to 3700% in Montreal and underestimate emissions by 34% in Edmonton, when compared to a method accounting for variations in regional electricity carbon intensity.

Investigation of thermal indoor climate for a passive house in a sub-Arctic region using computational fluid dynamics

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 677-692 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Risberg ◽  
Mikael Risberg ◽  
Lars Westerlund
Keyword(s):  
Fluid Dynamics ◽  
Computational Fluid Dynamics ◽  
Simulation Software ◽  
Heat Losses ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Correct Prediction ◽  
Indoor Climate ◽  
Passive House ◽  
Entire Volume ◽  
Floor Area

There is currently an increasing trend in Europe to build passive houses. In order to reduce the cost of installation, an air-heating system may be an interesting alternative. Heat supplied through ventilation ducts located at the ceiling was studied with computational fluid dynamics technique. The purpose was to illustrate the thermal indoor climate of the building. To validate the performed simulations, measurements were carried out in several rooms of the building. Furthermore, this study investigated if a designed passive house located above the Arctic Circle could fulfil heat requirements for a Swedish passive house standard. Our results show a heat loss factor of 18.8 W/m2 floor area and an annual specific energy use of 67.9 kWh/m2 floor area, would fulfils the criteria. Validation of simulations through measurements shows good agreement with simulations if the thermal inertia of the building was considered. Calculation of heat losses from a building with a backward weighted moving average outdoor temperature produced correct prediction of the heat losses. To describe the indoor thermal climate correctly, the entire volume needs to be considered, not only one point, which normally is obtained with building simulation software. The supply airflow must carefully be considered to fulfil a good indoor climate.

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