This thesis describes the influence of thermal mass on the space conditioning energy consumption and indoor comfort conditions of multi-storey buildings with concrete, steel and timber structural systems. The buildings studied were medium sized educational and commercial buildings. When calculating a building’s life-cycle energy consumption, the construction materials have a direct effect on not only the building’s embodied energy but also on the space conditioning energy. The latter depends, amongst other things, on the thermal characteristics of the building’s materials; thermal mass can also be an influence on comfort conditions in the building. A modelling comparison has been undertaken between three very similar medium-sized buildings, each designed using structural systems made primarily of timber, concrete and steel. The post-tensioned timber version of the building is a modelled representation of a real three-storey educational building that has been constructed recently in Nelson, New Zealand. The concrete- and steel-structured versions have been designed on paper to conform to the required structural codes and meet, as closely as possible, the same performance, internal space layout and external façade features as the real timber-structured building. Each of these three structurally-different buildings has been modelled with two different thermal envelopes (code-compliant and New Zealand best-practice) using a heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) system with heating only (educational scheme) and heating and cooling (commercial scheme). The commercial system (with cooling) was applied only to the buildings with the best-practice thermal envelope. The analysis of each of these nine different construction and usage categories includes the modelling of operational energy use with an emphasis on HVAC energy consumption, and the assessment of indoor comfort conditions using predicted mean vote (PMV). From an operational energy use perspective, the modelling comparison between the different cases has shown that, within each category (code-compliant, low-energy and low-energy-commercial), the principal structural material has only a small effect on overall performance. The most significant differences are in the building with the best-practice thermal envelope with the commercial HVAC system, were the concrete building has slightly lower HVAC energy consumption, being 3 and 4% lower than in the steel and timber buildings respectively The assessment of indoor comfort conditions during occupied periods through using PMV for each of the three categories shows that the timber structure consistently exhibited longer periods in the over-warm comfort zone, but this was much less pronounced in south-facing spaces. To examine the reasons for the less acceptable PMV in the timber-structure versions, an analysis of indoor timber and concrete surface temperatures was carried out in both buildings. It was found that, particularly in north-facing spaces, there were large diurnal swings in the temperatures of timber surfaces exposed to solar radiation. These swings were much less in the case of concrete surfaces so the environment was perceived to be more comfortable under such conditions because of the reduced influence of higher mean radiant temperatures. To moderate this potential downside of solar-exposed internal timber surfaces, better results are achieved if, when timber is used for thermal mass, the timber is not exposed to direct solar radiation, for example locating it in the ceilings or on the south side of the building. Two other approaches to combating the potential overheating problem in the timber-structured buildings were analysed in an illustrative mode; addition of external louvres to reduce direct solar gains at critical times of day and year; and use of phase change material (PCM) linings to act as light-mass energy buffers. Although external louvres increase comfort conditions significantly by reducing the periods of an overly warm environment, they produce an increase in heating energy consumption through reducing beneficial solar gains. The use of PCM linings shows little benefit to overall indoor comfort conditions for the building of this case-study.

THE TITLE OF THE DIPLOMA THESIS AND ABSTRACT TITLE: The Legislation Governing Energy Efficiency in the European Union ABSTRACT: The European Union's energy policy has undergone a major transformation over the last few years. The interest in ensuring sustainability, self-sufficiency, competitiveness and secure energy supplies leads to deeper energy integration among Member States. High energy efficiency is an ideal tool for achieving these particular objectives because its basic principle is to provide more services while using the same or even less energy. As a result, a variety of conceptual instruments and relevant legislation have been revised over the last few years, which was accompanied by a conflict of interest between various stakeholders and the adoption of less than ideal compromise solutions. This diploma thesis aims to evaluate the current legislation on energy efficiency in the European Union, including its development. The thesis is divided into three parts, the first of which represents the initial theoretical basis that aims to define the basic concepts and indicators of energy efficiency. The second part deals with the strong link between environmental protection and energy efficiency while emphasizing the importance of fundamental environmental principles that are reflected in the...

This paper describes a methodology to assess the energy performance of residential buildings starting from the semantic 3D city model of Vienna. Space heating, domestic hot water and electricity demand are taken into account. The paper deals with aspects related to urban data modelling, with particular attention to the energy-related topics, and with issues related to interactive data exploration/visualisation and management from a plugin-free web-browser, e.g. based on Cesium, a WebGL virtual globe and map engine. While providing references to existing previous works, only some general and introductory information is given about the data collection, harmonisation and integration process necessary to create the CityGML-based 3D city model, which serves as the central information hub for the different applications developed and described more in detail in this paper. The work aims, among the rest, at developing urban decision making and operational optimisation software tools to minimise non-renewable energy use in cities. The results obtained so far, as well as some comments about their quality and limitations, are presented, together with the discussion regarding the next steps and some planned improvements.

