Heat loss estimation from in-situ measurements: what is the influence of seasonal factors?
To attain the international climate change mitigation agenda, governments have set ambitious targets to reduce CO2 emissions. As approximately one sixth of global primary energy consumption is used for space heating and hot water production, emission reductions in the building sector are essential to meet the obligations set.
Several energy performance simulation tools have been adopted to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of energy-saving measures during retrofitting, to issue energy rating certificates or to assess the Quality Assurance of the building process. However, a number of studies have shown important discrepancies between predicted and actual energy savings after energy-saving-oriented interventions, with significant implications for their success.
Heat losses (HL) through the building fabric have a key role for reliable performance simulations. Therefore, the use of in-situ measured HL instead of theoretical values would be fundamental to account for the building state of conservation. Available methods for HL evaluations from in-situ measurements are seasonally bounded and require quite long surveys, restricting the use of real data.
In an attempt to overcome current limitations, this presentation will introduce a novel method for HL evaluation from shorter in-situ surveys and explore the influence of solar radiation on estimations to possibly extend data collection to summertime.
This lecture was recorded on 15 April 2014
