Methodology Applied to the Evaluation of Natural Ventilation in Residential Building Retrofits: A Case Study

Alberto Meiss, Miguel A. Padilla-Marcos and Jesús Feijó-Muñoz
Additional contact information
Alberto Meiss: GIR Arquitectura & Energía, Universidad de Valladolid, ETS Arquitectura, Valladolid 47014, Spain
Miguel A. Padilla-Marcos: GIR Arquitectura & Energía, Universidad de Valladolid, ETS Arquitectura, Valladolid 47014, Spain
Jesús Feijó-Muñoz: GIR Arquitectura & Energía, Universidad de Valladolid, ETS Arquitectura, Valladolid 47014, Spain

Energies, 2017, vol. 10, issue 4, 1-19

Abstract: The primary objective of this paper is to present the use of a steady model that is able to qualify and quantify available natural ventilation flows applied to the energy retrofitting of urban residential districts. In terms of air quality, natural ventilation presents more efficient solutions compared to active systems. This method combines numeric simulations, through the utilization of Ansys Fluent R15.0 ® and Engineering Equation Solver EES ® , with on-site pressurization tests. Testing consists of the application of the seasonal pressure gradient on the building’s envelope and the calculation of the ventilation flows in three climatic representative conditions (summer, winter, and annual average). Through the implementation of this methodology to existing buildings it is possible to evaluate the influence of the built environment, as well as key parameters (relative height of the dwelling, number of vertical ventilation ducts, and airtightness of windows) of available natural ventilation.

Keywords: natural ventilation; building retrofit; indoor air quality; pressurization test (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/10/4/456/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/10/4/456/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:10:y:2017:i:4:p:456-:d:94738

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().