This paper describes a methodology to assess the energy performance of residential buildings starting from the semantic 3D city model of Vienna. Space heating, domestic hot water and electricity demand are taken into account. The paper deals with aspects related to urban data modelling, with particular attention to the energy-related topics, and with issues related to interactive data exploration/visualisation and management from a plugin-free web-browser, e.g. based on Cesium, a WebGL virtual globe and map engine. While providing references to existing previous works, only some general and introductory information is given about the data collection, harmonisation and integration process necessary to create the CityGML-based 3D city model, which serves as the central information hub for the different applications developed and described more in detail in this paper. The work aims, among the rest, at developing urban decision making and operational optimisation software tools to minimise non-renewable energy use in cities. The results obtained so far, as well as some comments about their quality and limitations, are presented, together with the discussion regarding the next steps and some planned improvements.

The aim of this thesis is to assess the influence of superstructure implementation and thermal insulation of residential building for expenses associated with operating the property. Calculation used detached brick apartment building in Brno Slatina on the street Tilhonova 50a/50b, which has two separated entrances. The heat sources, principles of thermal insulation of residential buildings, energy prices and the possibility of her savings have been described theoretically. Various materials have been designed with different insulation thicknesses of thermal insulation material. To existing and newly designed apartment building has been processed label of the building envelope and certificate of energy performance of the building and then the values were compared. The thesis includes a calculation of the costs to perform construction modifications and determine payback period of the investment.

The Directive 2002/91/EC of the European Parliament and Council on energy performance of buildings entered into force on 4th January 2003, setting the minimum requirements of energy performance. All Member States had to incorporate the requirements of the new directive in national legislation by January 2006 and build up relevant systems and measures to transpose and implement these requirements. The stage of Directive’s implementation in the countries of Southern Europe is reported because of the similar climatic conditions and the geographical location for a future enforcement in Greece, as the building code in Greece is still under development. As energy use in buildings accounts for about 40% of the final energy demand in the European Union, the application of building standards can achieve a reduction in electric energy consumption and therefore an increase in energy performance of buildings. A record of the electric energy consumption of office buildings in the four Prefectures of Crete is implemented aiming at a future energy saving, which may be obtained by either through increased efficiency or by reducing electric energy consumption.

Devido à climatização dos ambientes internos condicionar o bem estar e o conforto térmico das pessoas é que se fazem necessárias novas pesquisas que procurem potencializar as tecnologias existentes e reduzir tanto os custos de instalação quanto o consumo de energia. É sabido que os sistemas convencionais de calefação proporcionam um alto consumo de energia e uma emissão de níveis de ruído muitas vezes inaceitáveis, entretanto os sistemas radiantes ganham, a cada dia, uma maior abrangência como alternativa de climatização devido às suas vantagens comparativas com relação aos sistemas convencionais. O emprego de sistemas de calefação por piso radiante em muitos países é limitada pelo preço da instalação como consequência do elevado custo dos materiais como é o caso da fabricação das tubulações. Estas geralmente são fabricadas de polietileno ou de cobre, sendo este ultimo o que entrega um maior desempenho térmico e, por conseguinte um melhor fornecimento de energia, mas o elevado custo deste material restringe o seu uso principalmente ao setor residencial, podendo atingir um mercado maior que compreenda edifícios públicos, de escritório, escolas, hospitais, etc. Com isso, este trabalho procura reduzir a quantidade de materiais de tubulação necessários para garantir o desempenho do sistema e o conforto térmico de uma habitação aquecida com um sistema radiante. Para isto, foi desenvolvida a resolução numérica do modelo matemático da transferência de calor no interior do piso pelo método dos volumes finitos na formulação implícita e implementada em código computacional na linguagem Matlab. Para isto, foram considerados dois parâmetros fundamentais para garantir o conforto térmico da habitação que correspondem à temperatura da água e a distancia entre os tubos que compõem o sistema. A análise corresponde ao cálculo da temperatura superficial do piso para distintas temperaturas da água e distintas distâncias, obtendo resultados interessantes que permitem reduzir o custo da instalação em até um 40%. / Due to temperature control of interiors conditioning the well-being and the thermal comfort of people, it is necessary to make new researches aiming to improve the existing technologies and to reduce both installation costs and energy consumption. It is known that the use of traditional heating systems involves high energy consumption and, in some cases, unacceptable noise levels; while radiant systems are gaining a wider scope as a heating alternative due to its advantages compared to conventional systems. The use of radiant floor heating systems in Brazil is limited by installation cost due to the high price of required materials. This fact restricts the use of these systems primarily to the residential sector. However, it may be possible for this technology to reach a larger market, including public buildings, offices, schools and hospitals. Therefore, to optimize the most relevant design parameters relating to the thermal performance of the system and reduce both the amount of required materials and the system operating time, this paper elaborates on a method consisting of a high-resolution numerical mathematical model of the heat transfer within a floor using a finite control volume method with an implicit solution scheme. In this work, we consider how the properties of the materials, environmental thermal comfort factors and the performance of the system work together with the theoretical underpinnings of the heat transfer phenomenon to define the design parameters to optimize the materials and provide greater control over the energy consumption. This optimization is achieved without changing any environmental thermal comfort conditions or the well-being of the occupants. Finally, a numerical solution for the heat transfer within the floor is implemented using the computer code Matlab.

Energy performance in buildings has become one of the most broadly debated subjects in contemporary architecture / and current legislation has emphasized its importance by requiring buildings to possess an energy performance certificate. Due to the technological advances in computational tools, it is possible to analyze the energy performance of buildings before construction starts / however most energy performance evaluation tools, requiring complex solid models and high technical knowledge in the field, can be used only during the post design phases. Since any design decision has an important effect on the energy performance of a building, evaluation tools should be used from the very beginning of the design process. In this dissertation, a building energy performance evaluation program, entitled the Energy performance Advisor (EnAd), was developed for evaluating the energy performance of buildings considering not only the legal framework of Turkey, but also the building design process. The program does not need advanced expertise, and was developed to be usable in any phase of the design process. The program, using the monthly calculation method of TS EN ISO 13790, was developed based on the European Union Directive on Energy Performance in Buildings (EPBD) and the current Turkish legislation on the subject. EnAd integrates the legal framework with the energy performance criterion into the building design process, while providing rapid feedback on energy performance and related legislation, and guiding the designer to improve design decisions. This dissertation has also shown the effects of building size, exposed surfaces, ventilation and infiltration, window-wall ratio, U-values, set-point temperatures and temperature differences between the outside and inside spaces on energy performance of buildings through generic case studies while searching the reasons for discrepancies between the results derived from the four evaluation tools, three of which is highly acknowledged energy performance evaluation tools. The validity, reliability, precision and usability of EnAd as a design-support tool has been proved through the usability and convergence tests conducted. Finally, the thesis has pointed out the importance of the use of energy performance evaluation tools from early stages of architectural design process to achieve higher performances as well as the roles of decision makers in this process.

Devido à climatização dos ambientes internos condicionar o bem estar e o conforto térmico das pessoas é que se fazem necessárias novas pesquisas que procurem potencializar as tecnologias existentes e reduzir tanto os custos de instalação quanto o consumo de energia. É sabido que os sistemas convencionais de calefação proporcionam um alto consumo de energia e uma emissão de níveis de ruído muitas vezes inaceitáveis, entretanto os sistemas radiantes ganham, a cada dia, uma maior abrangência como alternativa de climatização devido às suas vantagens comparativas com relação aos sistemas convencionais. O emprego de sistemas de calefação por piso radiante em muitos países é limitada pelo preço da instalação como consequência do elevado custo dos materiais como é o caso da fabricação das tubulações. Estas geralmente são fabricadas de polietileno ou de cobre, sendo este ultimo o que entrega um maior desempenho térmico e, por conseguinte um melhor fornecimento de energia, mas o elevado custo deste material restringe o seu uso principalmente ao setor residencial, podendo atingir um mercado maior que compreenda edifícios públicos, de escritório, escolas, hospitais, etc. Com isso, este trabalho procura reduzir a quantidade de materiais de tubulação necessários para garantir o desempenho do sistema e o conforto térmico de uma habitação aquecida com um sistema radiante. Para isto, foi desenvolvida a resolução numérica do modelo matemático da transferência de calor no interior do piso pelo método dos volumes finitos na formulação implícita e implementada em código computacional na linguagem Matlab. Para isto, foram considerados dois parâmetros fundamentais para garantir o conforto térmico da habitação que correspondem à temperatura da água e a distancia entre os tubos que compõem o sistema. A análise corresponde ao cálculo da temperatura superficial do piso para distintas temperaturas da água e distintas distâncias, obtendo resultados interessantes que permitem reduzir o custo da instalação em até um 40%. / Due to temperature control of interiors conditioning the well-being and the thermal comfort of people, it is necessary to make new researches aiming to improve the existing technologies and to reduce both installation costs and energy consumption. It is known that the use of traditional heating systems involves high energy consumption and, in some cases, unacceptable noise levels; while radiant systems are gaining a wider scope as a heating alternative due to its advantages compared to conventional systems. The use of radiant floor heating systems in Brazil is limited by installation cost due to the high price of required materials. This fact restricts the use of these systems primarily to the residential sector. However, it may be possible for this technology to reach a larger market, including public buildings, offices, schools and hospitals. Therefore, to optimize the most relevant design parameters relating to the thermal performance of the system and reduce both the amount of required materials and the system operating time, this paper elaborates on a method consisting of a high-resolution numerical mathematical model of the heat transfer within a floor using a finite control volume method with an implicit solution scheme. In this work, we consider how the properties of the materials, environmental thermal comfort factors and the performance of the system work together with the theoretical underpinnings of the heat transfer phenomenon to define the design parameters to optimize the materials and provide greater control over the energy consumption. This optimization is achieved without changing any environmental thermal comfort conditions or the well-being of the occupants. Finally, a numerical solution for the heat transfer within the floor is implemented using the computer code Matlab.

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2017-07-03T14:37:36Z No. of bitstreams: 1 flaviamariaaviladossantos.pdf: 1014342 bytes, checksum: 7e55947fa04e16cd6f5f2775d29b0a3c (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-08-08T13:02:16Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 flaviamariaaviladossantos.pdf: 1014342 bytes, checksum: 7e55947fa04e16cd6f5f2775d29b0a3c (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-08-08T13:02:16Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 flaviamariaaviladossantos.pdf: 1014342 bytes, checksum: 7e55947fa04e16cd6f5f2775d29b0a3c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-03-28 / Ao longo dos anos a falta de desempenho nas edificações do Brasil tem sido em problemática no setor da construção civil. Os problemas relacionados ao desempenho das edificações fomentaram a busca por melhores parâmetros construtivos, bem como melhores posturas capazes de configurar qualidade e desempenho para os produtos oriundos do setor. Frente a este cenário, em 2008 fora criada a ABNT NBR 15.575 – Desempenho – Edificações Habitacionais, cujo objetivo era promover uma visão sistêmica das edificações com foco nas necessidades dos usuários. No contexto da sustentabilidade, a Norma de Desempenho apresenta três exigências: durabilidade, manutenibilidade e impactos ambientais. O gerenciamento da manutenção consiste em um fator preponderante na configuração de desempenho nas etapas que abrangem uma edificação, sendo capaz de cumprir ou até prolongar sua vida útil, bem como de seus sistemas. Este trabalho objetiva verificar os impactos da aplicação da Norma de Desempenho nas empresas de edificações brasileiras, bem como verificar a maneira através da qual as empresas realizam as ações relativas à manutenção dos empreendimentos. Para tanto, a metodologia consistiu em uma revisão bibliográfica seguida da realização de estudos de caso junto a quatro empresas de edificações. Como resultados, tem-se o cenário local quanto ao atendimento á Norma de Desempenho bem como às exigências de manutenção desde a etapa de projeto. / Over the years the lack of performance in the brazilian buildings has been problematic in the construction sector. The problems related to the performance of the buildings fostered the search for better construction parameters, as well as better postures capable of configuring quality and performance for the products coming from the sector. Against this background, in 2008 ABNT NBR 15,.575 - Performance - Housing Buildings was created, whose objective was to promote a systemic view of buildings with a focus on users' needs. In the context of sustainability, the Performance Standard has three requirements: durability, maintainability and environmental impacts. Maintenance management consists of a preponderant factor in the configuration of performance in steps that encompass a building, being able to meet or even extend its useful life as well as its systems. This work aims to verify the impacts of the application of the Performance Standard on brazilian building companies, as well as to verify the way in which the companies carry out the actions related to the maintenance of the projects. For this, the methodology consisted of a bibliographic review followed by the accomplishment of case studies with four building companies. As a result, we have the local scenario regarding compliance with the Performance Standard as well as the maintenance requirements from the design stage.